Throwback Sunday: A "Back to School" Therapuetic Music Experience Challenge from 2018

It's that time again - time for my students to go back to school tomorrow, so rather than come up with a TME to share, I thought I would challenge you all to use a specific song and make it into a TME.  

FULL DISCLOSURE: I will use your ideas in my music therapy interactions with my clients, but I will NEVER share them outside of my own clinic without explicit permission from you, and I will make sure that you are listed as the source of the TME idea in my TME file for perpetuity. I will NEVER profit from your idea in any way. Someone stole one of my songs and TMEs once - I don't want anyone else to ever have to go through what I've gone through.

So, here's the deal. I have a song that could have so many different uses in a music therapy session, and I'd like to know what you all think and how you would use it. This is a participation deal. Please comment below. In your comment, tell me if you want me to publish it so lots of folks can see your idea. If you don't tell me to publish, I will not publish it.

I find that my TME ideas come from two sources - goals of clients and specific songs. Today, we're going to go for a specific song and see what types of goals we could address with this song. Are you ready?

Here's the song...

Here's my process.

First, just listen to the song and the music. What stands out? Do you notice the beat? The instrument timbre? The lyrics? What do you find yourself paying attention to? I use a handy table to help me organize my thoughts about the therapeutic elements of music.

Therapeutic Function of Music:

Melody	Pitch	Rhythm	Dynamics	Harmony

Form	Tempo	Timbre	Style	Lyrics

Chart adapted from Hanson-Abromeit, D. (2010). A Closer Look at the Therapeutic Function of Music. Presentation at 2010 American Music Therapy Association National Conference: Cleveland, OH.

This chart helps me to think through the musical elements present in every song and to organize my presentation of the song. For example, the rhythm is what draws me into this song initially. After that, the melody gets stuck in my head, and I find myself singing nonsense syllables to the melody in the rhythm for days after hearing it (I may regret listening to this song today...didn't think about that little fact until just now - too late!). I can't really understand the lyrics all that well, so it may lend itself to a piggyback song in my clinic.

After I listen to the music with a musician's ear first, I go back and listen to it again. This time, I keep my clients' preferences, goals, and objectives firmly in mind when I listen. Would my clients like this song? Are there any barriers in how the song is constructed that will keep my clients from engaging? (For my clients, the tempo is a bit too fast for singing along, but not for dancing along...) After that, I start to brainstorm how I could use this particular song to develop therapeutic music experiences that will address the targeted goals and objectives. I do this through another handy chart which helps me think of the treatment domains that I often address in music therapy. Here it is...

Purpose:

Motor	Academic/Cognitive	Social/Communication
Emotional/Behavioral	Musical	Other

This chart helps me arrange the skills that I will be addressing while using this particular song. Now, I often use this as a stand-alone brainstorming tool, but it is also the first thing that I put into specific therapeutic music experience (TME) plans, so the brainstorming version often looks significantly different from the finished TME version. For example, I may use this particular song in several different TMEs with very different clinical purposes. I could use this as a fill-in-the-blank song with some adaptations to lyrics and song presentation (I would have to play the song rather than listen to it on the iPod to slow the tempo and change the lyrics for my clients. Most of my clients would not be able to sing at the recorded song tempo. I could use this as a dance routine/motor sequencing foundation. I may have to slow the recording down for this as well, depending on the clients present. In these two cases, the final chart above in the TME plans will reflect the domains addressed based on how I am using the music rather than on all of the ideas that I may come up with during the brainstorming session. (I feel that those statements are confusing...what do you think?)

Okay, here's the challenge for today's post.

How would you use this song with your current population? Don't state that you wouldn't - adapt the song to fit the clients that you work with on a regular basis. How could you use this song in the NICU? I think it could be done, but probably not using the recorded music and with significant changes to the presentation of the song. How about with folks with significant health issues? With folks in a mental health setting? What types of goals would you address within the context of this particular song?

I love to hear what others think about TMEs and how others develop things into TMEs. Leave a comment below with an indication of whether you want to make your comment public or not, and I'll respond! I'll also share my brainstorming ideas with you (if you leave your email address - I will only use it to communicate with you within this context, no marketing - I SWEAR!!).