Friendship Circle is one of my favorite programs to work with. It is an incredible organization that provides services for children and teens with autism, as well as the opportunity for them to make friends and work on social skills in a supportive environment.

I work with Friendship Circle by providing group music therapy services for their Children’s Circle (ages 3-8), Tween Scene (ages 9-12) and Teen Scene (ages 13+).

I LOVE working with these groups because they always keep my on my toes and give me inspiration for continually creating new ideas.

Since I know there are not a lot of resources out there for music therapists working with tweens and teens, I’ve compiled my best ideas into three E-Books (Tuneful Teens 1 & 2 and The Rap Pack for Teens) and a 5-hour CMTE Course called Tune In To Teens.

Be sure to check those resources out if you’re in need of some inspiration when it comes to session planning!

To wrap up the school year, the Friendship Circle groups performed in a Morning of Talent at the beautiful Pinecrest Gardens in Miami.

Here are some pictures from the performances (all shared with parental permission):

Teen Scene did a performance of The Friendship Rap with their own original lyrics:

(PS – Music therapists you can grab the PDF with lyrics and instructions for this intervention plus a free Rap Track MP3 by clicking HERE).

Tween Scene performed “My Body Makes Music” (and these two girls sang like SUPER STARS!!)

Children’s Circle performed “Red is Rojo,” a song to teach the colors in English & Spanish, using multicolored scarves:  

It has been a fantastic year and the Morning of Talent was a great way to bring together everything we’d been working on.

I’m looking forward to starting my seventh year working with the Friendship Circle come this Fall!

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Empathy.
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the definition of empathy is: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.

I decided to explore this concept with a group of adolescents I work with in Miami. The inspiration for this idea came from The Mosaic Project, an incredible organization that works to promote a peaceful future by uniting young children of diverse backgrounds and exploring the concepts of empathy and tolerance.

They have an excellent collection of songs that I listen to in my car all the time :) AND use during my music therapy sessions. My favorites? “It’s All Right to Cry,” “Don’t Laugh at Me,” and “We Are the Mosaic.” But who am I kidding, they’re all fantastic and lend themselves to concepts that we frequently address with our clients.

Since social emotional skills are one of the main goal areas I target with this teen group, I used “The Empathy Song” as a springboard for lyric analysis and discussion.

Want to know the procedure and questions I use during the music therapy session to facilitate this discussion?

Then check out this resource ~ Tuneful Teens 2: MORE Creative Ideas for Engaging Adolescents in Music Therapy. In it, I share MANY MORE ideas similar to this one, as well as activity templates and sheet music!

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Love is in the air!

I’ll admit that I am a big holiday person. Now that Valentine’s Day is around the corner, I’m excited to be implementing my themed activities for this holiday of love. (Too cheesy?)

My previous post was about Valentine’s BINGO, a musical game I use with my tween and teen clients. Be sure to check out that post so you can see how to access the template and use the game in your sessions right away!

Today, I want to share a Valentine’s Day songwriting activity that I implemented yesterday with my group at Friendship Circle of Miami. I used the song “Put a Little Love in Your Heart” by Jackie deShannon as a template and left blanks for the group to fill in.

My very large post-it paper looked like this:

________________________________________

Put a little love in your heart

________________________________________

Put a little love in your heart

And the world will be a better place (repeat)

For you, and me, just wait and see!

I like this song because it’s catchy and has just enough repetition.

Most of the group had heard the song before and the rest caught on quickly. I sang through the original song so they could hear the melody and flow of the song. Then, I asked for lyrics to fill in that had to do with love or friendship.

This is what they came up with:

We love the Friendship Circle, it’s a great place to be

Put a little love in your heart

Music and art and crafts, yoga and sports and dance

Put a little love in your heart!

And the world will be a better place (repeat)

For you, and me, just wait and see!

You are my friend you see, I will give love to you

Put a little love in your heart

Valentine’s Day if here, come on and spread your cheer,

Put a little love in your heart!

And the world will be a better place (repeat)

For you, and me, just wait and see!

I was very impressed with the lyrics they came up with!

One of the group members had just started a new relationship, so he had a lot of feelings to draw from (hence Verse 2!). We sang the song through a few times and they were very happy with how it all turned out.

Next time we meet, I am going to record them on GarageBand and send the MP3 to each of them so they can keep their work. Very meaningful for them!

What are YOUR favorite Valentine’s Day themed interventions?

* Looking for more inspiration for your adolescent groups? You’ll want to check out this resource ~ Tuneful Teens: Creative Ideas for Engaging Adolescents in Music Therapy *

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I am a BIG fan of using musical games in my music therapy session. I use these games to facilitate social interaction and work on group cohesion with my school-age and teen clients.

Today’s post is about one of my favorite creations…Valentine’s Day BINGO (aka HEART)! Here’s how it works:

1. CREATE
First, create various BINGO cards (but instead of BINGO at the top, you’ll write HEART). Each square has a different “love song.” Then, you can use a special hole punch to make little pink hearts to use as markers. Check out Tuneful Teens: Creative Ideas for Engaging Adolescents in Music Therapy for the template. It’s all ready for you to print and use!

2. PLAY
On the day of the session, divide your group into three teams and provide each with a different HEART card. Then, sing and play each song listed on the card. Your clients or students will mark each song as they hear it with a little pink heart marker. Once they get five across, down, or diagonal they have won HEART! (Although we always say – “Everyone’s a winner!”)

This game was a huge hit last year and I look forward to playing again this year!

* Looking for more inspiration for your adolescent groups? You’ll want to check out this resource ~ Tuneful Teens: Creative Ideas for Engaging Adolescents in Music Therapy *

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One of the places where I provide music therapy is the Chabad Center of Kendall’s Friendship Circle.

Friendship Circle is a place where children and teens with disabilities can come to take part in a variety of activities: karate, yoga, gymnastics, dance, art, music therapy, and more.

Each child and teen is paired with a buddy (a high school volunteer) who participates in all the activities with them.

I love working at the Friendship Circle for many reasons, one of them being that I get to design interventions for an older population. I have the chance to think “outside of the box” musically, learn pop songs, and think of creative ways to facilitate interaction between the group members and their buddy.

The idea of the Guess the Weather Activity came from my former intern, Patricia Chaviano, who is now a full time music therapist working for Seasons Hospice in Miami (yay Patricia!) This is how I ran the activity for the teens –

Guess the Weather

1. I printed out two pictures of each kind of weather condition: sun, rain, lightning (for thunder), rainbow, wind, and snow.

2. I then split the group into two. Each group was given the same set of weather pictures. Next, I told the group I was going to play various songs. Their job was to listen carefully and guess the kind of weather being sung about in each song. As soon as they knew they the answer, they were to place the picture with that type of weather in the middle of the circle.

3. I then played various songs (and encouraged them to sing along if they knew it):
– SUN: “You Are My Sunshine” or “Here Comes the Sun” by the Beatles
– RAIN: “Singing in the Rain” by Gene Kelly; “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” by Perry Como; “Umbrella” by Rhianna; or “Who’ll Stop the Rain” by Creedence Clearwater Revival
– THUNDER: “Thunder Rolls” by Garth Brooks
– RAINBOW: “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” by Judy Garland
– WIND: “Blowin in the Wind” by Bob Dylan or “She’s Like the Wind” by Patrick Swayze (from Dirty Dancing)
– SNOW: “Let it Snow”

4. This group LOVED playing in teams, coming up with a team name, and gaining points in order to win. So, I awarded one point for each correct piece of information:
– Correct answer (identifying the correct weather condition)
– Correct song title
– Correct artist
– Correct decade the song was written

Musical Rainstorm

5. For the second part of the activity, I split the group into three. One group was given rainsticks and drums (with light fingers tapping) to sound like RAIN. One group was given wind chimes and drums (with palm across the top) to sound like WIND. One group was given thunder tubes and drums to sound like THUNDER.

6. We practiced having each group play only when the picture of their weather condition was placed in the middle of the circle (once they understood the directions this was done without talking).

7. I then sang my original song “A Rainstorm is Coming.” The lyrics of the song and the pictures cued each group to play and stop at the correct time, creating a musical rainstorm.

These two activities were very effective in facilitating listening skills, attention, and peer interaction. I would love to hear some other ideas for songs that highlight different kinds of weather.

Want MORE creative ideas for engaging teens in music therapy? Check out the Tuneful Teens series to inspire your creativity:

Image: graur codrin / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Image: Jennifer Ellison / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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