How have you used these four music experiences in your practice?

[Meredith Pizzi]

How have you used these four music experiences in your practice? Have you made any changes in these areas since beginning this course? Post your remarks to the board.

[Amanda Braden]

Singing: I have used singing to increase communication and vocalization by leaving off the ends of phrases of songs to encourage my clients to fill in the final word. While using this intervention in recent weeks after beginning this course, I have utilized more movement while singing as I’ve been reminded that music and movement go hand-in-hand. While working with a client in the control phase and utilizing singing and movement, I have noticed an increase in her vocalizations while moving and singing rather than just when singing. I believe the movement helps her sustain her attention, and also, she just likes to dance and move.

Playing Instruments: I sometimes play “Play/Stop” games with my clients in sessions. Since beginning this course, I have been more conscientious of ensuring that I facilitate longer pauses in the music before playing again.

Moving: I often use movement to recorded music with my teens with autism to provide them with opportunities to engage in sensory activities. I haven’t really changed this particular intervention in any way. However, as I mentioned above, I have been utilizing movement along with singing in recent weeks to help increase level of engagement during singing interventions.

Listening: Since most of my clients are beyond early childhood age, I often use music listening activities in which I ask my clients with autism to listen to the musical elements that they hear in recorded songs and express what they are hearing to me in order to increase their conversation and communication skills. I haven’t really altered this particular intervention. However, while working with a client in the independence phase yesterday, he was choosing to listen to me play instruments and sing rather than to participate in the music-making with me as he often does. He just sat, smiled, and nodded his head to the beat while I played and sang. Typically, I would be discouraged by his lack of participation, but after going through the material in this course, I remembered that was perfectly fine and completely appropriate for his developmental level.

[Katie Whipple]

I really enjoyed this element of the training. In every session I provide for children I try to incorporate all of these elements. I consciously place them at specific places within the session in order to gain and maintain attention and engagement. This is something that I try to have my music therapy students think about as well. When planning music therapy experiences, providing a variety of musical modalities really helps with engagement. That being said I incorporate these different methods throughout the session as well. Most of my hello songs encourage singing or at least vocalization as most of my hello songs invite the client to sing or respond in some way about how they are feeling, what the day is, etc., depending upon the need and ability. Every population I work with I encourage instrument playing because I feel that all clients have the ability to contribute musically to the group and can share in that “responsibility”. Depending upon who I am working with instrument exploration may be more applicable or if working with adults or older children it may be more structured. I think the key here is the type of instruments being played that is vital! I utilize movement in most all my sessions whether it is large, improvised movement experiences or very structured, fine motor movement experiences. With children I work with I aim for improvised movement as long as it is in response to the music. As for listening I have utilized this with adults through progressive muscle relaxation. For children, I utilize drum “rumbles” and “stops” to gain attention.

[Michelle Russell]

I use the playing of instruments in each session that I lead. I have noticed that the children who are in the control phase seem to wait with anticipation for “instrument time”. After several sessions with me they “know whats in the blue bag”. I have found that breaking up my session between singing/spoken chant and exploration of instruments allows me to set a pace for the session. By alternating between the two I can either slowdown or pick up the pace/energy of the session. When I work with my youngest of clients (3 months) I love to tune into their listening skills. When I work in a childcare setting the staff in the infant room is amazed that the children track me as i walk around the room with my guitar.

Movement can be a lightning rod with some of my groups. While I encourage movement, in some of my preschool aged settings the staff does not always. There is a fine line between “now its time to sit still and listen” and “please control your body”. In one session I have a larger size preschool group. This is a childcare setting with 17 3-4 year olds. This group is my biggest challenge with movement. The staff would much prefer that “no one get out of control”. I am always trying new ways to incorporate movement without producing chaos.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

Since I’m not currently working with children in any capacity, this question is a bit more challenging to answer. I do feel like I’m better able to critique my previous work, though, with the knowledge that I’ve gained in this week’s module. For example, providing time for a response, providing time for listening skills rather than just being go-go-go with active music making the entire time (granted, my previous work was with preschoolers, so they are certainly more go-go-go than newborns). But I sympathize with your above comments, Michelle, about staff not wanting things to get out of control. It can be a bit of a battle. I try to focus my movement centered activities toward the middle of the session so that I have time towards the end of the session to focus on some less active activities and bring any sort of chaos level down a bit.

[Jaycie Voorhees]

Hearing more about these areas of focus during a session was quite validating to me, as I have come to structure and plan my sessions to have elements that fall under singing, instrument play, movement, listening (not as often, but usually incorporated into the instrument play), relaxation, and/or stories.<br />

Singing: My hello and goodbye songs are usually done with voice only, although I occasionally have the children play instruments during goodbye. I also like to find songs that incorporate call and response elements (such as “Victor Vito” with kids in the responsibility phase and older), or improvising songs for call and response or simply joining in to familiar tunes.</p>

Instrument Play: I always incorporate some kind of instrument play, whether it be non-directive with the students playing and exploring while I sing familiar tunes, or singing about particular instruments, exploring various sounds one at a time (i.e. “listen to the sound of the maraca, shake-shake-shake), or providing specific directives of how to play their instrument. I also like to incorporate turn taking with instruments, which moves into the listening area a bit too.</p>

Movement: I always incorporate movement with young children as well, and because I work primarily with children in the responsibility phase I use a lot of creative songs that also ignite the imagination and other cognitive skills (i.e. “the Goldfish Song”, “Monster Boogie”, and “We Are the Dinosaurs”–you can tell Laurie Berkner is a favorite of mine!). With younger kids I do more structured and center-based songs that help the child focus on their own body.</p>

Listening: I love turn taking games where everyone plays instruments together then we listen to one person, then all play together, then listen to another, etc. I also like to occasionally bring in new types of music and see the child’s reaction to different styles as we listen and engage. With these older kids I also recently did a “Day of sharing” in which each student had a chance to play or sing anything they wanted for their peers. It was a great opportunity for listening and learning to appreciate what others have to offer, and they did great! (although we did take several sensory breaks through movement games to keep their focus).

[Kristina Rio]

I loved reading about the specific ways all of you are incorporating these music experiences in your practice!

[Megan Dewing]

This part of the training I enjoyed a lot. I use singing a lot in my sessions to. Although I incorporate singing, instrument play, and movement into my sessions, I realized that I do not give enough time to just simply listen. When going over the listening sequence, I became aware of how often I cut a song or chant short and don’t allow enough time to just listen to the music. This is something that I look forward to incorporating more into my sessions with my clients.

Movement is something that I have always tried to incorporate into each of my sessions, but I have had some of the same experience in the past with teachers or aids in the preschool classroom not wanting it to become too “crazy”. I found the more structured the song was with what they were doing (following a leader, or freeze dancing) to be helpful in large group situations.

[Anonymous]

I have also enjoyed reading how everyone has used these music experiences.

[Christine Czuhajewski]

I’ve used the different types of music experiences in practice, but have probably used singing less frequently than others based on the individuals who I work with. I try to incorporate some of each into my sessions, particularly when I am working with groups. Most of my students are school aged and developmentally still within the early childhood music developmental levels. I use singing most frequently during greeting songs, but also to encourage awareness while working with students who are non-verbal and just starting to develop consonant sounds. I often pair singing with a specific movement song and focused on pairing repetitive sounds with movements such as “puh” for pat or “boo” for boom while stomping feet. In some of my sessions I use movement as a way to engage and energize the group- especially if it is early in the morning on a school day. This helps me see who is able to attend enough to imitate movements, who has body part awareness, and maybe who is even able to make choices of what movement we can do next. I use instrument play in sessions as well, sometimes paired with movements, and sometimes just to move to the beat of the music. When working with individuals, I frequently use instrument play to follow their beat and make music at the energy level or behavioral level they are showing me. With the population at my school, we frequently use instrument play to help de-escalate heightened bodies and pair the movement with specific sensory output from instruments, depending on what their specific sensory reactions to instruments are. Listening kind of goes hand in hand with some of the other experiences, such as singing and instrument play. Listening can be as complex as listening to what others are doing and trying to have a shared interactive experience, or as simple as listening to calming music to de-escalate when heightened. I always end each session with a period of relaxation to help students regulate and prepare for the transition into the next class. As an adult, I sometimes forget how hard seemingly simple tasks like waiting or sharing with another person can be, so I like to let each student have their own time to listen to soothing music, perhaps move along with stretches or blowing a scarf, play a preferred soothing instrument or sing the melody of the song with the music. I’ve seen students respond to the relaxation in one or more of these ways, and sometimes all at once.

[Kayla Lyles]

Singing is pretty hard not to do and I use it to primarily increase communication and vocalization in clients. I love instrument play and since starting the course I do allow the clients to take the lead more to create that conversational aspect. As a former dancer, I love to incorporate movement into sessions as much as possible. Even with my pre-teens, I love doing sequencing type activities using the boomwhackers and rhythm sticks just to get them up and active, especially if they are struggling with gross motor skills. With music listening (I typically always use live music) experiences I really use this for attention, especially if I give instructions which really requires clients to listen.
I’ve really enjoyed reading how you all incorporate these into your practice daily!

[Darcy Lipscomb]

This week both reinforced many of the techniques that I already use (Playing & Moving) and reminded me of some that I could use more or in a different way (Singing & Listening). Reflecting back on some of early childhood sessions/groups, I realized that while I may be singing throughout all the experiences (Sing, Play, Move, Listen), I don’t often provide a space for the children to “just” sing and explore within a Singing experience. I see this as going hand-in-hand with allowing or actually creating space for the children to “just” listen and explore within that experience. I wonder if this is carryover from our go-go-go society? Last week I used Iza Trapani’s “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” book during an early childhood group at a library and explored both singing and listening, and the response was great!

[Amanda Maestro-Scherer]

With the little kiddos I work with, I always try and incorporate elements of each of these into each session. To encourage singing or vocalizing, I love using the Nordoff-Robbins song “Let’s Sing A Song”– the repetitive “La”s and musical cues are so fantastic to encourage vocalizing! With instrument play, when I introduce the instruments, I tend to start off with some type of explorative instrument playing, letting them check out all the instruments, put them down, try the next one, etc. with no direction from me. (It was nice hearing that it’s still developmental this way, that felt very validating!) I also will do a lot of musical surprises and starting and stopping depending on where the child is developmentally. Moving is almost always a part of each session, whether a body awareness, or something else. (I love a lot of the Laurie Berkner songs for this, Song in My Tummy and the Goldfish song are great ones!) For listening, I will often incorporate a musical story song, or maybe even end with a lullaby or something more sedative, depending on what the kiddo and the parents are needing in the moment.

[Mary Withington]

I use all these elements in my groups, no matter what the age-babies to very older adults. I always noticed Head Shoulders was hard for the 2 and 3 year olds, and now I know why! I think the discussion of the awareness stage of musical responses will be so helpful. I’ve had many moms say their 4 month old or younger baby was too young to get anything out of a music group. But this is just not so. I was thinking about a mostly non verbal teen with autism who is in my MT group. I never thought of this until now, but based on his behavior and musical responses, I think he is in the trust stage of musical development. I plan to use these ideas to help him be successful in this stage as I try to help him move towards independence. I can’t expect that he can imitate a beat pattern or isolate body parts on command. I plan to try to match his vocalizing instead of trying to get him to match mine. I plan to talk this over with the COTA who works 1:1 with him with in the group. Maybe it’s unrealistic to expect he can use an IPAD communication device yet and push yes or no buttons. He just likes to see his Thomas the Train light up and make sounds, and briefly uses pulse and meter on a drum or when strumming a guitar. I can help him pat his knees instead of trying to get him to clap his hands. He’s not there yet. He greatly brightens with familiar melodies and his facial expressions change and body movements increase when he hears a song he likes. This has given me a new take on what to do to help him succeed.

[Milijana Majstorovic Kozul]

As all of these activities (moving, singing, listening and playing) are important I would like also to incorporate parents as “assistance” or better to say member of the group.
These activities should have taken some kind of order …. Working with the babies I will begin with little dancing in circle after that, singing as the most powerful should be second one activity. Babies have very short concentration, focus and attention so I will try with opening song, and then maybe learn (parents) some simple nursery rhymes (4 lines), after that I would bring instruments (depends on age/months), then maybe I will use scarf’s to show /see the sound (song). After that we can make our group song where everybody will be included on their own way.
As I don t have experience working with kids up to 1, I have to think about (or to experience) the dynamic of that kind of group.

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