4 Secrets to Keep Your Business Moving Forward

Things are always busy at MTC, but the past few weeks have felt even more intense as we continue to move through our season of transition and change. School starting back in August is like the start of our new year. With that new year comes new students, new policies, new contracts, and tons of awesome new ideas!!

I know that it can get confusing for everyone (myself, team members, and families included) because we are shifting things around and have several balls in the air. So, I wanted to share a few ways we stay organized and on the same page as a team and share some ideas you can implement as well.

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  1. Know Your Role – I say it time and time again.  Rachel and I make a great team!  We work constantly to clarify and simplify our roles so that we can each play to our strengths and accomplish more within our company without repeating work.  Knowing that I handle most of our  internship details and HR topics while Rachel handles more of the PR and family contact/communication allows for us to easily designate who needs to handle new tasks and gives all of our team members a better idea who to talk to about certain topics.
  2. Write It Down – I was out of town last week and was without Wi-fi for an entire week. Coming back on Monday was a little bit of a shock to my system after having been away but it was made easier by the fact that Rachel kept a running list of what happened each day.  Reading through that document was a quick and easy way to brief myself for the upcoming week and get back in the swing of things. This is a practice we started over a year ago that I am so thankful for! We also keep pretty detailed meeting notes and communicate throughout the day via Slack
  3. Honest, Clear, and Concise Communication – Being truthful and timely helps us to keep things moving.  Even though we have a scheduled Tuesday meeting to talk about business matters, you will find Rachel and I in and out of the office using whatever little face-to-face time we have to quickly answer each others questions or have small discussions.  I write down what we need to talk about so that we can communicate more effectively and move forward as quickly as possible. We also encourage regular communication with all of our team members and have an open door policy so we can address most issues and celebrate victories as they occur.
  4. Check out our facebook live video from earlier where I share secret number four and delve further into how we keep things running smoothly.

 

We are looking forward to sharing more of the projects we are working on in the very near future! Stay tuned by following us on facebook or becoming a VIP member!

 

 

Intern’s Corner-Week 7

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To be honest, this was a hard week; I struggled with confidence every day. In previous blog posts, I’ve written about how confidence has been an issue my entire life, but today I had a realization and I hope it helps anyone who is also struggling with confidence.

I decided to take some time for self-care this morning and play my flute.Although I hadn’t played the flute in a while, it came back to me easily. I reflected on my journey with playing the flute and realized that it hadn’t been easy. When I was younger and had first started playing the flute, I hit many bumps in the road and felt like giving up because nothing came easy. I spent hours practicing and perfecting each piece, learning the basics and then the technical skills. But I put in the hard work then, which now makes playing the flute a little easier.

How does this all relate to music therapy and my internship? I felt confident in my flute playing because I had practiced and worked for so many years on it and now it comes naturally to me. During my internship, I am taking voice lessons, learning to play different styles on the guitar/piano, and practicing improvisation. This week, specifically, I beat myself up because I struggled in these areas and was not “perfect.” Just like I struggled with my flute playing at first, which is now an extremely comfortable instrument for me, I will get comfortable with singing, playing those different styles on guitar or piano, and improvising during a session, if I practice them frequently. My confidence will increase over time. It took me several years to be confident in my flute playing, but I was eventually confident, with practice.

You can’t expect yourself to be great at a new skill immediately; that is what I learned this week. Sometimes you just have to get out of your own head and stop expecting perfection. When I first started playing flute, I wasn’t perfect and I STILL can grow and learn new skills even after playing for so long. The same things apply to my internship. I choose to keep learning, growing, trying my best, and being confident that confidence with these skills WILL come with practice.

Life is a fun journey and it’s even better with confidence!

Have a good week!

Sammy Springer

Singable Stories in all of their Music Therapy Glory

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Here at MTC we love to use singable stories. You may see us using them with our Listen & Learn groups but did you know that we also use them in 1:1 music therapy sessions?

Singable stories are a great tool for

  • Increasing sight words
  • Improving enunciation of vowels and consonants
  • Reading full sentences or more independently
  • Improving reading comprehension
  • Identifying letters uppercase and lowercase
  • Increasing vocal range in inflection
  • and so much more!

These are just a few of the specific objectives that we work on every day with our clients here at Music Therapy Connections! Do you know somebody who could benefit from music therapy? Register them in services below!

Register here!

Questions about services for someone in your life?

Contact us at info@musictherapyconnections.org!

Intern’s Corner-Week Six

 

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My schedule is officially full and I’m starting to lead more during sessions and adaptive lessons. I’ve also received more constructive criticism, but that is an important part of growing and learning! All of this new information and learning that I am doing and the fact that I am a perfectionist makes it fairly easy to quickly become overwhelmed. Sometimes I feel like there is so much to learn and that there isn’t enough time to learn it all before becoming a professional music therapist.

For those who might be feeling the same way, you might feel like you want to give up and stop trying completely; this is normal and sometimes I feel like I want to shut down too. But perseverance and remembering your dreams and goals is important in pushing through. Remembering that I want to work with children, perform research furthering the field of music therapy, and maybe one day run my own private practice, helps me refocus and continue learning.

During my internship, I have the chance to absorb so much new information and experience every opportunity that arises. I have the chance to learn from my mistakes and work towards being a professional and great music therapist with two wonderful supervisors encouraging me and helping me along the way. As my internship progresses, it will become more manageable and the skills that I am currently learning will become second nature. I just have to get over this hump and the only way to do that is to persevere and keep my goals and dreams in sight. Everyday is a new learning opportunity, and I don’t have to be perfect because no one is perfect!

If you breathe, refocus, persevere, and continue learning then you will become successful no matter what. 

Thanks for reading!

Sammy Springer

 

Intern’s Corner-Week Five

Hello everyone!

I can’t believe that I am officially done with my first month of internship! I have learned so much in this past month and am so grateful for all the opportunities that I’ve had so far.

The biggest thing I’ve learned this month, besides everything clinical, is how to be and stay organized. You go from seeing one client or group once a week for an hour during practicum to seeing fifteen or more clients in your internship. It’s definitely an adjustment and extremely important to stay organized. During the past month I’ve figured out some ways to make sure I am organized so that I can concentrate on learning.20160902_125513

I created a song binder that includes every genre of music (music from different decades, movies, Disney, children, pop, hello/goodbye, and movement/instrument songs). When a client wants a specific song and I don’t have my IPad available, I can just look in my song binder for the lead sheet.I also have a binder that has tabs for each day and each client (with just the first initial of their first name) where I keep all my documentation sheets. It’s easier to plan a session when all the information is presented in a concise way under that client’s tab. I also have a binder for each off-site facility that I go to so that I can just grab that binder and go.

Also, I kept all of my notes from college. Inspired by Katey and Rachel, I organized my notes into different categories (such as MT & Medicine or MT & Schools) and placed them into a binder as well. When I go to study for my board certification exam, I’ll be thankful I put in that work so that I can easily reference/review any material.

I know it sounds like a lot of binders, but this system of organization works for me. If you are a current music therapy student or just starting out your internship, I encourage you to create an organization system that works for you that will help make your life easier! My supervisors helped guide me and showed me their methods of organization, which helped me develop mine.

Have a good week!

Sammy Springer