New School Session - New Music Therapy Schedule
Today is the day we start our Extended School Year (ESY). We have four weeks of school before another week off and then three weeks to finish up the rest of ESY. It is also the day we start our new schedules including three new groups and new start/stop times.
Of all the administrative tasks that music therapists face, I think that scheduling is one of the most difficult. I'm lucky. I only have to schedule for me. Some of my friends have to schedule many therapists. I think I would like to have that sort of challenge because scheduling is a puzzle for me. It is a very large logic puzzle, and I enjoy those types of challenges. Of course, I haven't had to coordinate the schedules of more than three therapists at once, so facing scheduling for many more therapists may not be as much fun, but I am thrilled by the idea of the challenge.
Scheduling fulfills several of the things that I enjoy in life. I get to color-code things (so I can see different aspects easily). It is a puzzle that makes me think about possibilities. I get an opportunity to move things around a large piece of paper (because I always start with actual manipulatives before putting things on the computer). There are a multitude of possibilities and solutions. There are times when there are conflicts, but that leads to more possible solutions. It is wonderful.
Anyway, enough rhapsodizing about the joys of scheduling.
Our new school session also includes the start of a new assistant principal. This guy was the art teacher at a local middle school. He's been to see me once and discussed the need for more meetings for all of us who are not classroom teachers. (I'm aware of the need for meetings, but I really don't like filling up my preparation time with sitting in a meeting that includes material that could be shared via email.) I would rather be doing treatment.
Speaking of treatment, I won't get to do as much individual treatment as I was hoping to do this session because my room holds the reward store. Since we don't have school on Fridays (did I mention that? I don't think I did.), I had to offer set times for all the classrooms to come into my room to spend their points. I will not try to do individual music therapy during those times - ethical and confidentiality concerns - so I lose 6 hours of treatment time per week during the summer. I've been trying to build up my individual treatment since getting off of light duty last year, but it has been a challenge. Now, I have even more challenges.
It is now time to start the process and the day. I think I will try to do some cleaning before I leave the house for the first day of our ESY. Today I will do my four groups (tomorrow I have six groups) and try to get music therapy going the way I envision it.
New schedule, new challenges, new co-workers, new things to do in music therapy. It's time to start this extended school year. Here we go!
Of all the administrative tasks that music therapists face, I think that scheduling is one of the most difficult. I'm lucky. I only have to schedule for me. Some of my friends have to schedule many therapists. I think I would like to have that sort of challenge because scheduling is a puzzle for me. It is a very large logic puzzle, and I enjoy those types of challenges. Of course, I haven't had to coordinate the schedules of more than three therapists at once, so facing scheduling for many more therapists may not be as much fun, but I am thrilled by the idea of the challenge.
Scheduling fulfills several of the things that I enjoy in life. I get to color-code things (so I can see different aspects easily). It is a puzzle that makes me think about possibilities. I get an opportunity to move things around a large piece of paper (because I always start with actual manipulatives before putting things on the computer). There are a multitude of possibilities and solutions. There are times when there are conflicts, but that leads to more possible solutions. It is wonderful.
Anyway, enough rhapsodizing about the joys of scheduling.
Our new school session also includes the start of a new assistant principal. This guy was the art teacher at a local middle school. He's been to see me once and discussed the need for more meetings for all of us who are not classroom teachers. (I'm aware of the need for meetings, but I really don't like filling up my preparation time with sitting in a meeting that includes material that could be shared via email.) I would rather be doing treatment.
Speaking of treatment, I won't get to do as much individual treatment as I was hoping to do this session because my room holds the reward store. Since we don't have school on Fridays (did I mention that? I don't think I did.), I had to offer set times for all the classrooms to come into my room to spend their points. I will not try to do individual music therapy during those times - ethical and confidentiality concerns - so I lose 6 hours of treatment time per week during the summer. I've been trying to build up my individual treatment since getting off of light duty last year, but it has been a challenge. Now, I have even more challenges.
It is now time to start the process and the day. I think I will try to do some cleaning before I leave the house for the first day of our ESY. Today I will do my four groups (tomorrow I have six groups) and try to get music therapy going the way I envision it.
New schedule, new challenges, new co-workers, new things to do in music therapy. It's time to start this extended school year. Here we go!
Comments
Post a Comment