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Perspectives & Insights from a Local Music Therapist

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Loopy Stanley 2013 – we want YOU!

Filed Under : Advocacy,Education,Social Networking,Songwriting,Studio Music,Technology,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
Feb.11,2013

Hello and welcome February!

It is a blustery one here in North Dakota.  As  I type I am enjoying an impromptu Snow Day after we got a healthy dumping of snow and wind, enough to close down two major interstates (which in ND, is a pretty big deal).  Looking out my window everything is clear now, just lots of work to do if I should get the urge to attempt vacating my driveway anytime today!

This month is also showing up to be a blustery one for health too – lots of colds and flu bugs whirling around.  I myself caught one such bug that rendered me unable to get my last two posts of MT Advocacy Month out  in time for the end of January (as did, sadly the little client whose mother was going to write a guest post too – we may have to wait on that recovery a little longer).  But, weather and illness aside, I am excited to present to you all at least one of those posts: announcing the return of Loopy Stanley this year!

What is Loopy Stanley?

Last year, I began a project based on Flat Stanley, like you see in elementary schools around the world.  Children color in a little paper doll named Stanley, and send him via snail mail on “adventures” to their friends and family, all of whom photograph Stanley in their environments so that when he returns to his creators, they all have a photo collection of where he’s been.  Combine that idea with this great series of videos called “Song around the World,” and you have the basis of the concept for Loopy Stanley: have one group of people create a musical loop, and then send it out into the world to have recorded “adventures” with other people, so that eventually you can have a musical collection of where the loop has been.  Last year’s Loopy Stanley was an original loop created in the Ipad app Loopseque, and two MT-BCs contributed a total of 3 video and audio recordings that transformed the song from a simple series of beats and chords to an awesome melodic jam between my Ipad, a tambourine, a saxaphone, and an oboe – very cool stuff!  This year’s Loopy Stanley is based on a song you may find familiar, recorded by the students of the North Dakota School for the Deaf on Garage Band.  We’re hoping that using an already established song, and giving folks more time to contribute (last year I think we only gave folks a month, this year you’ve got two extra weeks!) will make Loopy Stanley a little more accessible this year.

So… check it out! And let us know what you think

This was my first time using iMovie on my Ipad to create the video, and I will admit to using some Quantization in Garageband, so you may notice some patches of video & audio are out of sync – no need to adjust your screen resolution or anything :-)

Promo Video for Loopy Stanley 2013 – link will open in new tab

If you think you’d like to contribute to Loopy Stanley, here’s all you’d have to do:

1. Like what you hear :-)

2. Email natasha.mtbc@gmail.com for me to send you audio or Garage band versions of the loops used in this video.

3. Record yourself or a client (audio & video) playing or singing along to one or all of the loops (wear headphones so we don’t hear the loops in the background)

4. Send your loops back to me by March 31st to compile with any others we receive to make one master track and video to be released in April of this year!

5. Check back in April of 2013 and like what you hear (again :-)

*Remember, please have recording permission for any client material you plan to submit as the final video will be made public!”

My kids at NDSD were very excited about sharing this song with the world this year!  They had a blast seeing and listening to the contributions from last year, and we look forward to hearing from folks again this time around – maybe one of those folks could be YOU!!

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The Space Between: CONNECTing Music Therapy & Music Ed

Filed Under : Advocacy,Education by Natasha Thomas
Jan.12,2013

As I mentioned in last week’s post, this month is Music Therapy Social Media Advocacy Month.  What  I may not have mentioned last week was that not only are Music Therapists across the country participating in this project as bloggers, but hundreds of MT-BCs with Twitter accounts are spreading the word about our field there as well, under the hashtags #MTAdvocacy, #LoveMusicTherapy, and #FollowMTWeek.  The last tag is thanks to Ben Folds, the talented performing artist and all around amazing person I had the opportunity to meet at the 2011 American Music Therapy Association Conference.  He has been tagging to Music Therapy related blog posts and facts, even following every Music Therapist who would give him a shout-out on Twitter (including yours truly!)  Needless to say, this month is already shaping up to be a huge success!

In past years’ Advocacy posts, I set about to define Advocacy and what it has meant to me at various stages in my career.  In 2011 it was all about Legislative Recognition, and being part of making North Dakota the first EVER  State to have a Music Therapy License is an experience I’ll never forget.  In 2012, I took more of a look at what defines me as an Advocate, and how what I do as an MT-BC affects the advancement of my field and improving overall access to services by individuals across the across the country, which is our ultimate goal!  This year, I want to look more closely at the role collaboration plays in Music Therapy Advocacy, specifically the relationship between Music Therapy and Music Education.  As MT-BCs, we can spend so much of our time explaining to people how we are not Music Educators (i.e., that we don’t teach music, we use it as a tool for non-musical goals) that over time, we create this unintentional and seemingly uncrossable void between ourselves and a field that, particularly for myself as professional working in Special Education, we really need to be able to collaborate with.  And this can go both ways too: Music Educators who are not themselves educated on what Music Therapy is (or can be) can contribute to the void by attempting to conduct their own idea of “Music Therapy”, which can create issues of “territory” and scope of practice that end up with a resulting “you stay out of my sandbox, and I’ll stay out of yours” mentality.  But it doesn’t have to be that way.  Over the last year especially, I’ve found myself in situations where I really needed the insight of a music educator, and they really needed insight from me – the experience of working with the educators in my community to enhance the therapeutic goals I set for my clients every day has been one I hope that more of my colleagues in Music Therapy can get to enjoy at some point in their careers as well.  Here are some of the Do’s and Dont’s I’ve picked up as tools for effectively connecting with Music Educators:
1. DO communicate regularly with the Music Educators in your students’ lives. They may have themes they’re using in class that you could draw from, and you may have insights on how to manage difficult behaviors that they may never have heard before.
2. DON’T underestimate how busy Music Educators are.  With programs being cut across the country left and right, all of us who work in Music are feeling it, but Music Educators especially are stretched incredibly thin, and as a result may be difficult to reach or communicate with.  DON’T give up! DO be patient :-)
3. DO ask questions about how you can help, where the teacher’s comfort level is, etc., and respect any boundaries they may set.   I have some teachers who ask me to pop into their classroom from time to time, either to observe our shared students in class with them, or to meet with them personally outside of class. Some of the educators I work with ask that I not come into the classroom at all, and prefer to send me weekly “check-in” emails to let me know how my students are doing.  As an itinerant professional, I recognize that I am always in someone else’s space and not my own, so I always follow the educator’s lead and seek clarification where it is needed, though I will confess to a certain amount of prompting on my own part – sometimes educators may not know what you can do for them or how you can help, so asking questions like “What are your goals for this student?” or “What would you most like to see from this student in your class?” can help to open the gates to discussion how your expertise can be of use to the Music Educator (and vice versa!)
4. Lastly, DO keep yourself abreast of what’s going on in the world of Music Education however you can.  I enjoy perusing resources from Music K-8 whenever I have a spare moment (including this adorable song about fast and slow tempos put out by a Music k-8 project called Moobtoob – used it at the School for the Deaf just this week), and your state’s website will also include links to national and state standards for Music Education that can provide valuable insight into what educators around you might be trying to do for your students in those moments where they themselves may not be so easy to get ahold of.
So, in conclusion, successful collaboration between Music Educators and Music Therapists is the kind that is built on regular communication, mutual respect, patience, and the sharing of ideas.  I have found in my own practice that when I do this, my Braille Music students keep up better with their peers, and my students who are Deaf are able to experience more than if their Music Teacher and I had never talked at all.  It is through building these types of meaningful connections that Music Therapy, and ultimately the clients we serve, can thrive!

 Advocacy –> Recognition –> Access

Since 2005, the American Music Therapy Association and the Certification Board for Music Therapists have collaborated on a State Recognition Operational Plan. The primary
purpose of this plan is to get music therapy and our MT-BC credential recognized
by individual states so that citizens can more easily access our services. The
AMTA Government Relations staff and CBMT Regulatory Affairs staff provide
guidance and technical support to state task forces throughout the country as
they work towards state recognition. To date, their work has resulted in over 35
active state task forces, 2 licensure bills passed in 2011, 1 licensure bill passed
in 2012, and an estimated 7 bills being filed in 2013 that seek to create either title
protection or a licensure for music therapy. This month, our focus is on YOU and
on getting you excited about advocacy!

Still to come this month: the return of Loopy Stanley! And a guest post from a parent of a child receiving Music Therapy services.

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Music for Academic Enrichment

Filed Under : Braille Music,Early Childhood,Education,Family,General,Hearing Impairment,K-12,Visual Impairment by Natasha Thomas
Sep.18,2012

One, two, buckle my shoe…

Sound familiar?  This little nursery rhyme has been the center of a new unit of mine at both the School for the Deaf in North Dakota and our upcoming programming week at the School for the Blind here in Grand Forks.  Why? A few reasons:

1. the Counting concepts involved: this song is great for young children to practice counting from 1 to 10 (and I have a fun verse that goes backwards from 10 to 1 too!) not just for reciting the numbers in order, but remembering that order with interruptions (like the phrase “buckle my shoe” between the numbers 2 and 3).

2. the Rhythm and Rhymes: my students at NDSD find this song a good one for practicing their signing fluency, and I am able to address the issue of rhymes with my older and more aural students.  I can show them a variety of cards with pictures of objects like shoes, doors, and sticks on them and say “5, 6, pick up…” and then wait for them to point to the picture of the sticks.  Seems obvious to us who know the rhyme, but if you don’t, this can be a tricky concept! My students enjoy playing matching games to songs that rhyme.  At the School for the Blind we’ll be practicing playing the rhythm of the song with Braille Music notation, to focus more on the steady “Ta-Ta, Ti-ti-Ta” of the chant, and how that can be expressed on paper.

3. And lastly, impulse control.  This can be a fun song to start with singing or signing really slowly, and then speeding up each time you repeat it, but learning to control those giggles after each repeat is a skill we spend our whole lives developing, if you think about it – when something is fun, how do you transition to what’s next without too much disappointment or craziness?  This week I’ll be presenting for an early childhood class on using Music for transitions – may be another blog post here on the subject then too!

Until then, however, I have my grandparents in town this week and am enjoying spending some quality family time before Fall really kicks into high gear with the return of my travel rotation with the School for the Blind, resuming of the LISTEN Drop-In kids groups (hopefully the first Wednesday in October – yay!) and the American Music Therapy Conference, which will be coming up sooner than usual this year, and at which I’ll be presenting for my first ever National Conference! Lots to enjoy, be thankful for, and look forward to – much to learn as well!

Speaking of learning, one last AWESOME announcement: this week a new continuing education course by yours truly will be released on Music Therapy Ed.com on the subject of Music Therapy with the Blind and Deaf.  Some of the concepts I just discussed above will be included, as well as tons of info on the assessments I use in my work with NDSD and NDSB, and general information on using Music with individuals who are Visually Impaired or Hard of Hearing.  I could not be more excited about this or grateful to the amazing Kat Fulton for this opportunity, and I hope if this is a population or area of Music Therapy that is even remotely interesting to you that you’ll consider signing up for the course! It’s all online, available to you 24/7, and worth 5 CMTE credits.  It’s been an awesome experience creating the course and I look forward to hearing from students as they take it and seeing what they have to say about it – as much as I teach and advise in my profession, my clients and students teach and advise me every day!

So go out there and learn a little something new today – even better if you do it with music!

 

 

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“Seeing” Music Differently: 3 tips from the NDSB Braille Music Institute

Filed Under : Braille Music,Education,Other Special Populations,Visual Impairment by Natasha Thomas
Jul.19,2012

One of our NDVS/SB Braille Music Institute Students, listening to Beethoven on her computer – photo by John Stennes from a recent article in our local paper, the Grand Forks Herald (click here for link to full article)

 

This past week, as I mentioned in my last post, the North Dakota School for the Blind hosted it’s first ever Braille Music Institute.  During that time, we were lucky enough to have with us Bill McCann, founder and creator of the Dancing Dots company, which produces the Goodfeel Suite of software that can be used by and for Blind Musicians to produce what he calls “accessible scores,” or music that can be read by either a sighted or blind individual.  During our institute, students learned how to do this by scanning print music into a computer equipped with the program JAWS, a screenreader that collects print information and reads it aloud to the user.  From the scanned music, students were able to convert the lines and dots on the page to braille music that could be played back auditorally on their computer or read with their fingers through a tactile braille display below the regular keyboard.  We were also lucky enough to be able to purchase equipment called Limelighters, so our Low Vision students could additionally get their music enlarged on a touchscreen for easier reading and portability.

 

Image of a Student using a Limelighter, another piece of equipment our students were able to learn about this week. Runs the Goodfeel software with additional perks for enlarging music for low vision users to advance measure by measure with a foot pedal.

Screen Shot of the Computer program Sharp Eye, part of the Goodfeel Suite by Dancing Dots (click the image for link to website). On the lower part of the screen is the image of music scanned into the computer. In the upper part of the screen is the digitized, converted version in a playable, auditory and print format.

This is what the Braille looks like when converted digitally to an accessible format in the Goodfeel Software. Think of those toys you might’ve had as a kid where you could press your hand into pins and watch them raise up on the other side of the device – the pins on this display change their alignment phrase by phrase as the student moves their fingers along to the music.

As I’m sure you’ve gathered from the sheer girth of each photo’s captions alone, there’s a lot that these programs can do for users who are blind or low vision, and a lot that we did this week using them – far more than I could certainly go into detail about here!  In the four days students were on campus, they spent a total of 9 hours in direct instruction on music notation and transcribing technology,  visited two local theatres (attending an audio-described production of Oliver at one of them – very cool!), and had the opportunity to network with local peers from the Summer Performing Arts Company (SPA) about the challenges and rewards of pursuing a life full of music and art.  But I thought I’d share with you some of the basic things I learned this week about music for and by individuals who are visually impaired, in the form of 3 considerations you can make as an individual, student, educator, or therapist:

1. Never be afraid to move beyond your assumptions and ask an individual who is blind how their experience is going.  If you’ve ever found yourself working with a blind or low-vision student and wondering “Are they understanding this?” – that one consideration can mean the difference between an individual truly experiencing the music, and just “being there” for it.  If the individual you’re addressing is verbal use questions like “How is this going for you?” “What are you gathering from everything that’s happening?” or “Tell me what you’re hearing right now – what does that mean to you?”  and follow-up from their answers with confirmation or providing additional information (i.e., “Ok, you heard that – good! So did I – you might like to know that while that was happening, this was also going on,” etc.,) Frequent comprehension checks open the door to letting them express any concerns or gaps in understanding that they may be experiencing, as well as educating you on how they are learning and perceiving, so that you can adjust as is necessary and you are able.

2. If the individual you’re working with isn’t verbal, or you’ve determined that they aren’t getting everything there is, ask the question (either of yourself, or of them directly) “What do you think would make this easier to understand?”  Most likely, a verbal individual will tell you what would help (i.e., “if I could have a braille program telling me who the characters are, I might be able to better follow the relationships unfolding onstage.”).  If the individual isn’t verbal, think creatively.  What is the information they’re missing? Is it something that could be represented in a tactile, physical way? Or maybe an auditory one?  If so, are there adjustments you can make in that moment, or (like the Braille program example) is it something you’ll have to log away and remember to do next time?  Make whatever adaptations you can in the moment, and then confirm to the individual you’re working with that you’ll make further adjustments next time and thank them for their input.  Then it’s time to…

3. Locate the professionals near you that can help to make the necessary adjustments for the individual you are working with the experience a fuller understanding of whatever material you’re using.  Perhaps your local School for the Blind has an audio describer that can work with you like the one we found, providing descriptions of any visual information your client might miss via a microphone that they wear to communicate to the blind or low vision individual wearing the headset to hear them. Or perhaps you can contact someone about arranging an advance tour of the theatre or performance hall, so that the individual can get a sense of the layout or costumes before the show. Free-lance Braille transcribers operate all over the country as well, making reasonably priced Braille transcriptions of everything from menus to programs and more – many of them have websites or can be found via referral through calling your local school or other agency for the Blind.  Don’t ever let “well I can’t do it!” stop you from finding someone who can!

You might find these tips useful in a variety of scenarios. It never hurts to challenge the status quo and seek out the adaptations you need.  An internet search and a phonecall or two may well show you someone out there has had the same issues you do and found a solution!  Until I discovered the ND School for the Blind, I had no idea Braille Music was out there, or that so many students were hungry for it.  Now I know that the more tools and opportunities I discover to enhance my students’ learning, the more people I involve in the process, and the more places I can get to accommodate those people and opportunities, the more success my students will have – more people, more places, more often, more progress – and that goes for every individual I serve!

Coming soon: a look at the new journey I’m embarking on as a Music Therapist on vocal rest.  What I’m learning in my 8 weeks without singing (spoiler alert: it’s a lot!)

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Music as a Third Language

Filed Under : Adolescents,Bellydance,Education,General,Movement,Social Skills,Songwriting,Studio Music,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
Jul.9,2012

Hello and Happy July!  Hard to believe our last post was all the way at the end of MAY – quite the schedule I’ve been under lately, but so much fun information to share!  As I type this, we’re preparing for our first ever Braille Music Institute at the North Dakota School for the Blind, which I’ll be sharing more about as we get further into the week, but over the last month, my attention has been dedicated to something completely different: English Language Learners, also known as individuals learning English as a Second Language, or ESL Learners.  My work with this population came out of an experiment started last year by the popular Summer Performing Arts Company (SPA), which engages young students in the Grand Forks community from kindergarten through their highschool years in the performing arts (theatre, music, and dance).  Last year, the program pioneered their first ever sections of SPA specialized for ESL students (called ELL SPA) and students with Special Needs (which was called MY SPA).  I was fortunate enough to be asked to facilitate some drumming activities for ELL SPA at that time, and it was enough of a hit that they wanted me back this summer, this time to coordinate the whole of the ELL SPA program – quite an undertaking to be sure, but it’s been a tremendous learning and growing experience for me and one I hope to embark on again and again with these wonderful students as often as they’ll let me in future years!

The students in my two sections of ELL SPA (we met from 8am to 10:15, and 10:30 to 12:30) totaled 34 in number, with 30 of them from Nepal.  Our community has seen a huge influx in the number of refugees coming from Nepal, and some of the students I worked with had been in the country less than 2 months before starting our program, which ran from May 29th through the 3rd of July.  During the 2 hours I had each group for over the course of the month, we worked on everything from learning to play rhythms on the drums and chords on the guitar to writing a play, creating costumes and designing a set, and putting together a video presentation of their final performance to show everyone in the last week.  Our goals were to help students develop an understanding of the English Language and American culture through the performing arts, as well as provide them with opportunities for social interaction through sharing their own cultures with us and participating in activities that took them out of their own comfort zone and forced them to work together to achieve success.  One favorite game of our students for achieving this last goal was “The Blob.”  In this version of tag, one person is deemed “The Blob,” and tasked with chasing everyone else in the group.  When “The Blob” manages to reach someone and touch them, that person has to connect to them (either by linking arms or holding hands) and then together they have to tag the next person, who connects to them, and so on, and so on, until you have a giant “Blob” in which all members of the group are eventually “assimilated.”  We played this game in a large library (amazingly, without any major injuries – there were times when I wasn’t sure it was such a good idea!) but the game can also be played in small circles, with the movement of the group limited to small shuffling steps, or by blindfolding the members of the “Blob.”  Adaptations abound and the game is great fun to work on team work, while addressing issues of personal boundaries and freedom of movement.

This group was also the first one where my expertise in Bellydance was really able to combine with my job as a Music Therapist.  Many of my Nepali students were very interested in Bollywood, or East Indian Dance, which many Bellydancers study, so we had several “dance days” where I would bring in my hipscarves and props, and we would teach each other all the moves we knew, boys and girls alike, taking turns plugging our phones and other music-playing-devices into the speakers we were provided, and just enjoying the community of sharing with each other in music.  Those are days I’m going to miss for sure!

At the end of the summer, students shared that some of their favorite activities were the same as mine: playing games like the “Blob,” dancing in the library, and learning rhythms and chords to songs like Greenday’s Boulevard of Broken Dreams.  Many of them stated that they were proud of the work they had done, and I would have to agree with them as well: I was tremendously proud of all we were able to do in one short month, but above all it was my honor to be part of such an amazing group of international students, share in learning about their culture’s customs and traditions (and FOOD! Never again will I assume that salads can’t be spicy!)  All in all, this was a very new experience for me, but one I can’t imagine having a summer without!

I know I’ll be able to say the same about our Braille Music Institute coming up this week – students are just arriving now, and our special guest Bill McCann of Dancing Dots is hard at work preparing a demonstration of some of the software they’ll be learning to use to create music in both Print and Braille this week.  Already, I love the sound of sweet music coming from every corner of the building, from the Technology room to the Commons area – it may be a little hectic, but I wouldn’t have it any other way!

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Defining Music Therapy… in Residential Facilities

Filed Under : Abuse,Adolescents,Adult Wellness,Education,Emotionally Disturbed,Family,Hospitals,Mental Health,Other Special Populations,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
May.9,2012

There’s been a lot going on in the schools I serve lately – we’re hurtling towards the end of the academic year at the speed of light, it seems, and my kids at the ND School for the Blind and the ND School for the Deaf can’t seem to wait for summer to arrive!  It’s at times like these that my job focus starts to shift somewhat from the cognitive to the behavioral and emotional needs of my clients: change is coming, and that can be hard for anyone, with or without a disability.  So, each session begins with recapping how many sessions we have until there’s “No more Music Therapy” until next year.  “Three sessions left…two sessions left…one session left…See you next year!”

This, of course, is not the case for my residential clients.  On my caseload currently are 3 placements where I see clients only in their homes, not at school or anywhere else in the community.  These individuals are mostly adults with developmental disabilities, though one of my placements is an adolescent treatment facility where the clients live and go to school in the same building.  My role at those kinds of placements continues year round, so my focus is different than the schools I see, or places where young children are being prepared for school.  Where my school placements are focusing on academic concepts like colors, numbers, and letters, my residential facilities are geared more towards occupational skills that you use for daily life, like planning and sequencing, establishing and maintaining interpersonal relationships, and dealing with loss and other emotional disturbances.  When I come into my clients homes in environments like those I serve, I bring drums and my Ipad mostly, sometimes my guitar.  We spend some time listening to other music and talking about what it means (or could mean, some songs are more abstract than others – makes for good discussion!) or we just talk about what we like about it.  “Strengthening Emotional Vocabulary” is actually a goal at one of my placements – just learning new words for how to describe something is a valuable skill so you can learn how to speak appropriately and succinctly.  After we do a bit of listening, we engage in playing activities that require teamwork, like passing an instrument, or something more abstract like passing a beat (“you play, then I play” type of stuff).  It’s a lot like the community drum circles I lead – music making for stress relief and recreation.  We’ve talked here before about the importance of self-care.  Unstable mental health can so quickly become unstable physical health, and some of us need more support than others to make sure we’re taking care of ourselves!  That’s what I see as my primary role at the residential facilities I serve: a guide to self-care for my clients.

Some of the clients I see in their homes are so medically fragile that it may not seem like they’re doing much “caring” for themselves.  I’ve occasionally had people ask me where the “making” of music is happening with someone who, physically or otherwise, is incapable of grasping an instrument or making a sound. “Quality of Life” is a term you hear a lot used in many medical settings, and it’s a term I use heavily when I’m documenting sessions with my clients who have Severe Disabilities.  To me, someone who has a good Quality of Life is able to live as independently as their abilities allow them, and able to connect and share in day to day activities with people they care about and who care about them.   Sure, they may not strum the guitar without assistance or sing the words to every song with me, but when you commit yourself to getting to know someone through frequent time spent together, you notice the little ways they tell you what they want – a blink, a change in their breathing pattern, even an increase in salivation can mean “I’m paying attention, and I want more!”  – and for me, being able to help someone interact with another person on whatever  level works for them is not only magical, but meaningful and crucial to them having the best Quality of Life that they can.  I welcome the experience of working with an individual for whom I might have to look a little deeper for clues into what they like and don’t like – it’s well worth the effort to get to know another human being on this earth!

Next week we wrap up this little series with a look at Music Therapy with Community Centers, specifically my work with the LISTEN Drop-In Center and their free Family Music Group, which I’m off to right now!  Then I’m rehearsing with the ladies of the Lovely Dozen and 12 Houses Bellydance for our stage show this weekend – sure to be a rockin’ end to our first full week in May!  Before you know it, Summer will be here!

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Defining Music Therapy (con’t)…within Deaf Culture

Filed Under : Education,Hearing Impairment by Natasha Thomas
Apr.25,2012

The other day I was introduced to video of a Deaf Rapper, who goes by the name of Signmark, performing at NYU (you can find the video here).  In the video, a young Music Therapy student says something that really caught my attention:

“I hope that what [people] get from events like this, is not just knowing that people who are Deaf like Music, but people who are Deaf have this huge culture that we’ve not really understood or paid attention to.”

Many of us have heard the phrase “Deaf Culture”, and thought it just to be a community of people who are Deaf, but that is only partially true.  The reason for the use of the word “Culture” is more appropriate than we give it credit for here – there really is a Culture of beliefs and practices unique to the world of people who identify themselves as Deaf that doesn’t exist in our hearing world.  As such, interactions may literally seem “foreign” to those of us outside of it, but while I think that may lead some folks to believe that people who are Deaf don’t enjoy the same things hearing people do – music in particular – it couldn’t be further from the truth!

Have you ever heard the phrase “Music is Universal?”

I always like to define my personal take on this phrase to people as, Music is “universal” in the sense that every culture has a musical language, but it is not “universal” in the sense that all cultures use the same language – I believe every culture has its own unique way of expressing itself through music, and that those ways may not necessarily translate between each other in a way that any person from any culture can understand the music of any other one.  Let’s apply this to Deaf Culture.  In the hearing world, music is something we primarily hear and listen to – the rise of music videos  recently (as in, the last 20 years “recently”) have made music something we enjoy seeing too, but overall the music that is popular today always involves a vocalist – we find and identify artists who resonate with us based on the lyrics that come out of their mouths and they way that they vocally express themselves – that is our musical language.  In Deaf Culture, music relies less on what we listen to, and more on what we see and feel.  Though individuals who are Deaf also look to a song’s lyrics to identify with the artist performing them, they see, rather than hear, the words performed in ASL (American Sign Language) – that is their language. One thing is certain, though, even if a person is profoundly Deaf, they can feel the beat in their own bodies just as truly as someone who is hearing does.

When I showed my students at the ND School for the Deaf (NDSD) the video of Signmark performing with his vocal interpreter, in addition to one of his own music videos you can find here, they first greeted it with confusion.  One of them even asked me “How did he learn to sign so fast?”  thinking that Signmark was interpreting his interpreter! When I told them that Signmark was Deaf, and that he was the one being interpreted, the students reacted with such excitement!  Here was an artist they could officially call “theirs,” someone who not only came from, but shared with the world, their culture in just as cool a way as all the artists they had heard of day in and day out in their mainstream schools, but had long struggled to understand.

So, what was my role in all this?  As a hearing person, I first of all recognize that I will always be on the fringes of Deaf Culture – someone who is very close to it, but still truly on the outside looking in.  So, I see myself and the Music Program at NDSD as a bridge to help close the gap between my students’ existing musical understanding and the culture of music that exists both within and outside of themselves and their own culture.  My youngest students start with extra time spent learning songs like “Twinkle Twinkle” and the “ABC’s,” songs that are so familiar to us growing up, but that teachers and parents often avoid with children who are Deaf because they think they won’t get anything out of it – but they do!  There are so many academic concepts included in music, and no matter how profound the hearing loss, children still enjoy the feeling of a beat.  You can sing the song while they hold a hand to your neck to feel the air forming the sound of your voice, or tap a beat on a drum that they can feel and share in the making of music to as well.  The older my students get, the more we focus on the phenomena of music itself, how artists have helped shape the history of our country and the cultures within it, including Deaf culture.  Learning about artists like Signmark are good for us hearing folks too, to recognize how far people who are Deaf have come and struggled to be recognized as having the same creative and intuitive prowess that any other person has, as they’ve always had, but haven’t always been recognized.  It’s humbling to say the least, but it’s a lesson anybody can learn – you can never assume that the people you interact with in this world, no matter their ability or disability, have or don’t have the same understandings as you do – that’s why the constant pursuit of knowledge and creative expression is so important.

To that end, it’s been my exciting pleasure to be on what I consider to be a Continuing Education Cruise, with lots of presentations this past month (and more to come!) on Music Therapy in the field of both Visual and Hearing impairment – it’s been a pleasure to share with events like the Dakota Chapter AER conference and the ND School for the Blind’s Family Weekend this past Saturday, talking to people about what Music Therapy is and how it can help them, and I look forward to sharing more in places like Kat Fulton’s Music Therapy Ed, which debuts July 1st (and you better believe when that website opens, I’ll be there taking a class or two as well as teaching one!)  It’s the true mark of a good field when it requires those who practice it to be constantly reinforcing and building their education with continued coursework and proof of progress.  It’s my joy to be able to say I choose a good one!

In the next few weeks, we’ll look more closely at some of my work with Adults who have Developmental Delays and Family Music Groups for Infants and Toddlers.  Until then, if you’re in the Grand Forks area, stop by 12 Houses for our Drum Circle Saturday, April 28th, at 7pm, or come take in a family-friendly, full costume and lights performance by 12 Houses Bellydance May 11th at the Firehall Theatre – if you aren’t in the area, take in a live performance or active music making experience near you – even better if it’s a little something you hadn’t heard of before!

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“Having” a Good Ear, “Being” a Good Listener

Filed Under : Adolescents,Advocacy,Early Childhood,Education,Family,General,K-12,Sensory Integration,Social Skills,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
Nov.7,2011

My how time flies!  Halloween has come and gone, Christmas lights are up in some neighborhoods already, and with Thanksgiving approaching, family is on many peoples’ minds.  This is the month that I choose to highlight family and friends in my sessions – themes on on the value and maintenance of important relationships abounds.  Communication is just one part of any healthy relationship.  In the last post I highlighted the teenage population, particularly the types of song lyrics they identify with and the language they use to express their feelings to the world around them.  In this post I’d like to take a look at how we as human beings listen to each other.  I’m a firm believer that in order to be a good communicator, you must not only be good with words, but good with your ears too!

In music, you often hear folks use the phrase “good ear.”   To have a “good ear” usually means that the individual is capable of discerning individual notes and other musical concepts sufficiently without needing the music in front of them – they hear it, they play it.  That intermediate step of reading the music notation isn’t always necessary for someone with a “good ear.”  It’s a skill that you can be born with or learn – it’s something the user possesses.

In life, you’ll rarely hear it solely put that someone “has” good listening skills – you’ll hear the phrase “they’re a good listener.”  Note the more active phrase there – someone can “have” a good ear, but they have to “be” a good listener.  Listening is more active than hearing.  Hearing happens, listening is done.

There are many things musicians do to strengthen their ears -  Music students at major universities actually take entire classes built around the concept of “Aural Skills”.  They practice listening to increasingly complex pieces, notating, labeling, and reproducing what they hear or read, over and over again, in order to strengthen their musical listening skills.  As Music Therapists, we can utilize some of these same concepts to assist our clients in developing real world listening skills. Here are some of my favorite exercises for helping my clients become good listeners:

For Infants/Toddlers – The “Cookie Sheet” Game

Developing good listening skills can start so young and with the simplest activities – as infants and toddlers strengthen their fine motor skills, they drop things.  Eventually they all enter an intentional “dropping” stage, a stage where they’re dropping everything off the edge of their high chairs or taking things out of their toy bins just for the sake of taking them out.  The “Cookie Sheet” Game involves just putting a cookie sheet or drum on the floor in the place where the student is prone to drop things.  When items hit it, they’ll create a fun little sound, and you can react with your own verbal imitation of the sound (“poof!” for soft items or “boom!” for loud ones, for example). This version of the game should be used with students in the incidental stages of “dropping” – once it starts to become an intentional thing, you’ll want to move on to verbally labeling your child’s actions in advance of them dropping them, otherwise you risk this “dropping” game becoming a “throwing” one!  Start to encourage your child to discriminate between two objects, one that makes a loud noise and one that makes a soft sound by first dropping one item and guiding them to visually imitate you with an identical item.  That way you can stay in control of the game, and your child begins to develop an understanding of the concept you’re trying to teach: distinguishing between sounds.

For School Age Kids – the “What’s in my Bag?” Game

Once students are able to start labeling sounds and the things that make them themselves, I like to move on to a little instrument discrimination game – I’ll show kids an array of instruments that all make different sounds.  I’ll set one of each of those kinds of instruments in front of them, and then hide one of each behind a barrier or, as the name of this game suggests, in a bag.  So, the students can see what the instruments look like on the floor in front of them, but they aren’t allowed to touch them.  They are only to point to whichever instrument they think I’m playing once I start making sound from behind the barrier or within the bag.  If they’re right, they get to play that instrument!

Musical Telephone

I’ve mentioned this game before in a previous post – it’s just like that Telephone Game you play as a child, one person starts a rhythm on one side of the room, taps it on the shoulder of the person to one side of them, and that person passes the rhythm down to the person on their other side, and so on, all the way around the circle.  At the end of the rotation you find out if the rhythm that the last person to receive it plays is the same as the one the original sender intended.  Here we start to get to the real crux of being a good listener – really paying attention to what’s being said to you so that you can pass it along to someone else.

From this game (Musical Telephone) I like to move forward into tying listening and talking together with a game like “Echo and Create.” In that game, a student has to accurately repeat a rhythm played to them by one of their peers, and then they have the opportunity to create their own rhythm that another peer will imitate.  It really ties it all together – listening and sharing come together the way they do in real life.  No one lives in a bubble – we all have to communicate, totally, listening and speaking.  Just having a “good ear” is not enough – listening is an active process, and we demonstrate that we are listening by how we respond, verbally or otherwise.

Communication, and how it impacts our relationships with family and friends, is one of my favorite topics for use with my clients.  I’m a natural stickler for communication in my day to day life, and it brings me joy to help others find fresh avenues for communicating with those around them.  Later this month I’ll have the opportunity to attend the American Music Therapy Association‘s conference in Atlanta – Advocacy will be a major theme, with our organization celebrating 2 states that passed Music Therapy Liscensure this year (North Dakota being one of them!)  It’s through effective communication and education of our peers that this has been possible, and I look forward to what I know will be an eventful week of learning and sharing!  Look for blog posts from Atlanta to come soon!

What are your favorite “Communication” based games?  Feel free to share them here or on Twitter!

 

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Censoring and Music Therapy

Filed Under : Abuse,Adolescents,Adult Wellness,Advocacy,Education,Family,Mental Health,Social Skills,Songwriting,Technology,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
Oct.28,2011

NOTE: in the post below, you’ll find hidden a new video I’ve uploaded for submission to the American Music Therapy Association for their Montage on videos answering the question: What is Music Therapy.  See if you can find it in one of the links in today’s post!

Over the past few weeks I’ve been working on a Song Writing Project with some of my Teen Groups.  This is one of the “Templates” I work from with this population.  Over the course of 6 weeks, we choose and listen to music from a particular genre, discuss what makes it what it is (in this case it was rap music) and what makes a “good song” to listen to, before delving into the studio (I make use of my husband’s home recording equipment – he runs FL Studio, and Sony’s Acid, equipped with Autotune and a variety of other fun tools on his PC) to create our own song or collection of beats, as one particular group opted to do.  Here’s what they determined to be quintessential of “good” rap music:

1.  A Balanced Beat (with a booming bass, but some high sounds too – students talked about the “cool factor” of using what they considered “novelty” instruments like organs to accent the standard kick drum or 808 sound that we’re all accustomed to as a low tone)

2. A Pleasing Vocal Quality – a tone that’s gentle on the ear but clear.

3. “Flow” – this sparked an interesting discussion: just what IS “Flow”?  My students told me that Flow is how everything comes together in Rap Music – the percussion, the melody, the vocals.  It needs to sound like all the pieces fit effortlessly.  They assured me they know when a piece ain’t got Flow!

4. Honest “Real” Language – these were some students’ actual words.  At first they just said “Language,” and when I asked them what they meant, they elaborated that cursing and profanity was “Honest” and “Real.”  I remember sitting back in my chair for a moment and thinking.  I asked “What makes cussing real?”  And we got to talking.   And I got to thinking.  Interestingly enough, other Music Therapists have been talking about this too – I’ve got 9 emails on the topic in my inbox from the Music Therapy Listserv to prove it!  This is a hot topic for a lot of parents and other professionals as well.  We want our students to be able to listen to music that they enjoy and that moves them, but a lot of the Rap Music that makes it out into the mainstream is loaded with profanity and cursing that many people find offensive.  We may only hear a third of it on the radio, but it’s there on Itunes and the CD’s we buy, and it’s being preferred by many teens to over music with cleaner lyrics.  So why?

My students have told me that when you grow up in certain neighborhoods and lifestyles, cursing is part of who you are, and if you make the choice to censor yourself, you make the choice to change who you are for other people, and that makes you less “real.” 

Hmmm….

Am I a fan of profanity? No.  Do I agree with my clients’ beliefs on it making you more “real”?  I don’t know.  Do I believe that there can be songs out there that contain both profanity AND a positive message? YES!

There are some great songs out there with positive messages (some tracks off Eminem’s recent “Recovery” album come to mind here) that contain excess amounts of profanity, but it seems more often than not that it’s used to emphasis the negativity of where the singer has come from and the magnitude of their resolve to change.  My personal belief has always been that profanity draws the focus of people from what you’re saying to how you’re saying it – meaning they listen to your words, but not your message.  I always require of my students that when they’re speaking to me and each other in sessions they find ways of addressing us that are honest while still being respectful of the rules where we are and the fact that some of us might not want to hear profanity.  I find this is a general good skill for them to strengthen: finding multiple ways to say the same thing – to say it effectively and with personal attention to your audience.  That’s what really gets your message heard!

When it comes to music, though, I recognize that sometimes there may not be another song that says what a client needs to say when they feel their own voice isn’t enough.  I have some facilities that have clear cut rules on profanity, and for those placements I adhere to those rules, but when a placement doesn’t have such rules, all I ask when a client presents a song for the group to listen to is that they provide me with a reason why they like it – it can be anything, lyrics, the beat, so long as they can show me they have put conscious thought into what they’re suggesting.  It’s like that old weight-loss tip you hear to put the fork down in between bites of food.  It’s such a little thing, but giving yourself the split second to think – do I need this? – can make the difference between gaining a pound and losing a pound.  It’s all about actively attending and taking the time to listen to your needs, and the needs of those around you.  That’s the ultimate message I try to leave my clients with – I don’t want to bog them down with “my” opinion or “my” feelings.  I want them to form their own and use their own voices while still maintaining an awareness of how they do so and how it affects others.

Whew! A little deep for a Friday post, huh?

I love working with my Teenagers because they make me think about things like this.  They challenge my counseling skills too!  It’s one of those areas of my Music Therapy training I never thought I’d use this much, but I’m glad I do!  I hope that this weekend you’ll take some time to think about the language you use and listen to, and why you use it as well.  If you’ve got kids, use the music they listen to as an opportunity to talk about language, and the powerful tool that it is.

Body language is it’s own thing too – observe this segue in action! – if you’d like to take a break from talking and see some dancing this weekend (ta-da!) check out the 12 Houses Bellydance “Hafla” this Saturday (Oct 29th) starting at 5:30pm with free food, and dancing from artists across the states of North Dakota and Minnesota (including yours truly!) starting at 7pm – it looks to be a great time! 2017 Demers Ave (next to Dakota Boy’s Ranch).  If you’re more in the mood for listening, UND’s Music Department has tons of great stuff coming up this week – check out their web calendar for more information.

ps: did you find the video hidden in today’s post? :-)

Whatever you do this weekend, be mindful of what you say and how you say it – with your voice or your body.   It’s worth the effort!

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Musical “Stratagies” for Learning

Filed Under : Adolescents,Autism,Early Childhood,Education,Family,General,K-12,Other Special Populations,The Therapeutic Process by Natasha Thomas
Oct.19,2011

As a Grad Student who recently survived Mid-Terms, there are a myriad of phrases and definitions running through my mind on a daily basis lately.   My Special Education studies are all about students in Individualized Education Plans, or IEPS: how to identify, assess, and ultimately, how best to serve their needs.   I completed my first Functional Vision Evaluation last week and now am on to the “Remediation” section of my coursework – the point at which I’ve learned all there is to know about the identifying factors of certain disabilities (in this case involving Vision) and how to assess specific deficits, and now I must begin learning how to target and treat individual needs.  The phrase “Instructional Strategies” has become key here, and I’ve found myself applying it to my everyday practice as a Music Therapist as well.

So What is an “Instructional Strategy?”

Just what it sounds like: an Instructional Strategy is a strategy for teaching or learning.  You can Google “Instructional Strategies” and you’ll find a wealth of information on different school districts and specific strategies they utilize to both teach their classes and show that students are understanding what they’ve learned.  Strategies for teaching and learning can be incredibly basic, like the 5-1 or 10-2 principles (where the instructor teaches a concept for 5 or 10 minutes, and the students get 1 0r 2 minutes to reflect what they’re learning before the next 5 0r 10 minute cycle of teaching begins), or they can be more complicated, like the application of Applied Behavioral Analysis , which is itself an instructional strategy that many people have heard of and requires its own level of training for an individual to administer it.

Here are some of my favorite Musical “Strategies,” based on the “Instructional” models I’ve been learning lately:

Active Learning: This is an incredibly basic principle where a student is engaged at their developmental and interest level with hands-on, “authentic” materials.  For me this means if we’re going to do a unit on fruit and vegetables, I have shakers that look like fruits and vegetables, I have picture icons of each fruit and vegetable, and I have actual fruits and vegetables that I will bring to more actively  engage the student in the learning process.  My students love the music of shaking the shakers, but they learn more about what the actual items are when they have something to compare each one to.  All the better if we can eat the food after we play with it!

Chanting: also called “Choral Reading” or “Choral Response,” even when used outside of music, I like to use rhythmic speech to reinforce learning of particular concepts, especially rules.  Even my students at School for the Deaf like to “rap” every now and again about following directions in class!  This is also an opportunity to help make “Social Stories,” another Instructional Strategy commonly used with students who have Autism, easier to remember.

Part to Whole: this is a branch from a huge tree of Instructional Strategies on how specifically you teach something.  Some of my older students have expressed interest in the Recorder, Piano, and Guitar.  All very different instruments, but all of them can be accessed using Western Music Notation – so, we’re teaching our students about notation part-to-whole, i.e., they are learning about one part of notation at a time, then how it applies as a whole to any of the three instruments they’re interested in.  We’ve focused on just rhythm thus far without a staff, which can be applied to strum patterns on the guitar.  Next, we’ll be talking about the scale, which can be applied to the recorder and piano.  With each part that we learn, a whole becomes easier to understand.  I mentioned this strategy was part of a larger “tree.”  You can also teach concepts each one of these concepts may seem incredibly simple by definition, but it’s in  the process of defining them that you discover new depths of teaching and learning.  Just what “parts” haven’t I taught yet?  What other “parts” are out there?  Suddenly you’re reaching out in a way that is more focused on just how your students and clients are learning.

Closure is one of the most important Instructional Strategies – building in time to say Goodbye and process the learning that has occurred.  Depending on the abilities of my students this could be an actual discussion of what we learned that day, or for lower functioning classes I’ll sing an actual song titled “What did we do today?” in which students have to answer questions about the visual schedule we’ve been following for the class’s activities that day.  Those groups always close with a Goodbye song that acknowledges each student individually by name, giving them time to say Goodbye or something they liked about Music today.

Again, these strategies may seem incredibly simple and obvious, but remember that the real value in them comes from defining how you’re reaching your students, clients, and children, not just what you’re doing.  It’s important to check in every once and a while and ask yourself just how you know what you’re doing is effective – write it down, make a plan, give it your own catchy name, as long as you’ve thought it through it’s bound to have a more profound effect than if you hadn’t!

This week in Grand Forks:

Saturday October 22nd we’ll be having our monthly 12 Houses Drum Circle – bring your own drum or drums will be provided. This is a free, family friendly event so we hope to see you there at 7:00! 2017 Demers Ave or join the conversation about this post and other events on line. Either way this weekend is looking to be a good time!

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