Sing Me a Song: Characteristics of the Singing Voice in Early Childhood

The Diller-Quaile Institute is conducting a study regarding young children’s singing behavior and development. We invite families with young children up to age five to participate in this study.

We hope that this inquiry will expand the current knowledge of how young children develop as singers, which may provide insight into how we design musical experiences and instruction for young children.

If you would like to participate, we ask you to complete the short form on this page, and to create and submit a short video of your child singing. We ask you to submit only your child’s birth date with the video, which we will use to categorize the videos by exact age; no other identifying information about your child will be connected to the videos.

Please note: Only parents or legal guardians of the children may choose for their child to participate. You child does not need to be currently enrolled at Diller-Quaile in order to participate; all families who wish to participate are welcome.

Instructions:

Take a video of your child singing on their own. This can be any song that they like, without any introduction, accompaniment, or assistance. We would like to see and hear the musical choices that they make naturally and independently; it is perfectly OK if they do not know or sing a whole song, or if they make errors, or change the song in some way.
Complete the form on this page (below), where we ask for your name and email, and for the birth date (month and year) of your child. This form also asks for you to indicate if you do or do not give consent for the video to be used in future presentations of the study, or in Diller-Quaile’s Teacher Training programs. Please note: you may withdraw your consent for your child to participate in the study, or to have their video shared, at any time; there is no penalty for withdrawing. If you do choose to withdraw, any video content or data regarding your child will be deleted.
Send the video to Caroline Moore at cmoore@diller-quaile.org via wetransfer.com, by clicking here. Please enter your child’s birth date (month and year) in the “title” field. We ask that you submit no additional information about your child, we do not need their name or class number. Caroline Moore will download and store the videos on a password protected computer for the duration of the study; at the conclusion of the study, all videos will be deleted. Wetransfer.com will notify you when your video has been downloaded; wetransfer will automatically delete the videos after 7 days, or you may delete it at any time. There is no charge to use the wetransfer service.

For a full description of the study, purposes, and procedures, please click here. This study has been reviewed and approved by Diller-Quaile’s Institutional Review Board: Study #23240408.

Participation Form

Parent/Guardian Name

First Name

Last Name

Parent/Guardian Email

Child's Birth Date (Month and Year)

Consent to Share

I DO give consent for my child's video to be shared in presentations of the study, or in Diller-Quaile's Teacher Training programs. In understand that my consent may be withdrawn at any time.

I DO NOT give consent for my child's video to be shared in presentations of the study, or in Diller-Quaile's Teacher Training programs.

Questions?

Thank you for your participation in this important and exciting project. Any questions or concerns may be directed to Caroline Moore, Director of The Diller-Quaile Institute.