Music Therapy
Children with disabilities are like butterflies with a broken wing. They are just as beautiful as all others but they need help to spread their wings.
What Is Music Therapy?
Music therapy is an evidence-based treatment that helps with a variety of disorders including cardiac conditions, depression, autism, substance abuse and Alzheimer’s disease. It can help with memory, lower blood pressure, improve coping, reduce stress, improve self-esteem and more. You don’t need a background in music to participate.
Music therapy is the clinical use of music to accomplish individualized goals such as reducing stress, improving mood and self-expression. It is an evidence-based therapy well-established in the health community. Music therapy experiences may include listening, singing, playing instruments, or composing music. Musical skills or talents are not required to participate.
How Music Therapy Helps?
Music has a significant role in most people’s daily lives. We look to music to help us get through our daily commute, and other people crank up their favourite playlist to keep motivated while working out. Many people even listen to music while doing other activities like cooking, taking a shower, or doing laundry. Many people use music as a creative outlet, while others use it as a calming therapy. Music also significantly affects our mood. We can dance, run more quickly, let our brains wander, and recall memories thanks to music.
Depending on the song, we may feel joyful, depressed, energised, or relaxed. It should come as no surprise that music therapy has been researched for use in controlling a variety of medical disorders given how much of an influence music can have on a person’s mood and wellbeing. Different musical genres elicit different kinds of brain stimulation. For instance, it has been discovered that classical music promotes comfort and relaxation whereas rock music might be upsetting. The pain threshold may be increased in part by music to have therapeutic effects. There is a healing power to music, regardless of whether someone is actively performing an instrument or singing.
Numerous mental health issues, such as depression, anxiety, autism, trauma, and schizophrenia, can benefit from music therapy, according to research. In addition to serving as a tool for processing emotions, trauma, and sorrow, music can also be used to control or calm anxiety or mood dysregulation.
Music has the power to provide enormous joy, to relieve stress, and to promote self-expression; it is a crucial tool in mood management and may be utilised on a regular basis to heal people, whether they are battling with their emotions or a mental health issue. When you are feeling sad, what song or genre of music helps you regain your courage and joy? How can music soothe you after a trying time? Does playing an instrument or singing a song improve your mood?
Who Do Music Therapists Work With?
People of all backgrounds, ages and cultures can respond to music, and to music therapy. Notable groups music therapists have helped include:
People with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
Individuals on the spectrum learn best when there is familiarity, structure, predictability and consistency.
Individuals with Alzheimer’s disease
Music therapy may help with memory and stimulate your mind because of predictability, familiarity and feelings of security.
People in correctional settings
If you’re incarcerated, in a mental health facility, half-way house or group home, music therapy may help with problem-solving, communication skills, relaxation and decreasing impulsivity.
Victims of trauma and crisis
If you’ve experienced trauma and crisis, you might have anxiety, stress and pain. Music therapy can help you with decreasing those three experiences, improving your mood, feeling confident and in control and providing a non-verbal outlet for emotions.
Those who are physically ill
The list includes, but is not limited to people with chronic pain, diabetes, cardiac conditions, cancer, headaches, recent surgery and people in rehab.
Individuals with mental health disorders
If you’re dealing with a mental health disorder, music therapy can help you with communication and expression, help you explore your thoughts and feelings, improve your mood and concentration and develop coping skills.
People with chronic pain
Music therapy can help decrease your pain, anxiety, fatigue and depression.
Military service members and veterans
Music therapy helps you cope with trauma.
Do Music Therapists Work With Children And Adolescents?
Yes. Music therapy may help with the following:
- Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)
- Blindness/Visual Impairment (BVI)
- Specific Learning Disability (SLD)
- Emotional Disturbance (ED)
- Speech or Language Impairment (SLI)
- Orthopaedic Impairment (OI)
- Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD)
- Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)
- Multiple Disabilities (MD)
- Behavioural Disorder (BD)
- Other Health Impairment (OHI)
What Happens During Music Therapy?
During music therapy you and your therapist will do one or more of the following:
Move to music
It can be as simple as tapping your toes together or as complicated as a coordinated dance.
Discuss lyrics
Read or listen to the lyrics of a song and talk about their meaning.
Play an instrument
Use an instrument like a piano, guitar, drums, etc. to share music.
Create music
You might compose music, write lyrics, or make up music together
Sing music
Use your voice to share a piece of music.
Listen to music
Enjoy the sound and lyrics.
How Is Music Therapy Used In Special Education?
Engagement in music therapy stimulates attention and increases motivation to participate more fully in other aspects of the educational setting.
When music therapy is deemed necessary to assist a student to benefit from their special education program, goals are documented on the IEP as a related service.
Music therapists support special and general education classroom teachers by providing effective ways to incorporate music into the academic curriculum.
Music therapists create strategies and pre-teach skills to encourage and support a student’s effective and independent engagement both individually and in groups to build students' capacity to participate successfully in the least restrictive environment.
Music therapists use music with special education students to develop in non-music areas, skills necessary for educational progress, such as increased communication skills, improved academics, or improved behaviour related to engagement.
Music therapists apply the inherent order of music to create structures to support behavioural expectations.
Facts About Music Therapy In Special Education
Research supports connections between speech and singing, rhythm and motor behaviour, memory for recall and retention of academic material, and overall ability of preferred music to enhance mood, attention, and behaviour to optimize the student’s ability to learn and interact. Rhythmic movement helps develop gross motor skills (mobility, agility, balance, coordination) as well as respiration patterns and muscular relaxation. Because music has the capacity to be customized or altered to meet individual needs it can be used to motivate movements or structure exercises that are prescribed in physical rehabilitation. Involvement in music may provide a favourable alternative to pain, discomfort, and anxiety often associated with some disabilities.
Music is processed by a different area of the brain than speech and language; so a student may be able to more easily interpret and absorb information and skills presented with music. One of the purposes of music therapy for students with disabilities is to provide the student with initial support using melodic and rhythmic strategies, followed by fading of musical cues to aid in generalization and transfer to other learning environments within the school setting.
