Music Therapy Group for Preschool age children with disabilities

Right now I am working with Idaho Parents Unlimited to try and get a music therapy group for preschool children with special needs.  We are asking for people to spread the word.  Please let people know.  The group will be working on social skills, communication skills, emotional expression plus much more.  All of this in a fun way so that we are working on the skills without the childretn feeling like we are working on the skills.  Have anybody who is interested contact me at matthewjordan@musicmakesconnections.com or they can call or text me at 286-5508.

Giving words to an aphasia patient through music therapy

It was been an awesome experience working with a woman who has had a stroke and can't speak because of the stroke.  The only word that she can say is, "no."  While working with her, we worked first to get her to match sounds while singing.  Now I have written some simple songs for her to learn with phrases that she wants to be able to say.  She can sing a lot more words than she can say right now.  Obviously the goal is to get her to be able to say rather than sing some things.

There was something amazing that happened at our last session.  One of her favorite phrases is "lock the door" because she is always trying to remind her family to lock the door at night.  For a while now she has been able to sing the phrases, and last session she actually said the phrase.  That was amazing.

Music Therapy with a young boy with autism

I recently went to see a young boy with autism at his home.  When I got there, I could hear him screaming when I was outside the door.  When they opened the door, it was clear he was upset.  He was wondering around, screaming asking for things, but not really wanting what he was asking for because when his mom would give it to hm he would just scream and ask for something else.

The mom looked at me and said, "go ahead and see what you can do."  I took out my guitar and strummed a chord.  The boy stopped.  He looked at me.  He came over and we sang and played instruments.  It doesn't always work that quickly and dramatically, but it has worked like that enough that I wasn't surprised.