Post to the board a personal reflection of what you personally will bring to early childhood music therapy based programs and how this information will support your work as a music therapist.

[Meredith Pizzi]

[Siobhan Rooney]

I work in early childhhod music therapy everyday and I see lots of parents who are so worried about their little ones. Many of the children that I work with aren’t able to participate in typical early childhood music programs or even worse, been asked to leave a group or mommy and me program. I want to show these parents that music is still an experience that they can share with their child regardless of disabilty and that it can be joyful and fun. More importantly, it can be a way for them to connect with their child and communicate when more traditional forms of communication may not be possible (for now). I’m excited to learn some new music and see what other music therapists are doing! I want to bring this knowledge to my program and grow my own skills as a music therapist.

[Elizabeth Schwartz]

Although we use the word ‘fun’, it really is another name for a bigger event of being musically present in the moment with our children. Remembering to have and be ‘fun’ is something I have to do every day in my clinical work.

[Coleen Shanagher]

I realized this week the importance of understanding typical developmental goals and milestones because it will give me a specific and concrete comparison when understanding a-typical behaviors. I have a new client starting and much of the information I have been provided uses terminology such as “global delays” etc, so it will be my task to figure out what areas need to be addressed. And the only way I can make logical goals and objectives is to base them on the typical developmental scale.

[Lauren Stoner]

One of the things I will be taking away from this week’s information is not only the developmental understanding, but also the encouragement to remember to look at life from a child’s point of view. I try to keep this in mind now in my work. The emotions, struggles, and successes can evoke significant responses for adults, adolescents, and children coping with mental health concerns. I think it is always important to be empathetic to the experience of the client, and it is clear that this value is present in Raising Harmony. One way to help clients better is to understand what they are experiencing and what they expect (for example: clear, short responses that are consistent). I am looking forward to learning more.

[Keeley St Clair]

I am most motivated by creating a developmentally appropriate service that is rooted in research and can offer something engaging and helpful to children and their parents regardless of ability. I feel that I can bring a child-like enthusiasm to my groups and to model this kind of wonder for families who attend.
The milestones listed will be a great resource for developing appropriate goals and objectives and evaluating any possible developmental lags happening. I am excited to learn more.

[Andrea U]

I really enjoyed Elizabeth’s emphasis on FUN this week. As a relatively inexperienced music therapist, I like to create fun environments for any client and find it as one of the greatest motivating factors in any therapy session. Similar to Keeley, I like to feel like I am a kid when I am around kids (that’s also another thing I enjoyed about this week’s lecture, acting like a kid again!) We are taught to be empathetic to our clients’ experiences as part of our training and I often find I forget that I was once a kid too! Going forwards in any future work, I would like to be more aware of this.

[Toni]

I hope to begin a community based program that is sensitive to families with children of all ability levels. This may be my first opportunity to be the person to spot the red flags for some families and refer to other disciplines early on to get the interventions needed. I truly believe that early intervention is the best intervention. So many families are not aware that their children need help until in elementary school (or later). I really like that this program brings attention to overall developmental milestones to focus on the whole child, not just the “musical milestones”.

[Kehlen Bushatz]

Because I am also a pk special education teacher I have a lot of experience with preschool-age children. I believe I have a very strong understanding of what children should and should not be able to do at this age. This understanding will help me better design music therapy sessions that are most developmentally appropriate.

[Erin Spring]

I bring experiences from working with early childhood through the YMCA swim classes I teach, especially the parent-child class with infants and toddlers 6 months-3 years, working with Sunday school music groups at churches, supervising at various preschools for practicum students are all helpful to my work in early childhood. While early childhood is not specifically where my greatest passion exist, I am extremely motivated by the struggles I have seen my friends face with their children’s development, both in just understanding their child’s development, and what to do when development is significantly lagging behind in specific areas. I am passionate about music’s impact on the development of the brain. My husband was a music educator, but lost his job a couple years ago like so many music teachers due to budget cuts. With music disappearing from schools, especially at the elementary level, I am even more motivated to provide this nurturing musical experience for young children. Even though I might not be the best therapist to provide this service myself, I can support the development of this musical opportunities for my community and provide qualified therapists who can best conduct these sessions. Gaining this training is the first step to bringing Sprouting Melodies into my business, next having my therapists trained and working with them to develop programing to meet our communities needs.

[Jennifer Sokira]

I think that I do well with meeting children “where they are” from a developmental and musical level, and this is something that has been a part of my intention going into all of my early childhood work to date. Working to see things from the perspective of the child has been a good tool as well to assist my families with developing insight into what’s going on with their typically or not typically developing child.

When I had my own children, my perspective on development really changed as well- especially with my older son I had many “oh wow, he’s doing that- he’s supposed to do that!” moments because a great deal of the young children I’d been exposed to at that point had not been typically developing or had many significant needs. Now that I’ve had a few years to integrate my understanding of development, I think that I am able to better serve my families, better able to spot and name what I am seeing, etc. I also feel this week’s module really helps to crystallize and reinforce that understanding.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for all of your great personal reflections! When I attended the online training in April, the responses for this question also seemed to be about thinking developmentally about our work, helping families to see what is developmentally “typical,” but also what might be a red flag. Erin I love that you are so involved in understanding working with this age group for your employees and students even though it is not your main focus! It is really important to have a boss or supervisor who is informed about what you are doing. Jennifer, I connected with your reflection on having children and getting a perspective change on development. I will be having my first child next month and really look forward to seeing development in action day by day with my little one.

[Sarah Tree]

I think the biggest thing I bring to early childhood music therapy based programs is my energy and my ability to thoroughly enjoy “child-like” (not childish) interactions with little ones. I like that Beth gave us permission to be child-like, that it’s okay to be fun and silly. I think that this will help to support the development of relationships between myself, the children, and their parents. I also think that the emphasis on supporting the needs of the parent is extremely important, and I’m looking forward to learning more about how to encourage and educate young parents/guardians as I continue this coursework.

[Kathryn Opher]

I see reinforcement that being “child Centered” is the best approach to being with the group. I think encouraging parents to use the music as a transistional object to play with their child also helps them to play without feeling overly childish or silly

[Elizabeth Schwartz]

The idea of being ‘child-centered’ seems as if everyone would embrace it…but we know from current educational trends that norms rather than individual learning is all the trend right now. I think we are seeing parents and teachers begin to advocate to return to a more ‘child-centered’ way of teaching.

[Anonymous]

Though I’ve had limited experience using music with this younger population I am looking forward to jumping in and participating in the music with children and their families. My first thought was wow, there are so many changes that go on developmentally with children not only from 0-5 years, but from 0-3 months! I’ve touched on development in classes at school, but this is a great reminder as to everything that’s going on in those ages. I really look forward to learning repertoire and strategies that will correspond with these milestones!

[Shannon Kiley]

We as music therapists have such a unique skill set, and thusly I think the most important thing that I bring is twofold: firstly, my training as a MT with the knowledge of what children need at particular times… secondly, my presence as a cheerful and patient navigator of the terrain. When I think about what separates a good early childhood professional from an unsuccessful one, (being given that the professionals have the appropriate information about early childhood), I keep returning to the sense of joy, relaxation, and patience in this work. These kids and their parents will challenge you and keep you on your toes and it’s so important to have a sense of relaxation and fun! This gives everyone else permission to relax and have fun, and combining that with our MT training and the information we are learning in this course, that seems a surefire recipe for success to me.

[Anonymous]

Shannon you make some great points. I have definitely found the children and their parents challenging me in many ways and this course has definitely helped me to meet those challenges. Great to hear from you!

[Petra Paukova]

WEll, I am a mother of child with autism, so I feel I have quite a lot of knowledge about developmental delays and so on. This class, however, teaches me a lot about normal development and I feel like it helps me to understand non-typical development as well. Hopefully this makes sense. I feel I can bring a lot of experiences from my private life supported by all the info from this class. I am quite intuitive and I know how to follow child’s lead. That is probably the most important skill for music therapist to have. Observe and follow your clients lead. I am glad learned what to observe and look for in this class.

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