Home › Forums › Sprouting Melodies – June 2021 › Week 1 › Introductions
- This topic has 35 replies, 6 voices, and was last updated 2 years, 9 months ago by
Samantha Springer.
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Anonymous
InactiveShare your professional experience with the group and what your hopes and expectations are for this course.
Be sure to come back and respond to others as well.
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Moderator
Hello everyone. My name is Erika Svolos. I am the online moderator for this training. I live in New Jersey with my husband, my almost 7.5 yo daughter, and our cat Moose. It is a joy to be a part of this fantastic program and to join in your Sprouting Melodies journey. I am a graduate of Marywood University, currently, a graduate student at Montclair State University, and have been a music therapist in New Jersey for over 20 years. Over that time, I have worked in a variety of settings including in-patient child/adolescent psychiatry, a private clinic for autism, a large urban public school system, private practice, a private special education high school for individuals with emotional and behavioral disorders, and a private Orthodox Jewish special education school. In August 2013 I started my own business/private practice; Music Therapy Services of New Jersey, LLC. I completed the April 2013 Sprouting Melodies online training and it was a wonderful addition to my practice. I began offering Sprouting Melodies classes in February of 2014 and I’ve truly enjoyed working with my SM families. I have been moderating the Sprouting Melodies Online Training for the past 7.5 years.
I will be assisting with any questions and/or technical difficulties.
You will be receiving an email with information about the online forum technology and my contact information. If you do not receive the email, please contact me at erika.svolosmtbc@gmail.com.
I am looking forward to getting to know each of you over the next ten weeks! -
Participant
Hello! My name is Debbie Merideth-Zantout. I live in Arizona with my husband and two boys 13 and 10, and three cats. I am excited to join all of you in our journey with the Sprouting Melodies training. I have been a board certified music therapist for twenty years, and a speech therapy assistant for six years. I have a bachelors degree in music education K-12 choral/ general music, and an equivalency degree in music therapy from Western Illinois University. I also have a speech language pathology assistant certification from Northern Arizona University. I have worked as a home health provider, in clinics, and in schools working with children and adults ranging from ages two to forty. I own my own business Enharmonic Speech where I contract with my supervisor through The Therapy Grove for speech therapy clients through the Arizona Department of Developmental Disabilities. I also provide in-home private pay music therapy services. I have worked with children and adults with developmental disabilities and learning disabilities in one on one sessions and groups.
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Participant
Also, I hope to implement what I learn in this course by developing group integrated early childhood music classes.
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Participant
Hello! I look forward to hearing your speech-language pathology perspective as we go through the course!
As soon as the fall semester starts and our two college kids are away again we’ll just have our two youngest boys left, similar ages. They are just-turned-14 and almost-8.
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Participant
I am interested in hearing about your SLP perspective throughout this course as well!
It’s nice to meet you!
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Participant
I am also interested to see how this training aligns with my speech therapy training/experience. My work with each client develops in interesting ways. Some sessions look more like music therapy, some are hybrids, and some are purely speech therapy. It depends on the client and their needs. Each training I do is very interesting to look at from both perspectives. It ultimately depends on the clients needs. It really is fascinating and keeps me on my toes. 🙂
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Participant
It’s a really fun age! My oldest is on the spectrum and in a gifted program, but shows no interest in music even though he has the natural talent. He really likes sports instead. My youngest loves everything artistic from drawing, dancing, acting, singing… My husband and I met in the music department in college as well! I’m excited to join all of you on this learning journey.
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Participant
It’s nice to meet you! Wow, you have so much experience! I am so interested in hearing about how you use your speech pathology background within your music therapy sessions. I am hoping to incorporate ASL into my early childhood music classes and might end up collaborating with an SLP, so I would love to hear your insight on how to do that effectively! 🙂
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Participant
Hi everyone! I’m excited to be participating in this training with you all, learning and growing together.
My name is Sammy Springer and I live in Wisconsin with my fiancé (my wedding is next March) and our two dogs. I have been a board certified music therapist for a little over 4 years. I have my Bachelor’s degree in Music Therapy from Western Michigan University and completed my internship in Springfield, IL with young children. I currently work full time as an employee at a state-run facility serving children/adults, but I also own my own LLC and provide home-based music therapy services to young children on the weekends and evenings.I love what I do everyday and feel blessed to be able to serve young children in music therapy! By taking this course, I hope to continue to learn and grow my knowledge about early childhood and music therapy. I want to implement the knowledge I learn each week in my sessions to provide valuable services to those in my community.
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Participant
Whoops! I forgot to add my Gravatar before posting. Hopefully it is uploaded now and you can all see me!
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Participant
Congrats! Also, wow you are busy! Do you have plans, or thoughts, to eventually grow your own business to full time?
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Participant
Hi Maria- I’ve thought about growing my business full-time, but right now, I love my full-time job too much. Maybe one day!
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Participant
Hi Sammy! I’m excited to take this course with you! Since we are both in the Madison area, maybe we could collaborate on something together at some point! Are you currently taking new referrals? I sometimes get referrals for families who are only available on weekends, and we generally don’t see clients on weekends. Can I send them your way in the future? 🙂
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Participant
Hi Danielle,
I would LOVE to collaborate at some point in time! I love meeting up with music therapists in the Madison area.
Yes, please do send referrals my way in the future as I would love to build up my weekend schedule! If you need my contact information, I am also on Facebook. =) Thank you!
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Participant
I completed my internship in Madison Wisconsin at the Central Wisconsin Center!
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Participant
Awesome! That’s where I work full time. Laurie, Jane, and Michelle are all people that I look up to in the music therapy community. It’s awesome meeting someone who interned there in the past!
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Participant
Hello Everyone! My name is Mikelia and I am an MT-BC in Fort Myers, FL. I went to Florida Gulf Coast University for my undergrad, I just got my board-certification in February and I have 4 cats. I currently work as a contractor at The House of Music Therapy, working with children with developmental disabilities. I am so grateful that I get to do the work that we do. I am excited for this course and I am hoping to learn how to use developmentally appropriate music for the kiddos that I work with daily, as well as expand my repertoire. Looking forward to it!
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Participant
Welcome and it’s nice to meet you! I too hope to learn more repertoire. Also, congrats on your recent board certification.
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Participant
It’s nice to meet you! Congratulations on your recent board certification – how exciting! Are you enjoying your work so far?
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Participant
Hello! My name is Maria Ramey and i live in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, which is a little over an hour’s drive west of Boston. I am in private practice working with all ages from preschool to geriatric; with diagnoses and goals all extremely varied. I will also be starting some part time fee-for-service work in early intervention in August. I initially signed up for this class with plans to get a fresh perspective for my school based preschool groups and to possibly start some direct community music groups, then I came across the early intervention job and the timing is just perfect!
I have a Bachelor’s from California State University Northridge, a Master’s from Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis (so many words to type out, haha!), and I’ve just started my third cycle of board certification. 🙂 I am also a mother of four, all musicians. They didn’t have a choice, as my husband and I met in youth symphony and started our family while young and in college, dragging them to rehearsals and concerts, and even college ear training classes, with us throughout their childhood. 😉
I am excited to learn and share with all of you!
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Participant
Well, I did remember to create an account and upload a current picture before posting but this post has an older photo attached to it from my Google account instead. I’ll try to fix that!
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Participant
Hi Maria! It’s nice to meet you. I’m interested in hearing more about what your are going to be doing with early intervention!
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Moderator
It is a pleasure to virtually meet each of you. It is always interesting to read about each participant’s background and experience. Thank you for sharing!
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Participant
Hi! My name is Danni Christian, and I am an MT-BC in WI. I’m a day late posting here – please forgive me! I am a new mom to a beautiful baby girl named Alaina June (“Lainey”), born on April 14. She’s my everything and also my reason for posting late!
I live in Sun Prairie, WI and own a private practice, Madison Area Music Therapy, LLC. I graduated from Alverno College with my Bachelor’s degree in music therapy in December of 2015 and became board certified in spring of 2016 (just started my second cycle!) I received my Master’s degree in special education from UW-Stevens Point in spring of 2020. I am licensed to teach early childhood special education as well as cross-categorical special education for all ages, with specializations in the areas of cognitive disabilities and EBD.
My previous experience includes working for a private practice in Indianapolis with children with disabilities, a private practice in central Wisconsin where I worked in school, hospital, and in-home settings (also primarily with children with disabilities), and, most recently, I taught early childhood special education full-time for the Sun Prairie Area School District for the past two years. I have decided not to return to my teaching position this year in order to focus on the business and to spend more time with my daughter. As I continue to grow the business, I will also be nannying part-time and bringing my daughter with me!
I started Madison Area Music Therapy, LLC in 2018 and it has been growing steadily ever since! We primarily provide home-based services to children, but we have also recently started up a group for an Adult Day Program and are excited to continue to expand our services to other populations. I currently have two employees and have another one starting in August/September.
I am hoping to launch early childhood music classes this fall, which is what brings me to this course! I am excited to combine my love for teaching early childhood with my love of music therapy, and to involve my daughter in this work (after all, I will need an example kiddo, right? 🙂 )
In my “free time” (ha!), I enjoy camping, going for walks/hikes, exploring new areas of Wisconsin, traveling (hoping that with the vaccines, it will be safe enough to start traveling again soon!!) checking out breweries/wineries, and relaxing with my family.
Looking forward to getting to know all of you! 🙂
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Moderator
Congratulations on the birth of your little one! I took the Sprouting Melodies training when I was pregnant with my child and I started moderating this training and my own Sprouting Melodies program shortly after my daughter was born. Welcome to the training!
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