Music for Getting Dressed
Children can be a funny thing. As an adult you can forget that getting dressed is a learned skill and potentially one of my favorite ones to watch children learn because it leads to some reallyyyy fun outfits the first few years. I know personally I went through a fringe cowboy boot phase where everything I wore was finished with these white fringe cowboy boots.
To say I was a bit extra as a child is putting it mildly
The website mother.ly has some great suggestions on how to help your child dress themselves. These include:
Getting dressed together - kids love to copy their family and providing them someone to mimic in taking clothes off and on is a great thing for them to see.
Start with removing clothes so they get the hang of taking off a shirt before attempting to put it on; give everything a name (armhole, head hole…).
Practice putting clothes on in a very large size - do you remember the fear of thinking you were lost in a shirt as you tried to squeeze your head through the top as a child? Just me?
Practice when you’re not in a hurry. It’s ok to sometimes take the lead and just dress them if you need to be out the door in a short period of time.
Have them sit down initially when first learning so they aren’t trying to learn a new skill and maintain their balance.
Don’t forget to teach orientation of clothing! Front, back, side…
Use a mirror so they can learn to check their clothes and fit after getting dressed.
Finally, supplement the learning process with visual aids. This is where I can help!
I wrote a song for some of my clients a couple years ago about getting dressed. The song addresses cold weather and warm weather options and focuses mostly on the SEQUENCING involved in getting dressed. A song is a great learning tool as your child works on developing more independence in getting dressed. The song can be played in their room as they get dressed independently or they can sing it to themselves (or you both sing it together) for musical reminders of what to put on first. Music also has the ability to turn something difficult into a fun task.
For visual supports I made a variety of little people that your child can dress in warm or cold weather. It starts with the underwear then shirt, pants or shorts, maybe a jacket, socks and shoes. So not only does this help them learn the dressing sequence but also when it is necessary to wear a jacket outside. I currently don’t provide all weather options (rain or snow) but general cold and hot weather options are on there!
Example of our visual aids.
Variety of people to dress, shoes, shirt, shorts, underwear, and cold weather clothes including jacket and pants. A final addition is a page that lists first, second, third…that can allow your kiddo to identify what they put on first and go from there.
The song is available for free on youtube and the visual aids cost $2 to print or $10+ for them to be laminated and mailed to you. I highly suggest taking time to laminate them and adding velcro so your child can dress and undress them as often as they want.
