I just realized that I have not mentioned anything in here about my work with adolescents this semester! I am currently doing my clinical practice at a High School College for students with learning difficulties such autism, asperger's syndrome, down syndrome, speech and language impairment, ADHD, anxiety etc.

This is my first hands on experience in conducting group music therapy sessions with this population and also had to work with the speech pathology students with one of the groups. It has been a challenging and learning experience to be running group sessions with these students. Imagine a bunch of adolescents are already difficult enough what more adolescents with different social, emotional, cognitive and physical needs.

Basically, I have been running an all boys group of 13-14 years of age who are lonely in school, have difficulties socializing, often bullied, have attention deficits and anxiety problems. These hyperactive boys keep me and my co-partner on our toes all the time! They are called "Beat Makers". Our goals for them were to form a safe and comfortable group to work on their social skills, team work, turn taking, and encourage positive behavior within the group. I have seen and learned so much just by leading these boys in activities that promote interaction through instrument play, singing and music listening.

It was interesting to see how these boys, each with their own distinct personalities, trying to form an identity for themselves within the group, how they tried to outdo each other, how they conversed with the person in the group that they admire, how they asked each other questions that they have been dying to ask but didn't dare, how they can be so encouraging and sensitive sometimes to other boys and yet on other times being a pain in the neck. As a therapist and a facilitator, I have learned to actually observe each of their personalities and to bring out the best in them within the group, to pull whatever thoughts, issues or opinion that they have mentioned and to put it to the group for discussion. Just a couple of weeks ago, one of our sessions were video taped and boy, that was the worst session that we've had with the boys all distracted and running all over the place. Yet, that was when I learned so much more about what I could have done and the week after that was so much better.

The other group that I had to co-lead was the totally opposite. They were all girls group called "Girl Power". Girls being girls are often more mature and I do not have to spend my energy running around. These girls were referred because of social and emotional issues. Their sessions were centred around group discussion on issues faced such as family problems, learning to say "NO", forming an identity for themselves, having a support group, how to handle anxiety and depression.

We used lots of lyric analysis, group songwriting and instrument improvisation to draw out these issues that the face and bring them into the group for discussion. At the same time, the group were to learn to use their social skill strategies such as maintaining eye contact when talking, taking turns to share thoughts and opinion, learning to listen to each other and communicate verbally and non-verbally.

These were the 2 contrasting groups that I have to handle. But these students remind me about my high school days when these issues were really real and hard to handle even for myself, what more for these students who have other difficulties. Nevertheless, there is a need to motivate these groups to form positive team work and learn from each other.