Halfway There....

So Friday was officially the halfway point of my internship. I can't believe it! All the things that I've done and learned in the last 6 months have totally blown my mind and reshaped the way I think about music therapy and myself as a music therapist. I can't even start to imagine having to leave all of my students in June. I'm gonna cry. Without a doubt. I thought now would be a good time to list some of my most memorable moments of my internship thus far, just in case I ever feel myself starting to forget them :) So here they are, in no particular order.

•  Teaching some of my middle school boys with autism how to do the chicken dance, they just couldn't get the shimmy part at the end no matter how hard they tried to model me, hilarious.
• When one of my lower functioning students that I had been struggling to make a connection with all year, suddenly played the tambourine through 3 whole rounds of 'Feliz Navidad".
• When a student finally got the concept of asking a new friend for their name after I had gone over it for like four consecutive sessions, I think I screamed I was so excited.
• When my supervisor, the students aide, and I stationed ourselves around the room holding out paddle drums and the student weaved through us smacking the drums like he was in a pinball machine, laughin up a storm.
• How every time I pull out a book with my group of first grade boys, one of the boys eyes physically bug out of his head because he's so excited.
• How one of my students bursts into the room smiling and yelling for EVERY session, because he's so excited for music.
• I once asked the same student mentioned just above to use his Dyna-Vox (a little computer like device to help him communicate) to tell me what he wanted to do in music. One week he said, "I want wild animals" the next he said, "I want macaroni".
• When I was working with a student on the concepts of fast and slow, I started strumming and singing really fast, and she had a giggle-fest so violent I thought she was going to fall out of her wheel chair.
• When we decided to do a wheel chair dancing activity with my medically fragile class, and they were all laughing and smiling more than I had ever seen before.
• When a student who had been working on breath support finally got her party blower to unroll all the way and squealed with glee.
• When a student grabbed my hand in the middle of the session and wouldn't let it go for anything. He also squeezed my cheeks together and giggled the next session.
• When a student quite a bit bigger than me got a little too into our dancing-fest and jumped up in an attempt to chest bump me.
• When a student that I had only seen be extremely violent with her peers, independently volunteered to share her instrument. My supervisor and I both about fell out of our chairs.
• How students will stop by the music room just to say hello, or tell something exciting about their weekend, or bring up left over cupcakes..... music teachers are the best you know.
• How I have one student who is very volatile and misbehaved in every other context of school but music, and how now she will do her work and cooperate just to be able to come up to the room for extra music time. Also, how I was the only person working with this student who had an abundance of positive things to say about her. With out music, her outlook in school was pretty bleak.

I think that the list could go on forever and ever, but I guess I'll stop there. Basically, I've seen what the  power of music can do in peoples lives and what it can do in my my life through them. It's been such and extreme blessing so far and I can't wait to see what else is in store for me in the next 5 months! And then it's off to the real world...AHHHH