Echoes of synchrony
Linda Swart · 2025
Rhythmical movement is at the heart of engagement and the ability to come into synchrony with another person. Linda Swart , educational psychologist, explores how musical play taps into the neurobiology of interpersonal relationships (“Echoes of Synchrony”). She focuses on the role of mirroring behaviour and how it can bring play partners into synchrony with each other. She describes the lost moments of engagement between adults and children and contrasts this with the authentic play partner who is fully present, mirroring the child, seeing them, hearing them, echoing them and the magic of synchrony that results. She presents an extended observation of Julie working with a child with significant disabilities and the roles of rhythm and synchrony in revealing this child’s true abilities. As a coda to this chapter, Julie Wylie provides an account of her earlier work with this same child leading up to the engagement that Linda witnessed.