Drum Therapy: Helping Teachers with Special Needs Students

As drum teachers, we all know that teaching learning disabled students can be a challenge—even for the most experienced teachers. Yet we also know that music is a powerful tool for healing. My pioneering techniques of drum therapy are used on a global basis to help the special needs population. All teachers—especially drum teachers—will have a special needs student at some point in time. Without the proper tools, some teachers may push these students aside. Others try to face the challenge of helping these students straight on.

Disabilities can appear in many ways, and can affect the student’s attitude, coordination, and retention. If you have a student with a disability, or any other issues, you need to know that there are certain ways to deal with each specific disability. Drum therapists are highly skilled and trained to deal with all of these issues.

Special needs students can range from being very high functioning to extremely low functioning, depending upon the severity of the disability. Sometimes it is very difficult to help these students as they can have several kinds of disabilities at the same time. It takes time to work with students who have numerous conditions because as the drum therapy intervention starts to help fight one issue, there is another just beyond the first one, then possibly one or more beyond that. It can take an extended amount of time to help students with numerous disabilities.

The Benefits and Objectives of Drum Therapy

Drum therapy combines the principles of physical and cognitive functioning with the art of drumming. It is used as an intervention to provide the special needs community with the opportunity to participate in createive, verbal, and non-verbal expression. Psychologists, school systems, occupational therapists, physical therapists, behavioral therapists, and teachers throughout the world use drumming as a tool in both individual and group settings.

Children and adults with autism, dyslexia, ADD, ADHD, Tourette Syndrome, Asperger's Disorder, OCD, and ODD can benefit from drum therapy through developing expanded retention, coordination, self-esteem, physical functioning, and cognitive functioning and comprehension. Participants learn problem-solving strategies, improved patience and perserverance, develop coordination, and nuture social skills, sensitivity, cooperation, and conflict resolution.

The objectives of drum therapy include helping all participants to:

1. Improve their ability to identify feelings and behavior.
2. Improve communication skills.
3. Channel cathartic release, or discharge strong feelings, safely through rhythm.
4. Gain valuable insight into their feelings and maladaptive thoughts.
5. Demonstrate improved fine motor skills, retention, and coordination.
6. Demonstrate improved psychomotor skills.
7. Demonstrate improved social skills through a combined group effort activity.
8. Gain self-esteem and self-confidence by being a major part of an artistic project.
9. Demonstrate improved frustration tolerance.
10. Develop personal expression through the creative art process.

This unique setting of therapy and intervention allows participants the opportunity to express themselves in an emotionally safe, non-threatening environment. This process is highly therapeutic, but unlike other school classes and social activities, drum therapy sessions allows a participant to express anger, sorrow, or other related feelings that are "unacceptable" in traditional settings. Cathartic release of strong feelings such as hyperactivity, anger, and fear are encouraged.

Strategies for Teaching Special Needs Drum Students

Drum instructors should use specific lesson plans and outlines in their drum lessons. Although the mainstream drum instruction and drum therapy intervention outlines are completely different, they are still related in some way because they help students reach even the most basic drumming and cognitive milestones at the same time.

Instructors and therapists should always remember the following strategies when teaching special needs students to develop physical and cognitive functioning:

1. Extreme patience at all times.
2. Start all lessons slowly.
3. Increase the speed of exercises, rhythms, and patterns slowly.
4. Repeat exercises and patterns slowly and often, at the end of each lesson.
5. Make sure the student knows the material before they leave the lesson.

A participant's drumming ability should never be graded, and teaching methods should be tailored to meet the specific needs to each participant.

Every participant can, and does, grow from drum therapy intervention. Some may have experienced failure in their previous school classes and/or social settings—whether primarily because of behavioral problems or a combination of their specific disability with a behavioral problem. As a result, these participants need to experience success. As abilities grow, a trusting relationship is built between each participant and the therapist. This trusting relationship opens the door to communication, which becomes the foundation that allows for behavioral modification and emotional healing to begin.

For more from Pat Gesualdo and drum therapy for special needs students, check out Drum Therapy: Healing with the Drumset —a powerul resource for drum teachers and therapists of students with disabilties. It explores the revolutionary drum therapy system that was developed by Pat, and used throughout the world in schools, hospitals, community centers, rehabilitation facilities, day care treatment centers, and mental health centers. This book is a comprehensive resource that contains material for the student/patient and the teacher/therapist.