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Eleven percent of children in the United States have been diagnosed with ADHD and 1 in 88 children have been identified with having autism.  People who have these diagnoses exhibit trouble with cognition, specifically with attention and inhibitory control.  So why use music therapy to help with attention?

  • Rhythm creates a temporal structure for neurons to fire
  • Rhythm creates an organized time frame, helps with learning and perception
  • Rhythm can create the right amount of predictability
  • Pleasant music increases blood flow to the basal ganglia and prefrontal cortex and decreases blood flow to the flight or fight response area in the amygdala

Below is an example of an ABA therapist working on joint attention with a child with autism.  Music therapists use similar techniques, but using musical instruments and songs.

Here is an example of a music therapist working on joint attention with a child.  You can also see how well the child’s attention is sustained while playing an instrument.  Playing an instrument is a great way for someone to practice and develop sustaining attention to a task as well as other types of attention and cognitive skills.

Mary Jane

What is the Transformational Design Model?
Also known as the TDM, the Transformational Design Model is an assessment procedure that is used by many music therapists. There are a series of steps that the therapist goes through as they are assessing the client that ends in determining goals and interventions that are best for that client. It is a system that basically translates scientific methods into real-life functional use. It helps music therapists take non-musical therapeutic exercises and turn them into musical exercises, and then take those exercises and turn them into real-life every day skills that are functional.
Why is it important in the practice of music therapy?
-Helps plan goals that are relevant to the clients’ needs
-Helps make sure the goals and objectives are musical
-Helps generalize interventions into everyday functional application
-Allows music therapists to work with and share with other therapists
-Ensures patient centered instead of discipline centered programs
-Give clients quality service

Mary Jane

 

Blog Topic – Job Market

                This is probably the most perfect week I could have gotten “job market” as a blog post, as I will be finishing up my internship work and moving on to the professional job market in less than a month now! Right now, the professional world of music therapy just seems to fill me with a mix of excitement and anxiety; excitement because I’m about to start what is going to be my life-long career and it can go literally any direction from here, anxiety because I still feel like an intern a lot of the time.

                From this internship, there is an array of different career options in front of me. Music therapists can make a living being self-employed, being in private practice, contractors, or working in a music therapy clinic/studio. Until recently, being self-employed was something that I didn’t think I could ever do. However, surveys have shown that about 81% of music therapists are considered self-employed, so it’s looking more and more like owning my own practice will be a necessary step in my life-long career.

                Where my life as a music therapist will go, nobody knows. The journey down this path, as I’m sure any professional music therapist would explain, is a crazy and unpredictable one. It’s going to be a crazy transition, but after 4 years of schooling and 6 months of interning, I feel as though I’m ready to take on the professional world. Here I come!

Mark

Music, the brain, and Aesthetics

While studying the different ways our brain processes music and music learning, one interesting concept that I came across was that we all have a preconceived cognitive schema, not only for music, but for just about just about everything else. A schema shapes our expectations about how a certain thing should be. In simple terms, a schema is our familiarity with a particular subject. We all probably have our own schema of music. When some of us here the word “music” we might think of the latest top 40 charts, such as Wrecking Ball, and some of us might think of a Beethoven symphony. A schema is important because it frames our understanding and our interpretation of familiar aesthetic objects.

This concept is greatly applicable to music therapy. From the moment I first read about music therapy, I had a schema formed for what I thought the profession was, and it’s incredible to look back and see how much that schema has been altered and changed already. It’s safe to say that after starting my internship here, my schema for music therapy is completely different than it was before, and is  still constantly changing.

Mark

Mary Jane Dibble is currently a music therapy intern for the Music Therapy Center of California. She is pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Music Therapy from Utah State University. She previously earned a bachelor’s degree in Communication from the University of Utah.
Mary Jane’s primary instrument is the violin. She is also proficient in piano and guitar. She has provided music therapy to adults with mental health disorders, older adults with dementia, children with special needs, and hospital patients. Additionally she has performed in community bands and ensembles.
Mary Jane’s Story
“Music has always brought a lot of joy into my life and serves as a great motivator. When I turn on good music, it’s like a mini vacation away from the stresses of life. My favorite part about music therapy is seeing the joy that music can bring and the changes for the better that music can make in people’s lives.”
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The word of the week could not have been any better suited to write about. Why?, because I have been anticipating this time for seven years and now the time has come. Seven years ago I went back to college to earn a degree in music, and music therapy, and now in a week that goal will be fulfilled.

My life is still full of anticipation, taking the certification exam, beginning to build a client base, and being part of the music therapy community. I thank all the friendly peers, students, mentors and professors who made this journey enjoyable and included me as part of their families.

And now with great anticipation of the future, I bid you all a heart felt thank you!

Craig

 

Collaborate – To work jointly on an activity, to produce or create something

As a musician, all I seem to do is collaborate. I have constantly been collaborating with other musicians and artists ever since I picked up the tuba. I’ve collaborated with single musicians by playing duets, or being accompanied by a pianist, and I’ve also collaborated with upwards of 400 different musicians, dancers and other artists on the field in a football stadium. A career as a musician has seldom led me to working alone.  The same thing can be said about my experience so far as a music therapy intern. I’m constantly collaborating.

Since I started this internship, collaboration has sort of taken on a new meaning. Not only is it collaboration with other musicians, but with other therapists as well. Working with clients is often very much a collaborative effort between other music therapists, schools, speech therapists, occupational therapists, and ABA therapists. We are always in constant contact with many of these other professionals to share what sort of goal areas we are working on with different clients, and our ideas of how to best work with the clients. This collaborative effort helps us to be sure that we are all helping the clients progress in the areas that they need most.  

-Mark

Renewal is a great self description of my journey through life. Over the years every fork in the road has led to a path of renewal. Renewal in my life, thoughts, and actions. 

Now coming to the end of my internship I will be renewing myself again as a music therapist. I have not completed my work I am just starting in another direction when I come to that fork in the road. Thanks to the great people here at The Music Therapy Center of California, they are helping me to fulfill a life long dream of playing music every day and help people at the same time. It doesn’t get any better then that.

I have seen the renewal of hope in clients and there caregivers brought on by the therapist great work here and that keeps myself striving to be the best therapist I can be.

If you are in doubt of yourself, not sure of yourself, then renew yourself!

Craig

Visual – a picture, piece of film, or display used to illustrate or accompany something

Visual is a word to which I can relate very strongly. I have always considered myself to be right-brained and a very visual thinker and learner. For me, things would always just click a little more when I was able to somehow see or visualize what I was trying to learn. For example, I would always try to think of piano keys when learning chords and scales in my college music theory class. Being able to relate these concepts to a set visual pattern, such as the layout of a keyboard, made it much easier for me to learn and understand the concepts. It wasn’t until I got to college, however, when I realized that there are many other people who think in a very similar way. In fact, 65% of people are considered to be visual learners. I’m also slowly starting to discover how important visual learning is to some people (To see just how important it is to some people, Temple Grandin sums it up perfectly in her book, Thinking in Pictures: http://www.grandin.com/inc/visual.thinking.html).

In my work as a music therapist, I’m starting to learn more and more just how much visuals can affect a person’s learning and understanding. When working with clients, using visuals when giving directions, teaching a lesson, or even having a conversation can make a world of difference to that client’s understanding. Much like myself, it just seems to make the message or concept click for them, and we as music therapists are very often able to use that to make therapy easier and more effective for the clients. A set of visual aids should be a standard tool in every music therapist’s arsenal, since it can make the world of different when working with people with special needs. 

Vivo: with life and vigor. 

Always have lived my life with vivo, and never have had any regrets. Now I am adapting my vivo to help others, bringing session plans that hopefully engage and excite my clients without being a distraction. (I must admit that sometimes my vivo can cause a temporary distraction, luckily, I have great supervisors who gently redirect the distraction back on task).

I especially embrace my vivo when talking to others who ask “What is music therapy?”. I can make a three a hour plane flight seem like 15 minutes, talking about, and answering question on the topic of music therapy. People seem to be quite interested and engage by how music therapy works and how it is usually different then there preconceived notion of music therapy.

Craig