Music & Art Therapy Promotes Positive Change in Girls at THRIVE!

Parents looking for effective therapy methods to help a struggling young teen girl can learn about Music & Art Therapy at our affordable, all-girls therapeutic boarding school near Austin, TX.
(512) 545-2226

Thrive Girls Ranch & Home understands that parents want to send their daughter to a safe, monitored environment where she receives personal care, and individual therapies that help heal emotional, behavioral and mental disorders–whether brought on by trauma, foster care, adoption or family genetics.

And while the young teen girl enrolls our therapeutic boarding school for counseling, treatment, and improving her academics and life skills, Thrive Girls Ranch also helps students improve emotional and physical health through Music & Art Therapy.

What is Music & Art Therapy?

“Music therapy is the prescribed use of music to effect positive changes in the psychological, physical, cognitive, or social functioning of individuals with health or educational problems.” (American Music Therapy Association, 2014)

“Art therapy is the purposeful use of visual arts materials and media in intervention, counseling, psychotherapy, and rehabilitation; it is used with individuals of all ages, families, and groups.” (Edwards, 2004; Malchiodi, 2012).

“Each discipline has been applied in psychotherapy and counseling with individuals of all ages, particularly children, for more than 70 years.” (Wheeler, 2014).

Music & Art Therapy at THRIVE Opens Hearts, Heals Minds

“Studies have shown that participating in music and art can alleviate pain, help students manage stress, promote wellness, enhance memory, improve communications, aide physical rehabilitation, and give them a way to express their feelings.”

According to the American Art Therapy Association, Art Therapy gives boys and girls “a way to explore their feelings, reconcile emotional conflicts, foster self-awareness, manage behavior and addictions, develop social skills, improve reality orientation, reduce anxiety, and increase self-esteem. A goal in art therapy is to improve or restore functioning and his or her sense of personal well-being.”

Music Therapy in Child/Adolescence Behavioral Health :
Allows for self-reflection through the use of a variety of music-based activities./
Fosters social and communication skills by making music with others./
Inclusive of trauma-informed and wellness-based models of care. /
Helps young people identify how their thoughts and feelings influence their behaviors, choices, and identity development/
Teaches young people how to self-regulate and to help them develop healthy coping skills.

Childhood behavioral health conditions that music therapists work with include, but are not limited to:
• Behavior disorders
• Mood and anxiety disorders
• Attention deficit / Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
• Autism spectrum disorders (ASD)
• Trauma
• Substance use disorders.

Music & Art Therapy at THRIVE Improves Behavior

“Music not only provides an emotional benefit to patients, but a physical one as well. Each of us have a parasympathetic system and a sympathetic (fight or flight) system, and music has a way of recalibrating this nervous system so our body’s innate healing mechanisms can kick in. Music also activates the dopaminergic areas on the brain that inspire happiness and reward in the child. Additionally, oxytocin, a hormone associated with bonding and memory, is released and creates an even stronger sense of kinship between the child and their music therapist.”

Clinical Art Therapy can be effective for adolescents who usually see it as a nonthreatening form of treatment. The art that the adolescent produces can help the therapist gain some idea of the youth’s concerns and life circumstances, especially those situations that are too risky to reveal or too personally embarrassing to relate. In addition, Art Therapy can be used to: Improve sensory-motor function/cultivate emotional resilience/foster self-awareness/promote insight/enhance social skills/reduce conflict/improve cognition/foster self-esteem.

Helping Girls Live, Learn and Thrive!

That’s why Thrive Girls Ranch & Home offers Music & Art Therapy in addition to Individual and Group therapy. We want each young teen girl to experience effective counseling as well as improve daily life at school, and back home with family.

We are an affordable, year-round Christian boarding school for girls ages 12-17 who are misbehaving or struggling with self-destructive or dangerous behaviors. We help girls transform into responsible, respectful and gracious young women. The therapeutic residential program in Central Texas features Teen Challenge Biblical advisors and mentors, a focus on academics, and a milieu of therapeutic activities, including equine therapy. Girls also benefit from vocational training and mentoring, and it is all designed to help girls transition into a life where they thrive!

If you want to learn more about how Music & Art Therapy helps young teen girls open up and heal at our therapeutic boarding school, please call now. (512) 545-2226