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Rachel Arntson, MS, CCC-SLP, has always loved music. So when she noticed that young children in an early intervention program at Osseo School District 279, in Maple Grove, MN, could dance and do finger plays to music but couldn't keep up vocally, she decided to write and record her own songs to augment their therapy.
"I wanted to give them practice they could actively participate in and would love to do that would make their speech better," Arntson told ADVANCE.
She created songs, originally recorded through a grant from the school district, with music partner Chez Raginiak. Their songs feature adults and children singing together to encourage turn-taking. This creates a musical conversation, not just a performance.
Each song has specific therapy goals, such as increasing vocabulary through repetition, imitating sounds, or answering choice questions, Arntson stated. "I have seen countless times the benefit of using music to improve speech."
Most of the songs have come from students she has worked with. Thinking about which sound, word or phrase a child needs to work on starts her creative juices flowing. She tells parents when their child inspires a song so they know their input has far-reaching value that extends to other children who need speech practice.
Beyond her own interactions with children, parents and siblings show her new and creative ways to work with her young students. For example, a father demonstrated how he used music in speech practice with his son, who could only imitate one vowel sound. Teaming up on the Bee Gees' song Staying Alive, the son sang, "Ah, ah, ah, ah," and the dad came in with the line, "Staying alive, staying alive."
"This is the kind of musical interaction and verbal practice I try to create in my music," Arntson stated.
The key to working with another boy came from his 4-year-old sister, who played one of her favorite CDs during a therapy session. While the Enya CD had not been in Arntson's lesson plan, the little boy became relaxed while they all danced around the room and imitated every sound.
Arntson didn't design her songs just for use in therapy sessions. Children can enjoy them anytime because they're fun, she said. "Because children can do the songs, they smile and their eyes beam. Most of all, they become verbal."
The benefit of using music in speech-language pathology is an emerging idea that needs to be explored further, she said. She conducts seminars on the topic, focusing on four areas of benefit for children:
- to improve memory with music, both for language concepts and vocabulary;
- to help interactions;
- to help gross, fine and oral-motor imitation; and
- for emotional aspects, such as self-esteem, parent-child interactions, relaxation and attention.
Other therapists can incorporate music into their therapy by first considering what children find enticing about music. Clinicians can look beyond children's songs to rock and roll, oldies and new songs, which all should be considered as potential speech tools. For example, the "Ba-Ba-Ba" segment in the Beach Boys song Barbara Ann is a perfect consonant-vowel practice song, said Arntson.
The songs she and Raginiak created have proved to be so successful that they launched Kids' Express Train, a company dedicated to enhancing children's speech through music, imitation and fun.
 For more information:
*Rachel Arntson, 877-876-3050, e-mail: kids@expresstrain.org, online: www.expresstrain.org
Nicole Benkert is on staff at ADVANCE.
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