[Shelley Tsao]

I think besides providing service and supporting the child, music therapist can offer lots of insights and tools for parents/caregivers to interact and support the child outside of music.

[Shelley Tsao]

I love Emily’s idea of tickling. such a great bonding experience and I am sure the laughter is contagious 🙂

[Shelley Tsao]

Karli, I love your example of how your baby/toddler group has grown together and that you are able to see so much change within the musical setting. so much fun 🙂

[Shelley Tsao]

I completely agree with Karli’s comment above. Being sensitive and mindful of clients’ cultural background is so important. it’s always a little tricky when providing music to a group with various cultural background.

[Shelley Tsao]

I really enjoy reading everyone’s introduction and how everyone’s music therapy careers have evolved. So many possibilities!!

[Shelley Tsao]

Erika, your example was so helpful. thank you.
I really liked Emily’s format. helps look at the information from a different perspective.

[Shelley Tsao]

Singing
Awareness – vocalization has varying pitches.
Trust – able to imitate and match pitch occasionally.
Independence – combine sounds together into intonation and inflection. Musical babble.
Control – able to reproduce some of the melodic contour of familiar songs.
Responsibility – Able to remember, reproduce and experiment with familiar songs.

Playing Instruments
Awareness –Basic awareness and developing an understanding of instruments and their body responding to music.
Trust – briefly grab and use instruments in pulse and meter.
Independence – explore ways to play different instruments.
Control – enjoy the starts and stops in playing instruments.
Responsibility – able to enjoy playing steady beat along with others.

Moving
Awareness – moves naturally & instinctually.
Trust – body moves in response to music with repetitive movement.
Independence – begin to isolate body parts with more intention.
Control – able control their body parts enough to imitate others and internalize.
Responsibility – able to reproduced learned musical movements in sequence.

Listening
Awareness – recognizes and prefers familiar vocal timbres.
Trust – Listen and attend to familiar melody.
Independence – actively attending to the music in their environment.
Control – have the skills necessary to make the choice to listen to music
Responsibility – stop their action and listen to other’s. Realization that their music can connect with other’s music.

[Shelley Tsao]

Karli, it’s so true what you said about listening to music, because I often feel like they are not “actively participating”, but I need to be more confident about providing a listening experience and not have any expectations, especially with a few of my pediatric hospice clients.

[Shelley Tsao]

I definitely try to incorporate all four musical experiences during my sessions. I usually try to mixed it up from song to song, but it also depends on where the client is at that day and their preferences. singing familiar songs or learning new songs, leaving out blanks to encourage participation. playing instruments they prefer and also introducing new instruments. exploring different ways of playing an instrument or building on what they are doing. doing movement songs to work on body awareness and creative ways of moving their bodies. for a few of my pediatric hospice clients, who aren’t able to play and instrument or move, I would use music listening to engage them, I might pause periodically during the song and look for subtle responses.

[Shelley Tsao]

I am located in Northern California, and have found that pop, classic rock, and reggae are the most popular among my clients.

[Shelley Tsao]

I started working with a 3 year old a few of weeks ago. He is extremely apprehensive towards new people, so mom and I have agreed to take it very very slow. my first session with him had no instrument and no singing. I have been slowly introducing instruments and songs. so I thought instead of my usual “it’s time for music”, “are you ready for music” was a great song to introduce, . It was well received 🙂

[Shelley Tsao]

I have a client who is in the control stage. He loves to dance and move to the music, follows melodic contour of familiar song and engages in spontaneous singing. Doing call and response activities is really fun for him. His cousin usually joins the session, so we have lots of opportunities to work on turn taking, imitating each other, and initiation. One of his favorite activity is to imitate different animals sound and movement. We use the song “If you are happy and you know it” and substitute the words for animals they pick. They enjoy singing the song, coming up with different movements and vocalizing. They both have a hard time waiting their turn to pick an animal, but both able to respond when I chance the tempo or dynamic.

[Shelley Tsao]

Karli, such a good reminder that so many changes happen in a short period of time. young children are constantly trying to figure out what’s going on within them and around them.

[Shelley Tsao]

Karli, such good qualities and important reminder to “jump into new situations with child-like enthusiasm” 🙂

Katherine, so important to continue to have fun!!!! and so true that getting information from other providers/caretakers is so important. it helps us to serve clients better.

[Shelley Tsao]

It was a great refresher on children’s needs at different stages. I really appreciate the points about children not developmentally ready to “share” and “say sorry”. It happens so frequently in social environments that children are asked to share and say sorry, it doesn’t support the child’s development when they are being asked to do things they are not ready for.
Opportunities for parent education is also very valuable. Giving parents information and tools to work on the same skills when they are at home.

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