Music for Special Needs

Personalized, one-on-one music sessions for children and adults with developmental disabilities. Sessions are tailored to each individual's needs, communication style, and goals, and are eligible for reimbursement through Regional Center funding for qualifying families. Here is a link to find your Local Regional Center

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WHAT IS ADAPTED MUSIC EDUCATION?

Adapted Music Education is a teaching approach I developed after years of working one-on-one with students who didn't fit into a standard music lesson format. Traditional piano or music instruction assumes a certain pace, a certain kind of attention, a certain way of processing information. Many of my students don't learn that way, and I noticed early on that the gap wasn't in their ability to connect with music. The gap was in how music was being taught.

So I created my own immersive program.

Adapted Music Education blends real music instruction with strategies drawn from special education: visual supports, sensory-aware pacing, flexible session structure, and goals that are set around the individual, not around a standardized curriculum. It's not music therapy. It's music education, adapted so that students who need a different approach can still have a real, rich relationship with music.

I started developing this approach over thirteen years of working with special needs populations in school settings, and refined it further through private one-on-one sessions with students connected through Regional Center services. What began as a way to reach a handful of students has grown into a full methodology, one I'm continuing to develop and, eventually, hope to teach to other music educators who want to work with this population.

If you're a parent, caregiver, or case manager looking for a music education approach built specifically around individual needs, I'd love to talk.  

Below is a video showing excerpts from a Therapeutic Music Class I led at Oak Hill School in San Anselmo. It illustrates a few of the approaches I use in this work.