There aren’t many things that I hate more than telling my kids to “hurry up.”  Or even to slow down (not that that happens often.)  It just sounds so rude, and complainy.  Yuck.  I surely wouldn’t want my kids to sound like that.  However, there are times when they really need to move faster.

Being ever the clever one, I decided long ago that instead of saying hurry I would offer what I call “Musical Criticism.”  It’s much less dorky than it sounds, I promise.

In music there are several terms that refer to the speed at which the music is played.  For example, Allegro means quickly and Adagio, slowly.  On those rare occasions when I need my daughter to truly book it, we use Presto.  This means, just as you might infer, very fast.  Ladybug caught on to this so quickly, and it was fun for her.  It was more like a game than mommy yelling to go faster.  Can you imagine?  She moved quickly and was happy about it.

It gets even better.  There are also musical terms that refer to volume levels.  We have times at our house when we get to be Fortissimo (loud) and others when it’s best to be Pianissimo (very quiet).  When the kids are too loud I say, “Time for a Diminuendo!”  This translates into, “Time to get quieter.”   Maybe I’m just the ultimate nerd, but to me that sounds so much more polite and just all around prettier than yelling at the kids to be quiet!

The bonus?  You are teaching your kids bits of musical knowledge that might foster their interest in the arts.  I suppose if they don’t grow up to be Mozart’s and Beethoven’s they might at least win a trivia challenge or two?

-Stephanie Wright