Working through Playing

It has been an interesting season. A mentor once shared with me about how Spring seems to bring about behavioural changes in children. This might be more apparent in temperate zones where they experience actual changes in climate and such. I am not sure how that plays out in Singapore. In any case, it was a few weeks of interesting behaviours to say the least.

We explored some of the challenging behaviours in and through music and stories. Some were specially written to suit the particular context the child was working on. They responded well within the sessions - following the story and understanding what the messages were, giving the expected answers to questions.

Moving away from the safe predictable construct of the story came musical play where there was a lot of improvisation both in the music and responses from the therapist. Although others might see it as relaxing fun time, there was a lot of work going on through the process.

Children were challenged through the unexpected musical and situational responses of the therapist. For some, it became a safe way for them to process certain situations they might have encountered outside the music sessions.

A reminder to self: never underestimate the power of working through playing!