Playing the ukulele makes me happy. It reminds me of summertime and being at the beach. Do you get that same feeling when you play? Recently, I started ukulele lessons with a three-year-old. It's been fun to come up with a short lesson structure for this age group, and the lessons have been going very well. [...]
There is nothing more frustrating than when you're leading a session, singing with enthusiasm, trying your hardest, and look out to see a group of children with...blank stares. No participation, they're just sitting there. You've spent hours preparing, hours practicing, and...nada. Not a good feeling, am I right? During my twelve years working as a [...]
I don’t know about you, but I was pretty excited to hear that American Idol was coming back on the airwaves in 2018. (Don't be ashamed if you were too!) I’ve watched on and off throughout the years since it began in 2001 and have always loved the show. I’ve tried watching the other vocal [...]
It's been a while since I've been on the blog to write! My family went on a Spring Break trip at the end of March (to St. Pete Beach and to see "real" mermaids at Weeki Wachee Springs!) and I've been playing catch up ever since we returned. But, I am very happy to be [...]
One of the most classic music therapy interventions is Musical Jeopardy. It's familiar, inviting, engaging and fun. Perfect for a practicum student, intern or seasoned clinician to facilitate. Every year I come up with a new version of this game and use it as I'm getting to know my new groups and clients, and assess [...]
Yesterday, something happened in one of my sessions that stopped me in my tracks. Now I've been a music therapist for twelve years (!!), and very little surprises me at this point. But on this particular day, I was facilitating a localization exercise with my clarinet in the resource classroom for students with severe and profound [...]
I've been on a session planning kick lately. Even though I have almost thirteen years (!!) of session plans saved up I still love coming up with new ideas, writing new songs and thinking of more creative ways to help my clients meet their goals. Lately, my three-year-old daughter has been really into the Nutcracker. She's [...]
I've been watching the weather and I see that in other parts of the country it's snowing and there were sub-zero temperatures last night! It's hard to believe that winter is going on in other parts of the country and world, because here in Miami it's 75 and sunny. (To be fair, we endure a [...]
If you follow my blog (and E-Book series), you know I love a good musical game. As soon as I mention we're playing a "game" at the start of a session, I immediately have my clients hooked and excited. Musical games are great in that you can sneak in work on lots of different goal [...]
I returned home late Sunday night from the National Music Therapy Conference in St. Louis, MO. I had so much to tell my husband that I didn't fall asleep until midnight (which for someone who has had a rough go with sleep this past year that's saying a lot!) I had a wonderful time that [...]
