Finding Balance: How Often Should a Music Therapist Introduce New Interventions?
As a new music therapist, I used to pressure myself to create new interventions every week, but I've learned that consistency and flexibility go hand in hand. In this post, I share my journey towards a more balanced approach.
2/17/20252 min read
My recent Instagram post discusses how I do not plan a new intervention for each client every single week. Let’s talk further about that post!
For some context, through my work in private practice, I see individuals with IDD, DD, Autism, Dementia, Chromosomal abnormalities, and mental health needs. In each session, I facilitate 2-5 interventions. While some interventions, like a “hello” song and a “goodbye” song, remain consistent, the other interventions have inherent novelty built into their structure. Most of the time, each intervention is designed to address one of the client’s goals.
Now that I’ve been a music therapist for three years, I have noticed some unrealistic expectations I have set for myself regarding how often I need to introduce new interventions into my sessions. For example, I often put pressure on myself to come up with a new intervention idea every single week for the different groups and individual sessions I facilitate. Why isn’t that realistic? I work multiple hours a day seeing these groups and individuals, traveling to their different locations, and documenting their progress. This does not leave much time to research new interventions every single week. While I expect this of myself (for some reason), I never actually end up facilitating new interventions for all of my caseload every single week.
This is not a blanket rule I apply to all groups and individuals, as some may need more novelty than others. However, since most interventions already include opportunities for autonomy and variation, I have noticed that most groups and individuals seem to benefit from more structure by repeating an intervention for about a month or so.
On the flip side, as my friend helpfully pointed out to me last week, it would be beneficial for me to encourage more flexibility for both myself and my clients! This realization has led me to adopt a more fluid approach—I now facilitate a new intervention approximately every two weeks for most of my caseload. While this frequency seems to work for me at the moment, I’m curious to hear from other music therapists about what frequency works best for them in different settings!