As promised, here is the very first activity for Melodic Approaches. I debated and debated over what should be the first music strategy. As a perfectionist I get caught up in “trying” to make everything just right before I try something new or allowing someone to hear a song I’ve been working on or even creating my session plans. Well life isn’t perfect and no matter how hard I try, neither am I. I have also learned over the years that opportunities fly by if you never put yourself out there and try. The premise of this blog is to share my thoughts and strategies that are working for the students I work with. I do not claim to be a top expert in my field or a professional grammy award winning performer. (My “recording studio” is in our craft room and I sing into my daughters karaoke machine.) I am merely just a music therapist who happens to have a passion for teaching others how to use music to help our kiddos reach their full potential.During my music therapy sessions this week we have been talking about how each one of us is given talents and how each of us are different in our own way. The students helped devise a list of their talents and things they are good at. We then discussed things that are hard or challenging for them and made a list. I made sure the list of strengths were much longer than the list of weaknesses than we talked about how everybody struggles with something sometime. When we finished our discussion we sang the following song, I’m not Perfect by Laurie Berkner. Laurie is one of my all time favorite children's’ song writers. I have been using her songs during music therapy since 2001 and tell all my friends when I grow up I want to be her! You can only imagine how excited I was last year when I was able to see her in concert! I did bring my children and 2 year old nephew so I wouldn’t look out of place.
I'm not perfect.
No I'm not.
I'm not perfect, but I've got what I got.
I do my very best.
I do my very best.
I do my very best each day.
I'm not perfect but I hope you like me anyway.
You're no perfect.
No, you're not.
You're not perfect,
But you've got what you got.
You do your very best, you do your very best.
You do your very best each day.
You're not perfect
But you know I like you anyway.
Cause, we're not perfect.
Oh no we're not.
We're not perfect.
But we got what we got.
We do our very best, we do our very best
We do our very best each day.
We're not perfect.
But I hope you like us anyway.
