Certificate
Specialist Certificate in Inclusive Music Teaching
The experience
Overview
This course has been designed to offer a practical and interactive learning experience.
Delivered over four teaching days (eight-hour sessions each), you will join a small cohort of no more than 20 peers, meaning you will receive a high amount of individual teaching attention. Sessions are scenario-based, giving you the chance to gain valuable feedback and apply your learning directly to your current music teaching practice.
Newly transformed Southbank campus
You will undertake the seminar classes at our Southbank campus, home of the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music.
Our recently reimagined Southbank campus sees Conservatorium staff and students co-located with their colleagues and peers at the Victorian College of the Arts, bringing all of the creative disciplines together, physically, for the first time in the Faculty’s history.
Being based in the heart of Melbourne’s arts precinct and cultural centre, our students enjoy many opportunities to participate in the artistic life of Melbourne. With such an array of events on their doorstep, our students are regular attendees at exhibitions, performances, rehearsals, masterclasses and other significant events in Melbourne's cultural calendar.
Who you will learn from
- Dr Grace Thompson, course coordinator
Dr Grace Thompson
I am a senior lecturer, researcher and registered music therapist. For over 20 years, I have worked with children, young people and families within the early childhood intervention sector, as well as special education settings.
My post-doctoral research focuses on music therapy with children with autism or disability, delivered within ecologically oriented strategies. I am the co-editor of “Music Therapy with Families: Therapeutic Approaches and Theoretical Perspectives”. In 2014, I was keynote speaker at the National Australian Music Therapy Conference and a spotlight speaker at the World Federation of Music Therapy Congress in Krems, Austria.
As course coordinator of the Inclusive Music Teaching program, my mission is to increase access to quality music education for people with disabilities, and to ensure music teachers feel confident they have the skills to support these students.
There is a real societal benefit in having music teachers ready and willing to take on diverse students. Those children and young people have a right to learn music – I don’t think it’s acceptable that there are limited opportunities for them to access great music education.