E-Book of Articles - World Federation of Music Therapy

Wheeler, Barbara: WMFT Proceedings of the Education Symposium
function some of which you might not find practical or limiting, can be
experienced as threatening and anxiety provoking.
So clear ethical rules and a respectful understanding of the processes
around the training are necessary.
The Potential Space
In the music therapy training, among other definitions, we use
Winnicott`s concept of ”the potential space” (or ”transitional area”). In
the ETMT it is understood as the range of individual and inter-relational
possibilities of action, which ”student clients” are able to use, and are in
contact with, in playing situations during a developmental process.
Developing processes means grounding and extending the potential space of
a human being.
For groups of ”student-clients” the playground of their potential
space is:
The group therapy sessions and the every day milieu with the group
of students to which they belong
The processes going on with the ETMT teachers (the group music
therapist and the individual music therapist) in exploring,
grounding and expanding their ”potential space.”
The ETMT teacher, in a paradoxical way, becomes both:
a kind of partner to the student`s disposition; a person the student
may relate to in a very close way
a part of a teachers group in a program where the student has to be
evaluated and examined in many other disciplines – even if the
ETMT teachers do not have other functions in the program.
Once a year we have a ‘check up meeting’ in the whole teachers
group where serious problems identified with students are addressed and
discussed with the involved teachers and the student. We never discuss any
personal information but the ETMT teachers can communicate within a
confidential frame to a permanent teacher (a professor in the program)
issues such as: weak boundaries, extreme anxiety problems, low motivation
or a lack of ability for self-reflection etc. At the meeting it is then briefly
discussed if those particular issues are evident in the individual student in
both Experiential Training disciplines as well as in other disciplines, and it is
discussed whether the problem is being dealt with in a responsible way.
The students know that we have these meetings, and that we never
bring issues up which have not been discussed with the student beforehand.
If there is general anxiety about a student, the student will be immediately
informed and advised what to do.
3. The playground for ”the potential space” of the students also
includes their ability to go into therapeutic processes at the same time as
training in many other musical and theoretical disciplines.
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