MINDY PETERSON, NCTM

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Would you like to support your child’s interest in music? Or would you like culturally enriching experiences of your own? This episode gives you the perfect excuse to design your own adventure that nourishes the mind, body, and soul! Craft a tailor-made camp experience for yourself, the child in your life, or a group of friends. Learn how to spark creativity and deepen connections through a personalized summer camp journey that will infuse music and arts into your summer (or fall break, or holiday break, or fill-in-the-blank). Here’s to creating memorable moments!

I’m Mindy Peterson, host of Enhance Life with Music podcast, where we explore the ways music makes our lives better. And this is Microhance, a micro-dose of musical enhancement.

I love asking questions and learning from the response. Occasionally the tables are turned, and I am the one being interviewed. This week, I was the guest on someone else’s podcast. One of the questions I was asked was: How can parents help support their child musicians engage and become more interested in the arts (particularly music, since that’s my arts specialty)?

This question reminded me of one of my favorite programs for engaging students when I was teaching piano lessons. I was, and still am, a member of MTNA (Music Teachers National Association). MTNA has a program called Music Achievement Award Program. This program’s purpose is to help encourage ALL students, especially the “everyday” students, to explore activities that not only help them become better musicians, but also expand their love and appreciation and understanding of music.

These activities could be reading a book about a musician’s life or some other musical topic; attending a live performance; watching a movie (like a documentary, musical, or a drama like Mr. Holland’s Opus); visiting a music-related museum or exhibit (shoutout to Schubert Club, here in the Twin Cities, that has a fantastic evolution of the piano exhibit); listening to a music-related podcast episode; or any other number of options. I had a page on my website giving students ideas for each category, and encouraged them to use the list to get the ideas flowing, and to come up with their own ideas.

For this program, the teacher and student would work together to set realistic, attainable goals.  Students achieving their goals by the end of the semester or summer (whatever the term was) received a certificate of achievement, provided by MTNA.

If your child is taking music lessons, definitely make sure their teacher is aware of this program. But… my point in bringing this up is that these activities are accessible to all of us, whether we’re in music lessons or not, and whatever age we may be. What I love is that the program recognizes the music education value of a variety of activities that are fun; are of personal, individual interest; and not necessarily thought of in the context of traditional music lessons.

I have also found that parents really enjoy this program – it’s a chance for them to enter in to the educational experience with their child, from brainstorming fun musically enriching activities, to having the perfect excuse to make that activity happen. And have the joy of learning themselves. As parents, we spend a lot of time planning for and driving kids to lessons and meets and camps. And sometimes parents think, I‘d like to take music lessons. I‘d like to go summer camp!

Today’s Microhance tip is to plan your own summer camp. You can do this for just yourself. You can do this for your child (or any child in your life), your family, group of friends, you and a partner. Brainstorm fun musically enriching activities in your area – and available anywhere, like books, movies, podcasts, and virtual events. I’ll put a link in the show notes to the page I made several years ago for my students, just to give you some ideas to get the creative wheels turning. Come up with a list of what you want to do, and a plan or time period to accomplish these goals. Maybe one per week for the summer as a family activity. Or one per day during one week in the summer when your kids have nothing else planned. Or a once-a-month outing with friends.

The science is clear on the mental, emotional, and physiological benefits of arts experiences, new experiences, learning new things, and connecting with people. Make this your perfect excuse to design your own summer camp, experience what’s available in your community, and enrich your life.

If you design your own summer camp, I’d love to hear about it!

You can always connect with me on email (mindy@mpetersonmusic.com), Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or LinkedIn.

I’m Mindy Peterson, and I hope this inspires you to enhance your life with music.

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