[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

I wholeheartedly agree with some of the comments above concerning how music therapists are focused on the development of the child, rather than just the musical development and that music therapists are trained to be able to work and adapt interventions for children with special needs. Some of the other values I think that music therapists bring are a focus on the whole child – being able to synthesize development of a child across multiple domains (cognitive, communication, physical, etc.). Also, the ability of the music therapist to adapt in the moment according to the aforementioned knowledge and the reactions of the children. And, finally, the focus on generalization is something that seems unique for music therapists as compared to music educators, etc. This was really emphasized for me during this module with the functional language and concepts and the comments of the parent in the video.

One of the other things that I thought about during the module – and that really struck me during the parent interview – was the feeling of empowerment that we as music therapists are able to provide for the parents. I think this comes from our enthusiasm about the use of music toward overall development, the emphasis on education for parents and explaining why we’re doing what we’re doing, and really advocating for the power of community music therapy – whether that community is as small as a family unit or as large as the various families that come together to share music during groups.

[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.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

Singing – Awareness: Can demonstrate different durations in sound; Trust: Makes purposeful, pitched vocalizations; Independence: Uses varied vowels and consonants when vocalizing; Control: Uses varied vocal dynamics; Responsibility: Sings in both major and minor keys

Playing Instruments – Awareness: Prefers consonance over dissonance; Trust: Briefly uses pulse and meter; Independence: Transfers instrument from one hand to another; Control: Generally has fast internal rhythm; Responsibility: Plays beats and rests within a familiar structure

Moving – Awareness: Movements are in simple rhythms; Trust: Displays movement that is rhythmic but not synchronized to the music; Independence: Isolates body parts to move rhythmically; Control: Dances spontaneously to music; Responsibility: Uses musical movements in sequence

Listening – Awareness: Distinguishes changes in melodies; Trust: Focuses inwardly to lullaby-style singing; Independence: Enjoys musical surprises of fermata, glissando, and silence; Control: Follows melodic contour of familiar song; Responsibility: Increases recognition of melodic rhythm without lyrics

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

I actually had a thought today that I would love to get knowledge on from those of you currently working in early childhood. I was thinking about my nephew and how his parents aren’t particularly musical, he hasn’t gone to any “Mommy & Me” type groups or anything like that. Probably his only exposure to music is from the radio or maybe a few CDs. So, would we expect a typically functioning child who is currently in the “terrible two’s” to have the musical development level of Independence? Would he still demonstrate frequent vocalizations of descending intervals/major 2nds just because of development in general? Or are these musical levels ones that develop only from exposure and practice with musical stimuli? I understand that a lot of these behaviors noted in each stage are actually sort of unrelated to “music making” as we know it – even though we know that they do relate, the children don’t understand it that way. But I was just musing.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

This is a harder one for me since I don’t really have a “home” community due to moving around so much throughout my life. Right now, I’m located in Western North Carolina so this area is heavy with Appalachian culture as well as being located in the Bible Belt. I think those two things are probably the most influential things to consider. That typically means that hymns (a good majority of the time, from the Baptist tradition) and bluegrass are pretty important here.

That being said, with relocation to Atlanta coming up for me in about 5 weeks, I’ll be moving to a much more diverse community – something that I am pretty excited about. The community there will have a tremendous increase in ethnic and racial diversity from where I am currently, and I look forward to finding out more about what that means regarding music.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

From my experience so far with some of these songs, I had a couple of things jump out at me:

1. The use of the minor keys/modes was surprising to me! It definitely was not something that I had really thought about before – I feel like so much of the children’s music we hear is solely in a major key. Definitely good food for thought. Since I’m not currently working with children – just preparing to do so – I’m curious if anyone who has used songs in minor keys has gotten any negative feedback from parents? I could see some parents possibly being hesitant because of the whole minor key associated with sadness thing. Just curious…

2. The other thing that really stuck out to me was the theatricality of the songs. It seems to be just a given that kids typically respond well to drama (for me, it seems to be a natural part of being with kids), but this got me thinking about that more pointedly than I have before.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

I haven’t had a ton of experience using music with young children, but I did have a practicum when I was in school where I worked with a developmentally delayed preschool child within a group of his typically developing peers. I kept thinking during this week’s module about how much all of this information would have benefited my work with him during that experience. I realize now that I was probably using interventions that were not appropriate for his (and possibly some of his peers’) developmental levels. For example, lots of attempting to teach choreographed movements/dances to songs, lots of turn taking/call and response playing, and very little transition and embedded songs. Whew! I remember that I did feel he built a level of trust with me by the end of the practicum and that we made some progress toward speech goals, for example, but I can’t help but think how much more productive our time could have been.

All of this information has helped me to identify some of the stages that I have interacted with my nephew in, though. I remember one of the first “meaningful” (to my adult senses) interactions that I had with him was when imitating back the contour and rhythm of his babbling. I remember how much he loved it and it really did turn into a type of conversation between us.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

I don’t have very much direct experience working with children of this age other than personal experience (my nephew, my cousin’s children, years babysitting when I was younger, etc.), but I know that I LOVE working with kids. I take pride in the fact that I am a bit of a child at heart and still love to be silly as much as possible. I think that I’ll bring an enthusiasm to this work that will be motivating for the children AND the parents. After reading Michelle’s comment above, I want to spend more time thinking about providing a supportive environment for the family as well as the children, and what that might look like. THe information from this week’s module will, undoubtedly, give me a more solid understanding of the children but also the parents: what they worry about, the types of behaviors they’re expecting to see from their children and when, etc. I also really took the experiential part of the presentation to heart and agree with Beth about the importance of putting yourself in the child’s position and trying to experience the world through their eyes.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

This was such an informative presentation! I don’t have children of my own, but I do interact frequently with children at different stages of development: my nephew is almost 3, my god-daughter is 14 months, and my friend’s son is 2. So it was really enlightening to me to correlate different things I heard during the presentation to the different children and their stages of development. At the same time, although I don’t have kids, I felt myself seeing something about a “should have developed this by this time” statement and feeling worried if I realized “…wait, my nephew doesn’t do that yet!”. I think this gave me some insight into the kind of monitoring and, possibly, worrying that parents must experience over their child’s developmental milestones (to a much greater degree than I experience toward my nephew, I’m sure). Aside from the educational parts of the presentation, it was good to hear about the possible red flags. And I really appreciated Beth’s comment at the end that it really does take actually working with the children in your group and seeing their development to really make total sense of all of that great information.

[Jacquelyn Blankinship]

Hi, everyone! My name is Jacquelyn Blankinship and I have been board certified since October of 2014. I have a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from a small school in Memphis, TN, and, after working for several years in higher education after graduation, decided to attend Appalachian State University’s Music Therapy equivalency program. I’ve definitely had a circuitous route to become a music therapist!

I completed my internship with a hospice local to Asheville, NC (where I currently live with my husband) in July of 2014. My husband helped to support us during my internship, and we both knew that after that it would be his turn as he has been waiting to attend a medical graduate program until I was finished with my education. Due to the fact that I knew we would be relocating in less than a year after my internship was completed, I was wary to work on building contract work or a private practice in Asheville. And, unfortunately, I was unable to find many already existing MT opportunities. So! Because of that, I took an unrelated job in higher education in December of 2014 to get us through. Now, though, we know that we’ll be moving to Atlanta at the end of May and I am so excited to dive into creating a successful opportunity for me to practice – FINALLY!!! I’ve been applying for jobs in the Atlanta area, but I was excited to take this course for several reasons: a) to give me another marketable skill set that varies from my experience with older adults/hospice, b) because I’ve always known that I would also love working in early childhood (some practicum experiences, nieces and nephews of my own, etc.), and c) to potentially use the Sprouting Melodies business package to help me start my own groups.

I am so excited to learn more, refresh the knowledge I learned in my coursework about development, etc., and to get to know all of you and share knowledge, ideas, experiences, and excitement!

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