And so it begins...

My new interns started two days ago. I always start them off on a Friday because it is the day where I do not have to do as much therapy as Monday through Thursday. Interns arrive, get a brief tour as we turn in paperwork to HR, and then we move into Music, Movement, Art and Rhythmic Sensations (MMARS). For the next 5 hours, interns get to run around playing games with all of the students that attend school at my facility. Then, after we have played tag, sang songs, completed an art project, attempted to develop our gross motor coordination. we move into orientation. The end of the day, after I have staggered the poor things with 4 pages of assignments, the dismissal policy, and other orientation information, I always ask for questions. The interns never have any.

These two have some advantages and some disadvantages.

The advantages -
  • I have had a nice long break from being an internship director. That is a good thing and something that I will schedule in from now on...
  • I have really thought about my training style and philosophy
  • I have revamped my forms and assignments, linking them to the AMTA Professional Competencies
  • The interns will be going through this experience together - for the first time I have started with two at the same time rather than staggering intern's start dates
  • They will have each other for the duration of the internship - always before, interns have bonded really strongly with one of their co-interns, but not the other.
The disadvantages -
  • I have never had two interns start at the same time - this new experience will be interesting, but I think I will like it...
  • Some things that I have changed are too new for me to remember
  • There is no clear way to determine who gets the good chair and who gets the bad chair...
  • They will have each other for the duration of the internship - this could be a problem if they do not like each other
My pledges to my interns:
  • There will always be chocolate
  • I will be the best supervisor that I can be
  • I will encourage each intern to develop her own philosophy of music therapy and style of practice
I hope that this experience will be a good one for both of the interns as well as myself. Here's to the next 7 months!!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Sing A Song Sunday - The Time Change Song (Fall)

Being An Internship Director: Why I Do Very Little Active Recruitment

Dear AMTA