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October 16, 2019 at 12:10 am
in reply to: What value do music therapists bring to families of young children?
ParticipantErin – Your response really resonated with me. Empathy is such a powerful thing and music therapists definitely have a strong ability to empathize. It is important to be able to understand what some families may be going through and to truly be there for them while helping them celebrate their children’s growth.
October 16, 2019 at 12:06 am
in reply to: What value do music therapists bring to families of young children?
ParticipantWe as music therapists provide families with the opportunity to take tools from our toolbox based on our educational experiences, the interventions/songs we choose to use in our classes, and our knowledge and understanding of early childhood development, as well as musical development. We have talked a lot about how this course will help in building up our toolbox to use in our practices as music therapists. This unique toolbox is one of the most important things we bring to the table that non-music therapists and recorded music simply cannot provide. We come to our classes ready with materials to promote growth and success, while providing the families with explanations and knowledge to help them continue that growth and success outside of the music room. Our education and training sets us apart from others in that we are flexible and ready to adapt to any group dynamic. We also have been taught to improvise and get creative in our work so that the growth can be a fun experience for both the child and the caregiver.
October 7, 2019 at 11:40 pm
in reply to: How have you used these four music experiences in your practice?
ParticipantI tend to use these four categories as an outline for all of my sessions at Alternatives for Children. Each session should provide developmental appropriate music experiences that address the categories of singing, playing, listening, and moving. My opening and closing songs tend to incorporate either singing and/or movement (patting, clapping, stomping). The meat of my session incorporates a variety of instruments to really saturate the children in a variety of familiar as well as novel experiences. I also find it is extremely important to increase their sense of awareness of those around them. I love to provide opportunities for the students to take turns on instruments and really learn and feel what it’s like to sit and wait, as well as listen to their peers play.
October 7, 2019 at 11:37 pmParticipantHi everyone.
I used Beth’s book and went through each chapter for each development stage to design my charts. I picked responses from each category of Singing, Playing, Moving, and Understanding that resonated with me and my experiences with my students at Alternatives for Children. For example, I picked the response “the child will combine two movements in a repeated pattern” for control under the movement category. When first moving my students into the stage of control, I like to incorporate songs that involve combined movements such as the pat and clap. Many of my gathering or hello songs involve the pat clap sequence.
I also chose “the child will use different vocal timbres such as shouting or whispering” in the control stage under the category of singing. When working with children who have a goal of increasing expression through the use of musical gestures with a communicative intent, I like to experiment with singing into the hollow inside part of a drum. We flip the drum upside down and sing into it, experimenting with different timbres (i.e. shouting, glissando, adding vibrato, whispering). The child typically finds it funny or surprising to hear their voice in such different ways at first, but it provides a safe and comfortable opportunity for them to experiment with their vocal range (in dynamics and pitch).
ParticipantHi Erin! Nazareth was right up there in my top 3 schools as well! I almost went there, but was really attracted to Fredonia’s school of music. I still wonder if I made the right choice sometimes as both schools seemed amazing! I went to a CMTE course at Molloy College this past Friday where Beth was actually the presenter and I sat next to Naz’s, Dr. Betsey King. She was a riot and had us laughing the whole time.
September 30, 2019 at 1:49 pm
in reply to: Sing and learn some of the songs presented in the video. Share with the board your experiences using these songs.
ParticipantI use many of the songs used in this video from Beth’s song book on a daily basis at Alternatives for Children. “I Can Move Around” is one of my favorites. I use it with children in a variety of the musical developmental stages, particularly trust. I use the song with maracas in which we are shaking and moving to the clear structure of the song. Sometimes we will pretend that the maracas are microphones and sing the “la la la” part into the maracas. We tend to change it up and use syllables such as “ma” for mommy, “da” for daddy, “ga” from grandma or grandpa, and lately even short words such as “no,” and “yes” for my kiddos are LOVE those two words. I also like to leave space after singing into the maraca microphones where we gasp and cover our mouths in surprise. It provides room for extra engagement and anticipation of what’s to come in the music.
September 30, 2019 at 1:27 pm
in reply to: Discuss with the board the traditional and cultural music in your home community.
ParticipantI looked at this question in two ways. When thinking about early childhood and some of the students I’ve worked with at my other job at the Music Academy for Special Learners, the classic nursery rhymes came to mind. The parents tend to bring these young children to me once a week and have mentioned that they “love Twinkle Twinkle,” “Mary Had A Little Lamb,” “Old McDonald,” etc. Sometimes I will incorporate those familiar songs, or rather melodies in my interventions when working through the “Trust” stage.
The other way in which I looked at this question was through the music I grew up listening to in my own home. My first memory of music was sitting on my parents’ bed while my father blasted the Beatles and Paul McCartney’s band, Wings through his boom box. I remember him singing the song, “Band on the Run,” and a variety of the classic Beatles songs, and from that day on, I have been a huge fan and have admired the music Paul and the Beatles have contributed to our society and the variety of generations they have reached over the years. It’s amazing how one song or artist or band can change a life from such an early age.
September 30, 2019 at 1:23 pmParticipantAs I have mentioned in some of my past posts to the forum, I am a former intern of Beth’s at Alternatives for Children on Long Island. I interned for her two years ago and as of this summer, I am now the new music therapist at AFC in Dix Hills, NY. As an intern, I studied her book consisting of the musical developmental levels on a daily basis, along with her song book that includes the music used in the second video of this week’s content. I still refer back to these developmental stages when designing and planning my interventions for each class at AFC. I currently see two self-contained 6’s and a bunch of self-contained, as well as integrated 12’s. Both of my 6’s have moved into the “Trust” stage. They turn their attention to the music and respond to moments of active silence. Many of them experiment with putting the maracas in their mouths. I tend to use very clear structures and predictable tempos in both groups as I am looking for movement synchrony (i.e. patting knees, stomping feet, clapping hands). I am also looking for the anticipation of those musical gestures, the sustaining of those synchronized gestures, as well as the group release of those movements.
ParticipantHi Sami!! Long time no see. It’s so nice to see another Fredonia student on here! Hope all is well.
I too also enjoyed taking many of the developmental psychology courses up in Fredonia and knew that this was going to be containing similar material. It’s nice to see you on here and learn that we have similar interests!
ParticipantI found this module to be a wonderful refresher from internship with Beth, while also reminding me of many other developmental markers to look out for when assessing my pre-school students. The main thing I always keep in mind in my practice is to make sure I’m having fun, as well as being productive with my students. It resonated with me and my personal experiences these past couple years as a new professional when Beth said that “fun and work are not exclusive.” I remember when I first started getting into the early childhood work, Beth would observe me and say, “you really looked like you were having fun.” She was absolutely right. The more I grew to love early childhood work, the more I found that I was excited to get up and go to work every day. Of course there will always be tough days when work feels a little more like work, but I always try to make sure I feel a sense of fun during every session, even if only for a brief few moments.
This module gave me a better sense of how to approach my assessments, while also providing me with tools to help, support, and educate the families that I serve as well. Working with the parents can be a very scary experience at first, but knowing that I have the knowledge and tools to better assist them in caring for their children while helping them bring their children down the healthier path makes the situation easier to approach. These tools will definitely boost my confidence over time when working with the families as this is something I would like to incorporate in my work more often. I’ve found that early childhood work can be extremely rewarding, especially when seeing the progress between the child and their caregivers. I would love to be of assistance in that growth and journey through development.
September 20, 2019 at 1:24 pm
in reply to: What was your most valuable takeaway from this weeks’ content?
ParticipantWhile watching this week’s content, a lot of memories from internship came flooding back to me, as well as concepts I’ve learned in child development classes back in Fredonia. This module was very clear and specific to how these developmental markers relate to our work through music which really helped me put the information into context. The one slide that really resonated with me was the picture of the two paths diverged in a wood. I remember siting down with Beth at my internship site when she first explained this analogy to me. I actually just used this analogy the other day with my family. I explained (without giving out any personal information) that we had a student at work who was having a hard day when he came in with his mother. Instead of giving up and sending him home, his music therapist left the facility and met him in the hallway where he was crying and rocking. She started using a music therapy intervention out there with him and his mother to invite him back into the music space and help him regulate his body and emotions. My family didn’t understand at first why she didn’t tell him to come back next time, but I explained that it is our job to take them down a path of healthy development and wellness, even when their disability wants to send them down a different path. I used the analogy presented in this module and my family then started to better understand our purpose as health professionals.
ParticipantHi Erin!
Congrats on the baby! Wishing you the best of luck throughout the remainder of your pregnancy.
Thank you for sharing on the forum and I look forward to hearing more from you in the coming weeks. 🙂
ParticipantHi Erika!
It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you for sharing your background and I look forward to hearing more from you in the coming weeks. 🙂
ParticipantHi everyone! My name is Hally Batterman and I’m a newly-certified music therapist living on Long Island, NY. I passed my boards back in April and I’m super excited to be taking this course so early on in my professional career. I received my bachelor’s in music therapy from SUNY Fredonia (in Western NY) and I was fortunate enough to complete my internship at Alternatives for Children under the supervision of Beth Schwartz. AFC is a group of four pre-schools (birth-age 5) on Long Island for children with disabilities and typical children as well. Throughout my education at Fredonia, I worked in a nursing home for older adults with advanced dementia, an adult daycare for adults with developmental disabilities, a high-functioning adult psychiatric facility, and two elementary schools in the city of Buffalo for children (K-5) with a variety of disabilities. Since graduating from Fredonia, I have worked at an assisted living home as a music therapist and recreation assistant, and now, I currently work at the Music Academy for Special Learners in Hauppauge, NY. It is a facility for children (and some adults) of all ages and abilities to receive individual music therapy services, as well as adapted piano, guitar, voice, and other adapted instrumental lessons. We also have children come for music classes for those under self-direction. We are a team of 13, most of us board-certified music therapists working together to service those in our community. Recently, I was just hired as the music therapist at the Dix Hills site of Alternatives for Children, one of the schools I had interned at with Beth Schwartz. I have been working there since July and it has truly been a dream come true.
I chose to take this class because I simply felt that I am not done learning all there is to learn about early childhood music. I know that I will never be done learning about this subject, but especially now that I was recently hired at my dream school, I would like to build up my toolbox of interventions and child development knowledge as best I can so I can be of best use to the students and families I am encountering each week. I also would love to eventually start offering early childhood music classes at my other job at the Music Academy for Special Learners. I am hoping I can maybe get some guidance on that through this course. I have definitely found that early childhood has quickly become my favorite population to work with and it seems to resonate the most with me. In my opinion, it has been extremely rewarding.
Thank you Beth and Meredith so much for all that you do! Looking forward to meeting everyone on this forum.
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