Wednesday Comes Once a Week
It is Wednesday again.
I have this one group on Wednesday afternoons who constantly challenges me. Honestly, they constantly challenge the art therapist, the transition teacher, and their own teacher and staff members as well. That simple fact makes the fact that they challenge me a bit easier to handle.
In all of my down time at work due to being on light duty, I have been spending time thinking about group treatment. We spend lots of time talking about things like assessing individuals, developing individual goals and objectives, and about how to develop music therapy experiences for individuals, but we don't often think about what to do when those individuals are part of a group.
I've come to the conclusion that groups are entities unto themselves. Each group member acts as part of the whole, but is not the whole. Similar to a body, the group learns to function when all group members are present and do not function the same way when a group member is absent or is not behaving in the expected manner. When a group member leaves or is replaced, it takes some time for the body to learn how to function as a whole again. Understanding the way each group functions as a whole allows the therapist to treat the individuals within the group.
My late Wednesday group is like a person who has a severe brain injury where body parts do not work in tandem but in opposition, especially when the brain wants parts to work in tandem. Each person in the group seems to want to work together but cannot. They have difficulty doing what they need to do to make the group work. They have difficulty responding to what others do. Where one goes, others follow or fight. There are moments of group coordination and cooperation, but most of the time they are unable to organize and work as a whole. I typically think of groups like this as "a group of individuals." It happens often with my students with diagnoses on the Autism Spectrum as well as this particular group of students. It takes a different outlook on how to organize and provide therapy services.
How do you work when your body parts don't work together?
You practice. You try for small moments of coordination and then expand on those small moments. You figure out ways to structure what clients need in order to offer successful moments. When necessary, you put the music away and focus on the relationship. You rely heavily on your therapeutic elements of music and on improvisation in an attempt to vector moods, promote the idea of working as a whole, and to keep something going to support the behavior that you want and to promote that behavior. You look for the small positives that happen and try to learn from the negatives. You keep working, even when it doesn't seem like you will ever be coordinated again. You keep working.
Last week's session was the first for the new school year. One student had to be taken out of the session. We had one relatively minor tantrum from one student. The two students that he goes after (because they give him the biggest response to his tantrumming) were able to maintain their own responses pretty well. I'm thinking we were honeymooning and am ready for just about anything today.
We're going to try Orff instruments. Please think of me about 1pm Central Standard Time. I could use all of the pleasant thoughts and prayers out there in the universe at that time.
I have this one group on Wednesday afternoons who constantly challenges me. Honestly, they constantly challenge the art therapist, the transition teacher, and their own teacher and staff members as well. That simple fact makes the fact that they challenge me a bit easier to handle.
In all of my down time at work due to being on light duty, I have been spending time thinking about group treatment. We spend lots of time talking about things like assessing individuals, developing individual goals and objectives, and about how to develop music therapy experiences for individuals, but we don't often think about what to do when those individuals are part of a group.
I've come to the conclusion that groups are entities unto themselves. Each group member acts as part of the whole, but is not the whole. Similar to a body, the group learns to function when all group members are present and do not function the same way when a group member is absent or is not behaving in the expected manner. When a group member leaves or is replaced, it takes some time for the body to learn how to function as a whole again. Understanding the way each group functions as a whole allows the therapist to treat the individuals within the group.
My late Wednesday group is like a person who has a severe brain injury where body parts do not work in tandem but in opposition, especially when the brain wants parts to work in tandem. Each person in the group seems to want to work together but cannot. They have difficulty doing what they need to do to make the group work. They have difficulty responding to what others do. Where one goes, others follow or fight. There are moments of group coordination and cooperation, but most of the time they are unable to organize and work as a whole. I typically think of groups like this as "a group of individuals." It happens often with my students with diagnoses on the Autism Spectrum as well as this particular group of students. It takes a different outlook on how to organize and provide therapy services.
How do you work when your body parts don't work together?
You practice. You try for small moments of coordination and then expand on those small moments. You figure out ways to structure what clients need in order to offer successful moments. When necessary, you put the music away and focus on the relationship. You rely heavily on your therapeutic elements of music and on improvisation in an attempt to vector moods, promote the idea of working as a whole, and to keep something going to support the behavior that you want and to promote that behavior. You look for the small positives that happen and try to learn from the negatives. You keep working, even when it doesn't seem like you will ever be coordinated again. You keep working.
Last week's session was the first for the new school year. One student had to be taken out of the session. We had one relatively minor tantrum from one student. The two students that he goes after (because they give him the biggest response to his tantrumming) were able to maintain their own responses pretty well. I'm thinking we were honeymooning and am ready for just about anything today.
We're going to try Orff instruments. Please think of me about 1pm Central Standard Time. I could use all of the pleasant thoughts and prayers out there in the universe at that time.
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