Music and autism : why should music be a therapy?

When I read articles and leaflets about activities for disabled people, I feel amazed these proposals are often "different" from the ones for "non disabled" people.

These differences lie not only in their contents, but also in their names. Swimming becomes "idrotherapy", sport is "sail boat therapy", "inclusive basket" or " together football" .... art is "drawing therapy" and music becomes " healing sound", " magic notes", " relational music" and so on...

The idea in itself it's not so bad. But I don't like how those activities are realized, and I disagree with their aims. I don't agree with considering all these activities as therapies, just because their are for disabled people. In my opinion, this is a wrong and dangerous view.  Because it gives a wrong idea of a disabled person, and it leads to " miracle thinking". It should be instead more useful to concentrate on concrete aims, real therapies and real life learning tasks. Without relying on some "miraculus" event who can "cure" important disorders just by listening to some music or drawing a paint.

Moreover, I think changing these activities' names is unnecessary. It'd be better just to adapt our teaching approach to whoever we have in front of us. Wether this person had a disability or not.

Each of us is a unique and original human being. To be an effective teacher we have to consider that point. We just have to understand what makes this person unique and what are her features.

If we could see a disability just like a cluster of traits, without being judgmental or afraid of them, we would do a great favour for a lots of people. And also for ourselves, because we could be more relaxed and confident while working with them.

When I look at Pietro, I just see a 4 years olded student, not a disabled child

"Differentiated" proposals are useless. We shouldn't think "normal" activities are not accessible to disabled students, because this is not true.

What makes the difference is the teaching approach, not contents or names.

If we choose to call theatre " expressive therapy" or chamber music " orchestral involvement", we don't make them easier. On the contrary, we just underline the differences between those who can learn, play, develop and those who can't.

It were like some people could have access to "real" activities and some others could just have a "surrogate" of them.

Not every child who starts a music, theatre or sport course will become a professional. But this souldn't be our goal anyway. Every child can, instead, reach a beginner level in music, sport or art.

It all depends on the teacher. Limits are never in the child, because every child can learn.

We should just know how to teach them, without thinking "this child can't learn" just because he has some issues. Or "I'm doing therapy" because everything related to disablity "must be" therapy.

Sara is autistic, but she is  first of all a violin and piano student

Some professionals want, anyway, their work to "be" therapeutic. They can prove how much their "patients" are improved, and they are sure this improvement depends on their intervention.

In some articles on music therapy I read "this child demonstrated a better emotional tuning because he pressed the piano's keys while the therapist was playing"

Well, in my view this is exactly what it seems : a child who's casually pressing some keys, without any awarness or ability to choose. Just like any other kid would have done in front of a piano.

There's no learning and no relation in this scene. This is not a relational behaviour, but it may be at best a turn taking behaviour, which is way easier than that claimed "relationship" skill.

I've also read that " When working with less affected patients (this is really what it reads!! Affected!) with autism, words are not needed. My whole communication with an Asperger boy consisted of singing. If I stopped singing, he went away and lost all his interest in me"

A casual reader may think : "That's great!" . Too bad that an Asperger child can perfectly speak in a correct and functional way, and it's terribly wrong to let him behaving like he couldn't.

Because this is a skill he certainly has, and we should at least help him to develop and use it with a specific and serious training. Not by singing.

In another article I read : " The worst thing a teacher can do with an autistic student, is to make him wait while the other are playing".

Yes, waiting it just for "normal" children, why should a disabled child learn to wait???
He's disabled, he's excused! He cannot learn.

Can you see the discrimination thought behind this sentence??

Finally, all the emphasis music therapy puts on freedom and "improvisation" like an instrument to express and encourage a relationship between the child and the therapist. This can be really dangerous and can lead to serious problems for an autistic person.

A music therapist writes : " Using an improvisative musical game, we find ourselves in a place where there aren't any rules and we can discover the unpredictable. In those moments, our patient will express himself with a look, a sound or a movement. And we'll see he'll be present. He won't be able to hide his love for music and his terrible need of something powerful but invisible that music is."

First of all, in this quote I see a lot of stereotypical thinking : why an autistic child shouldn't be "present"? Why shouldn't he love music?? 

Second, nothing can be more confusive and scary for an autistic child than a non-structured and an unpredictable environment.

The absence of rules and of a schedule can put an autistic person in a state of fear and anxiety. And it increases the probability of having melt downs, anxiety,  escape or aggressive behaviours.

Claid is a great (autistic) student, but he needs to have clear rules and a fixed schedule to work properly

Other music therapists say music is the best "communication" tool for disabled children. But a child can't express himself through music if ha can't play an instrument. It'd be just like speaking without words. It'd be a confused and uncomprehensible communication. It'd be a completely casual communication, just like improvisation without knowing any note is. Pressing piano keys or plucking a guitar's strings without any knowledge about it , it's just confusion and playing like with a toy.

In my opinion, this is not true self expression because it doesn't express anything and it's not a communication tool for a child.

A non verbal child, in fact, can surely communicate, but can't express himself completely, because he lacks means to do it. That's why we use signs, symbols and when it's possible words. Or even notes, but after a child has learnt how to "use" them.

I think the most important concept of all this talk is our view of a disabled person. If we see am autistic child like a "special" human being, who's different from us and who lives in a " world apart", then we want to be "magic" and help him "going out" that "bubble" he lives in. 

In this view, we need some "magic" tool which helps us to enter his world, to connect with him in a sublte and subconscoius way. The most important goal it is then the "emotional tuning" with him, that incredible "healing relationship" between us.

BUT  if we see an autistic child as he really is .... A CHILD, 

and we understand he needs tools and ways to a part of OUR world, which is also HIS world (becausen there is no "other" world!)...

We will then understand is unnecessary to find some imaginative and creative solutions just for this child.

We could just make what all the others do accessible also for them.

This way, he'll be allowed to live in the real world along with the other people.