Personal Reflection

Welcome to the Sprouting Melodies Training. I enjoyed meeting and learning about each of you in the Week 1 Forum Introductions. It’s great to have such varied training and experience.
I will be popping in to the forum every once in a while, but from week eot week you are in the very expert care of Erika who can navigate any challenges or questions. Thanks, Erika.
As Hally mentioned in her posting, I worked for many years in a wonderful facility for children 0-5 and their families. Now that I’m technically retired, my days (and frankly nights) are spent teaching at both Molloy and Shenandoah Universities. I’ve also finally had the time to do more writing and research.
In the ‘between’ times, I have a lot of fun spending time with our three adult children, and our two grandchildren – Max and Shani. It’s so great to hear them singing some of my songs!
Please feel free to reach out at any time – Elizabeth@RaisingHarmony.com

I feel that the most important thing that I can personally bring to early childhood music program is years of experience. I mentioned in my last post that I interned at a couple of pre-schools for children with disabilities. I fell deeply in love with the work during that year and was fortunate enough to be hired to come back two years later as an employee instead of an intern. I worked there for two years and when I decided to leave, it was extremely bittersweet. I still had an immense amount of love for early childhood work, but my schedule with grad school just didn’t leave me enough time to truly focus on the work while working as an MT-BC at my other facility. I was noticing that I couldn’t give my all to either job, let alone absorb and understand any schoolwork. I miss working with the little ones every day, but taking this course again is helping to prepare for the jump back into early childhood work at my current facility. I trained under Beth and while her approach and music resonated with me (and still does), I realize that I always put my own spin on it. I truly believe that what makes us all unique as MT-BC’s is our individual personalities and voices. I am not Beth (despite how much I may try to be sometimes). I am Hally and that’s more than okay. Over the years, I developed strong therapeutic relationships with many kiddos and their families in early childhood music groups and while my training/experience is to thank much of that, I know that my individual personality/voice plays an important role as well. I was given the tools and now I can use those tools and years of experience to make the work my own. This course is helping to sculpt and shape me into a better music therapist.

I think my personal therapeutic style focuses highly on relationships and building those relationships- between me and the kiddos in a group, as well as between those kiddos and their parents, and between the parents and myself as well.
In order to build those relationships, I’ve never been shy to be silly with my kiddo to get interaction. I currently have a client (3 years old) who loves to play the drum, but instead of playing the top of the drum, will play the side, which doesn’t make any (loud) noise! Whenever he does that, I go “huh?” in a very exaggerated tone, and he thinks it’s hilarious, and those types of interactions have increased his social interactions greatly in music therapy.

I really enjoyed reading what each of you bring to early childhood MT. This is a wonderful question to save and remind yourself of all the unique qualities you bring to your work.

I agree with Celia, it’s so much about relationships. With the little ones I work so hard to create a space of trust and safety. I also really try to show them that this is their time! I let them lead the way, be creative, and push the boundaries and learn what they can and cannot do in music therapy. I think some of what I bring is patience, flexibility, and consistency!

I feel that I can relate to a lot of you in this area! I tend to have a more relationship and client-centered approach to therapy. Really getting to know clients and allowing time for rapport to grow is so important, especially with the younger kids who are still navigating interacting with new people! It has taken a while to grow in this area, but allowing myself to look and act silly while working with early childhood helps a lot, they really enjoy the more silly you are! I think it is also important to let your personality shine through. While still being professional and a therapist, it is important to still be yourself in sessions.

Personally, I hope to use the observation skills that I have naturally and that I have further developed in my time with Pre-Kindergarten classes in the past. This experience with those Pre-K classes so far has enabled me to be more aware of developments and responses to music, and I’m already seeing some that match up with what’s been covered in the video lectures. And as some of you have mentioned, it’s helpful to be silly sometimes with the kids as this makes us more relatable, and I’m working on bringing out more of my goofy side in sessions!

I hope to bring my experience as an empathetic hospice worker into the environment of early childhood music, especially for parents and caregivers who may be experiencing a lot of stress caring for young children. We don’t necessarily know what kind of day a parent is having when they come to music. The important thing is to make sure parents feel encouraged and are able to take something away from music class the same way that their kids will!