ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with an overview of developmental milestones in singing and movement to music in infants and young children. In this area, Helmut Moog conducted one of the earliest investigations of the emergence of musical behaviors, involving over 8000 tests and observations of almost 500 infants and young children. The chapter focuses on young children's exploratory play with musical instruments, and the development of children's improvisations and compositions. The ability to sing songs from a standard repertoire improves gradually in the early years. Sandra Trehub& H. R. Gudmundsdottir found that mothers play an important role in supporting their children's singing by intuitively providing frameworks to support an increasing level of participation and engagement in songs. Singing in tune is a difficult task. It requires the complex coordination of internal feedback mechanisms and auditory feedback, such as the ability to adjust the posture of the vocal cords to the sound of one's voice.
