music, therapy, and me

I have a visit from an intern applicant on Monday, and I am getting ready to show off my music therapy space and what I do in that space. This takes a bit of time and effort, because (as you know if you read this blog regularly) I am a pack rat and organization is something that challenges me. Last Friday, I organized the storage room which will double as an intern office once I have an intern. I organized all of my cabinets so I can show this applicant (and the three others who will be coming) what type of materials are available. Today's task is to tackle my office space. The clearing and cleaning of my office helps me also declutter my brain - something that I need to do more often so my brain can work without getting bogged down in extraneous thoughts and problems. I keep my idea book near to me so I can write down tasks and ideas as they occur, but not address them until there is time to do so. The more I organize, the more things I find to do. It is amazing how that works. ...

I am a bit ahead of myself since I technically have another week of work before the 2016-2017 school year is finished, but I only have two therapy days left, so I am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel right now. It seems like a good day to contemplate what has happened this year. I know, some of you would LOVE to have this type of space, but it was not right for me. I started this year in a small room designated for music therapy. It was gray, had one window, no light switch, and no room for any type of movement therapeutic music experience. Did I mention that the walls were curved? Only one right angle in the entire room - made acoustics horrible to navigate and no place to put the piano without taking up valuable floor space. Kids would come in, sit with their backs against the wall, and we would do music therapy. If anyone had to leave, they would have to walk over all the legs of peers and staff members. It was not the type of place that I enjoyed, and I dreaded goin...

Here it is! My beautiful new room. In the past week, I've been able to do music therapy sessions with all of my students, and I started to introduce the idea of doing centers with six of my eleven large groups. It went pretty well this week. I've already made some adjustments and will be working hard to get other things put together before everything works effectively, but things went pretty well. I have made a data sheet for my paraeducators to fill out when they are with their students in the centers. They will keep track of our behavior management system, the amount of time kids engage in the center itself, and how much assistance the kids needed to complete the station. I changed from a paper-based format to a laminated sheet and have figured out how to accommodate client changes (four of my clients left in the 30 minutes after I laminated things - no prior notification!) without having to laminate things over and over again. I still have some things to work out. ...

I did it. I finished the first sessions in my new room setup, and it is interesting how different things are already, even though things aren't completely organized or settled yet.  The view from the door I am enjoying the new, larger space. I think the clients will as well. We spent most of the time yesterday roaming the room and figuring out what was in the cabinets. Group members started on the carpet, sang an opening song with me, and then were given the opportunity to explore the area. There were tables with books and fidgets. There were choice cards for playing the big instruments that are usually kept locked away in the cabinet. What will eventually be the center area The big instrument area The group area - looking at the office door Some of the clients acted as I expected. Some of them started off refusing to move around the new space. They sat and looked around. It took them some time before they moved around the room, looking at things th...

  I am moving into a magical room. Besides the space, the walls are covered with murals painted by my very talented friend, Tawnya. (If you are interested in her artwork, you can contact her here .) I have inherited the play factory room, so there are some things that are no longer relevant (see the elf), but she's going to change the art to bring in some music-type elements. I am going to try my best to keep the murals as a part of my room. Mr. Elf - I think I'll name him Bartholomew - will soon say "Welcome to Music Therapy." The expectations will also change a bit. I don't use the same terminology as the play therapists, so "No hurts" is no longer relevant. The rest of the murals can stay as they are. They add such a nice whimsy to the room. I love them and am ready to figure out how to use them. Here's a run down of the murals that I get to live with from now on. There is a ship high up on the wall above my large instrument jam space. Perpe...

My four-rooms ago music therapy room - the one I loved! I start moving today! The current music therapy room More of the current music therapy room In a facility where I have had eight different rooms, I am ready to find another "forever" home. I am absolutely positive that this will not be the last place that music therapy is placed at the facility, but I would like this to be my last music therapy room move at this place. We shall see. I had a perfect music therapy room at one point. It had built-in storage, custom designed to accommodate my drums and guitars, and was large enough for movement by entire groups but small enough to feel like things were contained. We could use ribbon sticks without risk of tangling up our neighbors. It was wonderful and taken away from me for the room I'm in now. In between those two rooms, I had three other rooms, but I eventually was able to move into the gray music therapy room three Novembers ago. Some of the cabine...

I am stuck in a thought loop these days. The thoughts are not always positive and have lots to do with the happenings of last week here in the States. I think I have a handle on what is going on, and then I see or hear something that just sends me back into a tizzy. Many of my thoughts are based on the just past election, but I don't discuss my politics with other people, so this will NOT be a political blog post. There are many other things going on in my small world - are you ready for a glimpse? My family is currently going through a situation that we had to live through about 20 years ago. I know this experience will make us a stronger nuclear family unit, but we have to live through it first. This all started on election day and has taken over most of my family interactions over the past week. This experience covers everything like a haze, coloring all other things. I was offered a new space for music therapy yesterday. The space is four times the space that I have now. ...