This year’s theme for Celebrate the Young Child events is MUSIC. At an early age, music can enrich their language, literacy, social development, cognition, attention span, mathematical, motor and self-regulation skills. Whether you sing lullabies to your little one, play them classical music or crank up your own favorite tunes, research shows that introducing children to music has long-term developmental benefits. A few of these benefits include: fostering creativity, self-expression, and self-esteem, helping the brain develop the areas that are used in language, teaching problem-solving skills, and promotes parent-child bonding through rocking, swaying, singing, and dancing. Our committee is excited to engage families on this topic throughout the year and hopefully, families will discover the joy music can bring to their lives!
Over 150 children and their families attended the event on September 19 st and were lucky enough to have the weather cooperate. Wildwood Park is located on Myrtle Street in the Woods Addition and a hidden gem in our community.
On behalf of the Celebrate the Young Child Collaborative we would like to thank the following:
– The band Windblown for entertaining us with their instruments
– Annie Fitzgerald for sharing her beautiful voice with us
– Victoria Proulx for performing her rendition of There’s a Wocket in My Pocket
– Pop Strings Orchestra from Crookston High School, led by Haley Ellis, for sharing their talents
– UMC Early Childhood Students for helping children make ribbon dancing wands to take home
– Crookston Head Start for providing the bubble stations
– Crookston Public School Early Childhood Family Education (ECFE) Teachers
– Polk County Public Health for providing their breastfeeding tent
– RiverView Health employees for serving the pizza
– Thrivent Financial for their Thrivent Action Team Grant so we could supply pizza for the event
– Park and Rec Department for making sure the park was ready for the event
– KROX and Crookston Daily Times for their coverage of the event
– The Crookston Early Childhood Summit, along with the Otto Bremer Foundation, for purchasing the maracas each child received and continue to make music at home
Gina Gunderson and the CYC Collaborative
Crookston Early Childhood Initiative (ECI), Crookston Head Start, Crookston Public Library, Crookston Public Schools, Early Childhood Family Education (ECFE), Polk County Public Health(PCPH), RiverView Health, University of Minnesota-Crookston
“It Takes a Village to Raise a Child.” – African Proverb
