I often hear new student families say, “We want our child to learn to read music.” It’s a common request, but sometimes parents grow frustrated when their child hasn’t started reading music in the first few years of lessons. So, what’s the hurry?
We know that learning music is much like learning a language. It takes children years of listening and using spoken language before they begin reading. In fact, it often takes four to eight years of immersion in spoken language before a child is ready to read naturally and fluently. This process unfolds best when it isn’t rushed, and the same holds true for reading music.
Why Is Music Reading a Goal?
When we point out objects like a flower to a toddler and say “flower,” we’re helping them build a vocabulary. That spoken vocabulary will eventually lead to reading, but first, the child needs to speak and understand language. Music students are older than babies, but their music learning process doesn’t necessarily align with their age. Their brains need time to develop a similar vocabulary in music—through listening, moving, and engaging with it.
Parents often expect their children to learn music by reading music. That’s why so many traditional methods begin with reading notes on the staff, usually starting with Middle C in the first lesson. Yet, this approach can lead to frustration. Many students struggle to both learn music and read music simultaneously, often resulting in them giving up on lessons entirely. Can you imagine teaching a child to read the word “flower” before they’ve ever spoken it? And yet, this is what many music teachers attempt by prioritizing reading before developing a solid foundation of musical understanding.
Mistaking Decoding for Reading
A common misconception in traditional lessons is that slowly working through a score, naming each note, is “reading.” But in reality, this is the equivalent of reading a book one letter at a time. True music reading involves understanding the patterns, relationships, and structures within the music—not just identifying individual notes.
In fact, without a strong sense of tonality, rhythm, and meter, children struggle to make meaning out of the notes on the page. Reading becomes slow and disconnected. This is where an audiation-focused curriculum, like Music Moves for Piano, changes everything.
What Is Audiation?
Audiation is the ability to think music in your mind with understanding, much like you can hear words in your head as you read. In our Music Moves program, children first learn music by hearing and doing. They listen, move, sing, and create music—developing their audiation. This happens long before they’re asked to read music.
By developing this internal understanding of music, students can eventually sight-read and play music with true comprehension. Around ages 10-11, when they’re ready to grasp abstract concepts, formal music reading is introduced. But by that time, their audiation skills make reading easier and more meaningful because they understand music on a deeper level.
Missing the Joy of Music
If we introduce music reading too early, children risk missing out on the joy and wonder that music brings. Imagine if, instead of giving your child experiences, you kept them in a room and only told them about the world. How could they understand something they haven’t experienced? Music is about emotion—joy, sadness, excitement—and if children are bogged down by reading too soon, they miss the experience of truly feeling music.
Music Moves for Piano, based on Dr. Edwin Gordon’s Music Learning Theory, gives children the freedom to explore music in its most natural form. By focusing on audiation, students learn to:
Express themselves through improvisation and composition.
Understand rhythm and tonality instinctively.
Retain and learn pieces of music more quickly.
Develop a natural sense of steady beat.
Sing in tune and harmonize easily.
Recognize musical notation as patterns, even before formal instruction.
Setting the Stage for Music Reading Success
Throughout the early years of our program, children are exposed to music notation as part of their learning environment. They may see musical scores and begin to recognize familiar patterns, laying the groundwork for reading music. But formal instruction waits until they are ready—when their audiation skills are strong, making it possible for them to read music with true understanding.
The Long-Term Benefits of Audiation
So, if your child is not yet reading music in their first few years of lessons, rest assured—learning is happening. You may not see it right away, but you’ll hear it in their playing, their improvisations, and their growing musical expression.
Music reading, when taught with a foundation in audiation, becomes a natural next step. Your child will not only learn to read music—they will learn to create, understand, and express music in ways that go beyond the page. Isn’t that a goal worth waiting for?
As Marilyn Lowe, author of Music Moves for Piano, says: “Music notation, in itself, cannot teach music reading. In fact, when music reading is based on the application of a familiar music vocabulary, it becomes possible to understand the unfamiliar.”
At Mountain Melody Music Studio, we believe that building this familiar music vocabulary from day one creates musicians who not only read music—but who live it, breathe it, and express it with joy.
Comments