[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

This is what I came up with for the four sequences:

Singing: 1. Awareness: Vocalize a nonspecific pitch in response to singing, 2. Trust: Make purposeful, pitched vocalizations in response to singing, 3. Independence: Use simple word sounds in familiar songs, 4. Control: Use selected sung words at the end of phrases, 5. Responsibility: Recall and reproduce learned songs

Playing Instruments: 1. Awareness: Use arms to reach towards source of sound, 2. Trust: Explore instruments with hands and mouth, 3. Independence: Transfer instruments from hand to hand, 4. Control: Play instruments in a variety of dynamic levels and tempos, 5. Responsibility: Respond to musical dynamics and tempo of the play of a peer

Moving: 1. Awareness: Tolerate body parts being moved rhythmically, 2. Trust: Move entire body rhythmically in response to music, 3. Independence: Imitate clapping hands in response to music, 4. Control: Maintain a movement pattern throughout a familiar song, 5. Responsibility: Recall and reproduce simple learned movement patterns

Listening: 1. Awareness: Tolerate different types of music, 2. Trust: Display affect changes in response to emotional content of music, 3. Independence: Demonstrate musical preferences and dislikes, 4. Control: Make instrument choices between a field of two or three, 5. Responsibility: Use song language or playing to express emotions

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

I work with a wide variety of clientele at this point because I am still building my practice and can’t afford to specialize with one particular population, so when and how I use the four different types of music experiences will vary greatly depending on who I am working with.

For my baby/toddler and parent music classes that I currently offer, I find that I use a lot more playing and movement experiences, as well as some singing experiences. I often combine two of these experiences into the same song-based activity (for example: playing and movement, where there is encouragement to play an instrument AND move your instrument in certain ways, or singing and movement, where there is encouragement to vocalize and move in response to action words and dynamics in the music).

I facilitate a number of group sessions for adults with developmental and intellectual disabilities. These groups are often high-energy and our sessions are mostly comprised of instrument playing and singing experiences (based on the goal areas that we work on). I find it is difficult to incorporate movement experiences that work for everyone in these groups because the abilities and needs of each individual vary from one person to the next (there are some individuals who are ambulatory, some who are not, some who can move their arms and wrists independently, some who need hand-over-hand assistance, etc.).

I think the type of music experiences that I use the least are listening experiences. Listening experiences are not often helpful in achieving the type of treatment goals I generally have established with my kid and adult clients. Sometimes I am able to use listening experiences with the older adults that I work with in personal care homes and retirement residences. I find that the goals that we are working on allow for more listening experiences, particularly if it is accompanied with some form of discussion and analysis afterwards (listening to a song and discussing how it is relevant to their life, discussing memories associated with the song, etc.)

I think that I will start to incorporate more listening and singing experiences into my baby and parent classes. Because of time constraints (30-minute classes), I feel like there is pressure sometimes to do as much as you can with these types of groups. I have been trying to simplify things more within the classes and I would like to provide more opportunities for each child to have a chance to really notice the sounds that are occurring around them and make an effort to point out any responses they might have to these sounds to the parents more, especially if it’s subtle responses that may go unnoticed when multiple experiences are happening at once (such as playing an instrument and moving at the same time). I would also like to incorporate more singing experiences – I think when I first started these groups I tried to incorporate more singing but because the babies didn’t always vocalize or respond during the time frame that these experiences were given, I started doing it less and less. I would like to change this now that I know more about the concept of “mirror neurons” – even though they are not responding right away, they are still listening and taking in your singing and what they hear will help them respond and vocalize later on in life.

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

I provide baby and parent music classes for infants ages 6-12 months and 12-18 months. This past week in the 12-18 month old group, I really noticed how the children responses’ were aligned with the responses and characteristics typically seen in the independence stage. For example, we were doing a song that encouraged movement using maracas/egg shakers and in the song, there are moments that the therapist is supposed to pause the music (to provide an element of surprise/sudden change to keep their attention). Every time I stopped the music, one of the babies in the class would immediately look up, make eye contact with me and freeze, no matter what he had been doing right before the pause occurred. The sensitivity towards musical surprises/silence in the music that is a part of the independence stage was definitely in full display in this case and it was wonderful to see how responsive he has become to the music being used (this was our 5th class into the program).

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

I have been a bit behind as well with the course and so I have not had a chance yet to use the songs with any of my clients. I have tested out one of the songs with my 18-month old niece though; we sang “Are You Ready For Music?” and she wanted to sing it about 8 times in a row!!

I am hoping to learn a few of the songs and use them in the baby/parent group that I currently offer next week.

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

I grew up in a rural area of Manitoba, Canada. Up here in Canada, many children from my generation grew up with the music from TV shows such as Mr. Dressup and The Elephant Show, as well as songs by Canadian childrens’ musicians Fred Penner, Raffi and Sharon, Lois and Bram. I’m not sure how much Americans know about these musicians, but if you have ever heard the song “The Cat Came Back” or “Skinnamarink”, then you will know what I’m talking about! Another aspect that has shaped music in Canada over the years has been CBC, which is the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. They are our publicly-owned media network (TV and Radio) and their radio station is broadcasted across Canada, so it kind of connects everyone here, from coast to coast (the music played on CBC radio ranges from folk and bluegrass, to classical, to indie-rock). In terms of my own family, I grew up listening to a wide variety of music: country, rock, pop, indie and folk.

Manitoba is part of the Prairie provinces in Canada, so genres such as country, western and folk are fairly popular here (as I’m sure they are in the Prairie areas of the US). We also have a significant Aboriginal population, so their traditions and music styles are prominent as well. In my current home of Brandon, Manitoba, musical preferences are quite diverse (as they are with any urban area).

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

Similar to the previous two posts, personally I think I bring a lot of enthusiasm, youthfulness and energy to the childrens’ groups that I facilitate. I love working with children (or else I wouldn’t be taking this course!) and I’m pretty comfortable with being childlike around them; I feel that the act of being childlike around a young child is a part of how we show them empathy and it really helps create a comfortable environment for them to work in, plus it makes the groups/classes a lot more fun!

This information will support my work as a music therapist by increasing my overall knowledge of child development and as mentioned in my first post for Week 2, it will help me become a better resource for parents who have concerns about their child’s development. It will also provide me with a better understanding of what to expect from the children that I work with, both in a group and individually, and if needed will help me re-evaluate the goals/objectives that I have created in the past for children in this age range.

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

I think my most valuable takeaway from this week was the amount of information that was provided to us on the development that occurs for each age group. I remember learning about this during my child development psychology class back in my undergraduate degree but I feel the information provided in this course is a lot more detailed and gives me a way better understanding of the type of behaviors and responses to expect when working with each of these age groups. I am not a parent and I currently don’t have any family members that are in this age range so the only way I’ve been able to interact with children has been through my work experiences, so this kind of information is extremely valuable to me.
Another takeaway I wanted to add in was the emphasis on how we can be a great resource to parents on the markers of child development, especially for those who may have concerns. I know that the focus of this course is to learn how to develop child music therapy programming, but I think it’s just as important to be prepared to work with parents and to be someone they can rely on to help ease their concerns and/or provide them information on development that they need.

[Courtney Kjaldgaard]

Hello!

I’m Courtney Kjaldgaard, MTA. I live in Canada (MTA is the Canadian equivalent of MT-BC) and I’ve been building a small private practice called Roads to Rhythm Music Therapy for the last two years in Brandon, Manitoba. Brandon is a small prairie city and I am the first music therapist to work within the area so I’ve been working hard to educate the community and advocate for music therapy over these last few years.
I started providing baby and toddler music classes as part of my services last year and so far I have received a very positive response from families within the area – the amount of registrations for classes has doubled since I started a year ago! I was motivated to take this course because I haven’t had much music therapy training within this age group (specifically with babies) and I want to enhance the quality of the classes that I offer by expanding my repertoire and gaining more expertise and feeling more comfortable providing a program that is structured around early childhood development and family dynamics. Also, the perk of this being a branded product will help my practice.

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