Provide therapy to 50 disabled children in India

Workshop at Samadhan – “Capacity Building through Music Therapy interventions”

Samadhan has been regularly conducting In-house workshops based on Music Therapy, Drama Therapy & Creative movement Therapy, for the capacity building of the Therapists and teachers of both the Special Education Unit & Early Intervention Unit. 

Music Therapy makes use of our inborn ability to appreciate and to respond to music.  The music therapy room is arranged to offer a range of accessible instruments, and client and therapist improvise together, creating music spontaneously.  A relationship is built up within the music, which can help the children with intellectual disability to overcome their difficulties and realize their potential for communication and relationship.  Music Therapy can offer an opportunity for the development of interactive skills, physical and perceptual ability, as well as a positive experience of self, which can promote self-esteem and motivation.

One of the interns Ms. Vanessa Pinto who worked actively with the children at Samadhan Dakshinpuri Centre , is a student from The Music Therapy Trust, c/o Action for Autism under the guidance of Dr. Lucy Bolger, Course Tutor has conducted a Workshop for the teachers and Therapists at Samadhan.

The intent of organizing the workshop was to introduce a foundation for identifying   and using different ideas of musical instruments for learning, and to expand teaching skills, offer lesson plan ideas and discuss teaching and learning basic music practices. The session also provided an opportunity for the participants to fully involve in musical therapy that are especially designed for children.  The workshop started with a presentation on introduction of clinical music therapy training which can be implemented by the teachers, providing an important opportunity for children with intellectual disability to develop their practical skills in music therapy in real-life clinical settings.

The workshop included several individual, group and partnership activities that helped the participants to learn about making effective use of musical instruments in their field of work. Fun-filled  activities including music, props, body awareness exercises, warm ups, story-telling and creative movement activities interspersed with verbal dialogue and sharing left the participants requesting more such workshops. The information and teaching was provided on integration of movementof body and introduction of a wide variety of music genres which can be used as therapy especially for children with Autism.

This new approach to fun filled and musical approach to teaching/learning was much appreciated by all participants. Not many privileged agencies use creative movement therapy and so this was first even for SAMADHAN.Activities with props/musical instruments helped them to overcome their inhibitions and gave them confidence to perform the task. It was fun and they look forward to regular sessions.  More activities with music can now be incorporated in special education and early intervention rehabilitation to enhance the social and cognitive skills of children with special needs.

Most of the participants felt that Individual themes and musical developments can be merged for each individual child; some children would like to sing and dance, others would like to be sung to, and some would try to play an instrument on their own.  The specific advantage for our children in our low socio economic community center  is the fact that both  you do not need costly musical instruments to produce music but can use ordinary everyday things which all families have and use  for cooking etc  to use as instruments. For instance drumming to a beat on an upturned steel vessel used traditionally for cooking rice.

Thank you for all the support from Global giving for encouraging our interventions and program for the intellectually disabled children.

Links:

• SAMADHAN - ABLE X online course