I am on a mission!

A mission to figure out how to use those “not-so-therapeutic” client-preferred songs and artists purposefully in our sessions.

So far, I’ve shared how you could use those songs during Name That Tune with a Twist and during Pop Music Relaxation experiences.

Today, I’m sharing an idea I came up with during covid when all my sessions were virtual.

I had to figure out how to connect with my tween and teen clients across the computer screen.

So, I started coming up with Mini Musical Bios and turned them into a game of Guess Who.

I started with a list of a few of my clients’ favorite singers and bands.

For each one, I created a PDF with pictures and factoids about that singer or band – one factoid and picture per page.

I made them large and colorful and visually appealing.

Each factoid was a clue to see if my clients could guess who the singer or band was.

I tried to include a mix of basic info, such as “I am a singer-songwriter, filmmaker, and former professional surfer” and little known facts that might stump even the biggest fans, such as “I’m an environmentalist and care deeply about the world’s oceans.”

At the end of the PDF, I’d ask my clients to try to guess who the singer or band was.

Click here to download a FREE PDF Mini Musical Bio for Meghan Trainor!

This was a great way to encourage communication skills amongst my clients.

Following this, we would move into a musical experience that included a song by that singer or band. It could be music and movement, singing, instrument playing, etc – the possibilities are endless!

This was a great way to keep my middle and high school music therapy clients engaged and excited about coming to our sessions.

Did this idea help or spark something for you?

Keep that spark alive! Now through August 31, 2025, you can sign up for Elevate at a discounted rate AND with some awesome bonus material.

Elevate is an email idea subscription designed to help you infuse creativity and FUN into your sessions with school-age & teen clients with autism & related disabilities. You’ll earn 10 pre-approved CMTE credits per package.

These resources will super charge you and get you ready for your music therapy sessions and classes this Fall.

There are three packages to choose from: the Teen Package, the Attention/Perception Package, or The Holidays & Themes Package.

Each package is approved by the Certification Board for Music Therapists (CBMT) for 10 continuing education credits.

You’ll receive an email with new musical experience ideas in your inbox each month for six months.

Click here to sign up for Elevate now through August 31st, so you can take advantage of the discounted rate AND bonus material: Keeping Things Cool for Your Teen Clients in Music Therapy.

In this bonus PDF, you’ll get:

• Where to hang out to find new music for teens
• Great pop songs for movement with teens (2025 edition!)
• How to keep things age appropriate and cool
• Why & how to use client preferred music

The post Using Not-So-Therapeutic Songs Therapeutically: Mini Musical Bios (+ FREEBIE!) appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

In a previous blog post, I shared one of my favorite brand new ideas (for either virtual or in-person learning) – Hip Hop Meets Classical.

If you haven’t checked out that post, do it now! It is sure to be a hit with your school-age and teen clients (and is also a great way to work on those auditory perception skills I talk so much about.)

The virtual idea I’m going to share about today is Musical Games.

So fun. So engaging. So many goals that can be worked on.

I’ve found virtual sessions to be the perfect platform for musical games, especially Name That Tune. It is SO easy to access the instrumental tracks for the songs, as well as the full (clean) versions on YouTube.

Here’s how we play Virtual Name That Tune:

I start by making a list of all my students’ favorite musical artists and songs (this info I gather in our first session working together, and every few weeks after that, since teen musical preferences change often).

I then pull up both the instrumental track and a full, clean version of the song.

Once in the session, I start by playing the instrumental track and seeing if they can guess: 1) The name of the song, and 2) the artist or band who sings the song.

I cannot tell you how awesome it feels to see the look of joy on their faces when they hear and recognize the songs that THEY like and are into. No judgement about the genre, artist, or band (as a former Backstreet Boys fan, I would have greatly appreciated this!)

Once they guess the song, wee jam out to the full version that includes the lyrics.

Is this something your students would be into, either online or in person?

The post Virtual Ideas For Teens: Musical Games appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Every so often I get an email from Google telling me the top searches that bring people to my website.

To this very day, the top search that brings people to my site, is “virtual music therapy session ideas.”

That tells me that you are in the same boat I am – still leading many, if not all, of your sessions online (and still looking for ideas to keep things fresh!)

Since moving up to Pennsylvania this summer, I’ve been fortunate enough to continue almost my entire caseload of clients, contracts, and students from Miami (all virtually of course!)

I have continued to brainstorm and plan, tweak and change, and create, create, CREATE virtual session ideas.

I thought it would be helpful today to round up some of those ideas so they’re all in one place for you. Following that, I’ll share some fresh, new ideas in upcoming posts.

Here are some ideas to get you started –

Virtual Music Therapy Ideas to Target Social/Emotional Goals

Virtual Music Therapy Ideas to Target Motor Goals

Virtual Music Therapy Ideas to Promote Relaxation

Virtual Music Therapy to Promote Creativity & Self-Expression

MORE Creative Ideas for Your Virtual Sessions with School-Age Kids & Teens

How To Therapeutically Use Videos During Virtual Music Therapy

It was fun to look back – I hadn’t even remembered all those posts I’d written!

Stay tuned next week when I share brand new ideas for your virtual sessions with children and teens.

The post Virtual Music Therapy Session Ideas Galore appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Although many music therapists and teachers have gone back to facilitating in-person sessions, I am still 100% virtual.

I have to say, I am enjoying the additional tools and technology at my disposal.

One of the tools I am loving and frequently using in my sessions with school-age and teen clients is video.

In addition to live music making, singing, musical games, and composing on GarageBand, I also incorporate music videos for visual support, and to add a layer of creativity that will engage my clients.

Here’s how I do that –

Musical I Spy/I Hear: I’ll introduce my clients to a new genre of music and teach them about the instruments that typically play that style of music. Then, I’ll pull up a music video and we play Musical I Spy/I Hear. I invite my clients to call out when they see (or hear) the instruments we’re looking for.

This Fall I did a bluegrass version. I pulled up a video of a bluegrass band playing and clients identified the fiddle, upright bass, banjo, guitar, harmonica, and even the jug! The Fourth of July version of this game, along with visuals (and lots of other goodies!), is part of the Summer Music Therapy Session Planning Pack.

Visual Support: I’ve also been using music videos to offer an added visual support that takes an experience beyond “just” music listening (even though that can be extremely beneficial and effective). During my summer sessions, I’ll facilitate a Hawaiian-themed music and art experience. My clients will listen to traditional Hawaiian music and draw to the music.

The music I pull up is a video on YouTube of a relaxing beach scene. This visual gives my clients some inspiration and ideas of what to draw. (More details on this experience are part of the Elevate Email Idea Subscription).

As a way for my clients to relax and wind down at the end of our current winter-themed sessions, I’ll play a video of “Wintersong” by Ingrid Michaelson and Sara Bareilles. (The song is awesome – check it out if you haven’t heard it yet!) Along with the song, I show visuals of winter scenes and snow. I use these as added visual support to jump start a discussion about our favorite memories of snow and winter.

If you’d like to use these visuals during your own Winter-themed sessions, you can grab them for free right here:

Music Video & Song Discussion: I’ve often facilitated song discussion experiences, where I’ll choose a song about a topic that’s relevant to my clients, we sing the song, and then discuss it. (You can find creative ideas for how to do this in the Tuneful Teens 2 E-Book and in the Elevate Email Idea Subscription).

Once I shifted to virtual sessions, I started incorporating music videos and using those to lead into a discussion about the music, the video, or both. For example, with the holidays approaching, I found a truly awesome YouTube video of the song “Christmas/Sarajevo 12/24” by Trans-Siberian Orchestra paired with a holiday light show. We watched the video together (and I watched my clients’ faces in awe!) Afterward, we had a discussion about our favorite memories of decorating our houses for the holidays and driving around to see the lights on other houses.

“That’s Christmas To Me” by the Pentatonix is another great song that I’ve been showing during my holiday-themed sessions. The music video shows home videos of the singers when they were children. I use this song and video to facilitate a discussion about our favorite childhood Christmas memories.

Behind the Scenes Look: Finally, I’ve used videos to give a behind the scenes look into the making of a music video. In August, I facilitated a musical experience with a group of teens with autism, that used “High Hopes” by Panic! At The Disco. We sang the song and had a discussion about our high hopes for the new school year.

Then, I showed them a behind the scenes video of how the music video was created. (If you haven’t seen it yet, the lead singer walks up a sky scraper!) It rounded out the session nicely and was something that captured their attention and truly interested them.

To close out, I’d love to hear if and how you’re using music videos therapeutically in your sessions – either in-person or virtually. Leave a comment below!

And for more information on the Elevate Email Idea Subscription, click here:

The post How To Therapeutically Use Videos During Virtual Music Therapy appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Are we really approaching the eight month mark of leading music therapy sessions and lessons virtually?!

It’s hard to believe, isn’t it.

Although there have been MANY challenges to switching from in-person to online services, there have also been some benefits.

I’m a glass-half-full kind of gal, so I thought today I’d share a few of those benefits. (And if you’d like to add your ideas, drop a comment below!)

Weather and Missed Sessions Aren’t Issues Anymore – In the past, we’ve at times had to reschedule due to weather (hurricanes or snowstorms). But with virtual services, as long as you have an internet connection, your sessions can go on as planned, regardless of the weather outside.

In addition, in the past if  there was a cancellation due to a holiday or illness, we’d likely have to miss that week’s session. But with virtual sessions, rescheduling is So. Much. Easier.

Access To More Music and Resources – I’ve found that with YouTube, I now have access to virtually any song, instrumental track, or video. In the past, I typically only had the MP3s available for songs I had planned in advance to use. Now, if a client requests a song, I can immediately pull it up and use the requested/preferred song (as long as it aligns with their goals and my general plan for the day, of course!)

In virtual sessions, I also have access to videos that I previously didn’t have the technology to share. For example, in August I facilitated a musical experience with a group of teens with autism, that used “High Hopes” by Panic! At The Disco. We sang the song and had a discussion about our high hopes for the new school year. Then, I showed them a behind the scenes video of how the music video was created. (If you haven’t seen it yet, the lead singer walks up a sky scraper!) It rounded out the session nicely and was something I never would have been able to show during our in-person sessions.

Screen Share – Can we pause for a moment and get a round of applause for screen share? Not only can we easily share music and videos, as I describe above, we can share BEAUTIFUL, COLORFUL, ENGAGING visuals. No printer, no laminator needed.

Whiteboard – Lately, I’ve been loving the whiteboard feature, especially for musical games (for example, Musical Spaceman, my musical version of hangman) and for songwriting. Just yesterday, one of my ukulele students wanted to write a Thanksgiving Song. So, I pulled up the whiteboard and we brainstormed lyrics together.

Location Independence – You can work anywhere you have an internet connection!

I’m sure there are many other positive things about virtual services that I’m forgetting to list here. If you’d like to add your ideas, drop a comment below!

And if you’re in need of some virtual session-planning inspiration, check out these E-Books. Although they were created for Spring and Summer session planning, the ideas can be customized and adapted for any time of year!

The post Virtual Music Therapy Benefits appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

In August, my girls and I made a long trek from Miami up to Maryland.

Our plan? To stay in Pennsylvania and Maryland for a few months to get away during hurricane season and avoid any kind of evacuation-during-a-pandemic situation.

It has really been wonderful getting to experience Fall again.

Twenty years living in South Florida can really make you miss the crisp weather and coziness of Fall!

We will be in Pennsylvania and Maryland for the next few weeks.

In addition to enjoying apple orchards and pumpkin patches, I am also going to be offering virtual services in the area.

This includes group and individual music therapy services and adapted music lessons on piano, guitar, ukulele, drum set, and voice, to children and teens with special needs.

The beautiful thing about teletherapy is that it doesn’t matter where you are (as long as you have a strong internet connection, am I right?)

If you are in Pennsylvania and Maryland, and are interested in starting virtual services, feel free to reach out to me here.

We already have several group sessions for children and teens starting up and would love to start more!

The post Music Therapy in Pennsylvania, Maryland, and D.C. appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Today I’m dusting off some oldies but goodies from the blog.

After four months of virtual music therapy sessions, even I needed to dig deep to find new ideas for my clients (many of whom have zero musical instruments or materials).

If you’re looking for musical experiences that would work well during teletherapy (or in-person!) with your school age (K-8) students and teens, take a look at these ideas from the blog archives:

A Pirate Creative Listening Experience – See how to use the soundtracks of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies to give students the opportunity to do some creative imagination and work on expressive communication.

“Old Town Road” To Target Therapeutic Goals – Here’s how to use this uber-popular song to work on sustained and selective attention, impulse control and direction following with your school-age and teen clients.

Combining Music + Art: A Hawaiian Theme – Bring out your leis and your ukuleles! In this post you’ll learn how to facilitate a Hawaiian-themed music and art experience.

Music Jeopardy – Click to get a FREE template!

Everything Is Awesome (The Lego Movie + therapeutic goals) – Find out how you can use a song from The Lego Movie to work on social/emotional and communication goals.

“What Do You Do?” A Social Skills Song – Sheet music + MP3 are available so you can use the song in your sessions and classes this week.

Had To Have High, High Hopes – Learn why this song by Panic! At the Disco is perfect for therapeutic use in our sessions.

The Friendship Rap – Click to get the Friendship Rap Lyrics + Rap Track MP3 for FREE

Session Planning With “Stitches” – See how to use “Stitches” by Shawn Mendes therapeutically to address attention-based goals (be careful – this song is an ear worm!)

Best Day Of My Life – Learn how to use this awesome song by American Authors to facilitate a meaningful song discussion.

The ABCs of Music – Learn this musical game that can be used as an ice breaker or warm activity at the start of a session.

Being Brave With Your Groups – Use this Sara Bareilles song to facilitate a thought provoking song discussion.

The Empathy Song – The Mosaic Project is a beautiful project intent on spreading peace and love through music. “The Empathy Song” is fantastic tool to begin a discussion and lyric analysis on the topic of empathy.

I hope these ideas jump start your creativity so you can keep rockin’ on in your teletherapy sessions (or in-person sessions if you’re at that point!)

If you need more ideas, plus beautiful visuals, check out the Spring & Summer Virtual Session Planning E-Books:

The post More Creative Ideas For Your Virtual Sessions With School-Age Kids & Teens appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Have you ever been on a call with a potential new client when your child yells from the bathroom “I’m ready for you to wipe me!!”

Or, had to take your child to the ER in the middle of your new E-Course launch?

Or, how about this – have you ever had to homeschool your child in the middle of a pandemic, while simultaneously working from home and revamping your entire business to a teletherapy practice?

If you answered yes to any of the above, or have a similar story, then I have some tips to help you find time to work while your kiddos are home.

It might be session planning for your next virtual session, or working on business tasks, like invoicing and new client intake forms.

Whatever the task, here are some things that, after a lot of trial and error, are working for us:

1. Schedule Quiet Time

Once my kiddos dropped their nap, we kept that same time frame and turned it into quiet time. My girls are now 3 and 6 and they know that every day, right after lunch, we go into 50 minutes – 1 hour of quiet time. They must stay in their room and play quietly or read until their green light turns on.

Following that, if they did a good job in quiet time, they get about 45 minutes of screen time. This gives them an incentive to stay in quiet time AND it gives me about an hour and a half of consecutive work time (consecutive is the key word here!) If your kiddos are young and have never done quiet time, start with a short amount of time and gradually increase it. This is a really great way for them to build independent play skills, too!

2. Work In the “Fringes”

I do my VERY best to only do work during my kids’ quiet time, and give them my full attention when they’re out with me the rest of the day. But we all know there are work things that come up that need to be tended to right away. And, there are things we could knock off our growing To Do list if we just had a few minutes here or there.

Finally (after 6 years of doing this) I’ve realized that some work can be done in the “fringes” – those little pockets of time your kids are playing or entertaining themselves – like a quick social media post or making visuals for your next session. And some work needs to be done during the aforementioned quiet time, like edit an E-Book, answer emails, make phone calls, and invoicing (definitely invoicing!)

Once I made this distinction, I was able to use the time that my girls were coloring or playing dress up to do those little nagging tasks. The tasks in which I could be interrupted and it wasn’t the end of the world. The rest of the work, where I need quiet and focus, I jam into quiet time.

3. Involve Your Kiddos

My little ones love to session plan and practice music with me. My 3-year-old even says she wants to be a music therapist when she grows up! Session planning and practicing are the perfect tasks to have my kiddos help me with. For example, I’m working on my Patriotic session plans for the first week of July, and my girls love patriotic songs.

So, we sing “You’re a Grand Old Flag” and “The Star-Spangled Banner” on repeat, which gives us the chance to make music together and bond, AND the chance for me to practice those songs for my upcoming sessions.

It is NOT easy to work from home with your kiddos, and I know everyone is doing the best they can.

I hope these ideas are helpful. Just leave a comment or send me an email if you have any questions or need some support!

And, if you’re in need of a creative boost for your virtual music therapy sessions, or are just plain strapped for time to session plan, check out the brand new Virtual Music Therapy Session Planning Pack for Summer! It’s available now for only $9 (but the price will be going up after 4th of July!):

In the E-Book, you’ll learn creative musical experiences that are working well in teletherapy and are effective in helping you connect (really connect!) with your clients across the computer screen.

Learn more about the Summer E-Book here.

Nell Miller, MT-BC called the first Virtual Session Planning E-Book (for Spring) “creative and wonderful” and says “I appreciate your ideas. You’ve helped me think of more varied things to try.”

Ashley Lewis, MM, MT-BC says of the first Virtual E-Book “I of course love your resources and I think you are brilliant. Your visuals are the best I’ve ever seen! I’m a huge fan of yours and I can’t wait to see what you come up with next because I will be buying it.”

You can grab both the Spring & Summer Virtual E-Books in a Combo Pack here ~ (its a BOGO: Buy One Get One Free deal!)

The post Working From Home With Kiddos appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve loaded up the blog with all kinds of ideas for your virtual music therapy sessions and adapted lessons.

Many of these ideas (like the Mini Musical Bios that you’ll find in the Virtual Music Therapy Session Planning Pack), were created just for teletherapy.

I found my brain being stretched in all kinds of new and creative ways.

How on earth do I lead a session online when the client on the other end of the computer has zero musical instruments?

How do I build rapport online with a class of students that I’ve never met before?

I hope the intervention ideas and the Zoom tools have been helpful in tackling some of those questions and getting your creative juices flowing.

Today, we’re wrapping it up by looking at one final Zoom tool (though I know there are many more to explore!)

That tool is the Whiteboard feature.

I used it just this morning in my virtual music therapy sessions and it’s perfect for these types of experiences:

Musical Games – If you know me, you know I LOVE musical games for teletherapy and for building rapport with new clients. I use the Whiteboard when I facilitate games like Musical Spaceman (more on that soon!) and Musical BINGO (because clients don’t need their own BINGO card – they can mark off spaces on the Whiteboard).

Songwriting – You and your clients can collaborate during the songwriting process. Since your client can also write on the Whiteboard from their screen, you can work together to write song lyrics and music notation.

Adapted Lessons – I don’t know about you, but I draw a lot of notes and diagrams for my adapted lesson students. It might be the acronym to remember the treble clef notes, or the difference between a half rest and a whole rest. And while writing on an actual whiteboard and holding it up to the screen only to find the words are backwards for the other person is fun, I wouldn’t recommend it. (Use the Zoom whiteboard instead!)

I’m sure there are a multitude of ways to use the Whiteboard that I haven’t even had a chance to explore yet.

Try some new things out with this tool and see if it’s helpful in engaging your clients and students.

I have just one word of caution, though.

Beware of the “draw” feature – many of my clients had a good laugh over my poor drawing skills during Musical Spaceman, but it turned out to be a great way to build rapport.

If you need more ideas, take a look at what’s offered in the Virtual Music Therapy Session Planning Pack.

Nell Miller, MT-BC calls the E-Book “wonderful and creative.”

Ashley Lewis, MM, MT-BC says “I of course love your resources and I think you are brilliant. Your visuals are the best I’ve ever seen! I’m a huge fan of yours and I can’t wait to see what you come up with next because I will be buying it.”

Find out what’s inside the E-Covers here:

The post Zoom Tools For Virtual Music Therapy – Part 3 appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.

Last week, I shared one of my favorite Zoom tools to use during telehealth music therapy sessions – the Screen Share feature.

I use it multiple times per session to share lyrics, rhythms, musical game questions, and visuals, and to show GarageBand when I’m working on projects with my clients.

This week, I’m going to highlight another feature of Zoom that you may know about but not be intentionally utilizing.

That feature is the Chat Box.

You’ll find it on the bottom of your screen, next to the Screen Share button.

If your group sessions are anything like mine, there are often times when the noise level gets high (I’ve had up to 24 participants in some group sessions!)

I’ll usually mute everyone, so they can hear me better, but that in turn makes it hard to hear their responses when I ask a question.

Enter the Chat Box.

If I ask a question (for example, during a song discussion about this American Authors song), I will ask my teen clients, or the person who is helping them, to type the answer.

This way, I can read through the answers and acknowledge each one, without having the ask clients to raise hands, wait with their hand up, then mute and unmute and mute and unmute (you’ve been there, right?!)

I’ve also found the Chat Box feature helpful when a parent, teacher, or client has some input that will help the session run more smoothly. For example…

“Can you mute ______ because there’s some background noise?”

“_____ has been raising his hand and has something to say.”

“Can we dance to Meghan Trainor at the end?”

I love the Chat Box feature because it helps my virtual sessions run more smoothly, and helps ensure everyone has a chance to participate and be heard.

I’d love to hear if and how you’re utilizing the Chat Box feature in your teletherapy sessions, too. Leave a comment below to let us know!

And if you need new creative ideas for your virtual (or in-person!) sessions, check out the Virtual Music Therapy Session Planning Pack. It’s complete with visuals, picture cards, musical game templates and samples, sample listening guides, and MP3s.

The post Zoom Tools For Virtual Music Therapy – Part 2 appeared first on Wholesome Harmonies, LLC.