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THE SJ CHILDS SHOW-Building a Community of Inclusion
🎙️ Welcome to The SJ Childs Show Podcast! 🎉
Join Sara Bradford—better known as SJ Childs—as she bridges understanding and advocacy for the neurodivergent community. This podcast shines a light on autism awareness, empowering stories, expert insights, and practical resources for parents, educators, and individuals alike.
Brought to you by The SJ Childs Global Network, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting autistic individuals and their families worldwide, this show is your weekly dose of inspiration and actionable ideas. Visit sjchilds.org to learn more about our mission, find resources, and connect with our growing community.
Catch us on platforms like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Goodpods—or tune in Fridays at 8:30 AM EDT on the Helium Radio Network’s Life Improvement Radio (Channel 1). Together, let’s foster a brighter, more inclusive world! 🌟
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https://sjchilds.myshopify.com/
THE SJ CHILDS SHOW-Building a Community of Inclusion
Episode 308-Beyond Words: How Music Bridges Neurological Differences with Craig Parks
Craig Parks transforms our understanding of connection with autistic children through the profound language of music. Drawing from his dual expertise as both a professional musician and father to an autistic son, Craig reveals how music became the bridge that helped his non-verbal toddler communicate and eventually thrive as a drummer with perfect pitch.
The conversation takes us through Craig's personal journey of receiving his son's autism diagnosis at just 16 months old, facing the uncertainty of whether he'd ever hear his child say "Daddy," and discovering how melody and rhythm created pathways of connection where words couldn't reach. "When he is playing music with other musicians," Craig shares, "in that moment there is no neurotypical, there is no autistic—there's just humans creating energy together."
This revelation led Craig to develop his groundbreaking "Parenting A to E" course, teaching parents to master their "affect"—the physical manifestations of emotions through facial expressions, body positioning, and vocal tone—to better connect with children across neurological differences. Through specially crafted songs that transform daily routines like bedtime and hand-washing into meaningful moments of connection, Craig demonstrates how parents can create lasting memories and stronger bonds with their children.
Beyond parenting techniques, our conversation explores the creation of truly inclusive spaces where neurodivergent children can be celebrated for exactly who they are. Drawing from his 27 years directing summer camps, Craig shares how compassionate communities can be built where differences aren't just accommodated but embraced. Whether you're a parent, educator, or someone who values human connection across differences, this episode offers practical wisdom for using music to bridge neurological divides and foster relationships built on acceptance and joy.
Ready to transform your connection with the children in your life? Email Craig at craigparks@parentingharmony.com for special access to his Parenting A to E course.
The SJ Childs Show is Backford's 13th season. Join Sarah Brafford and the SJ Childs Show team as they explore the world of autism and share stories of hope and inspiration. This season we're excited to bring you more autism summits featuring experts and advocates from around the world.
Speaker 2:Go to sjchildsorg hey everyone.
Speaker 1:I wanted to take a second to talk to you about the International Autism Summit coming up in April April 25th and 26th. It's going to be streaming free from all of my channels. If you haven't already gone to follow me, go to sjchildsorg. Click on any of the social media icons and go follow me so that you can be with us at the International Autism Summit 2025, autism Summit 2025, april 25th and 26th. Can't wait to see you then.
Speaker 1:Hi, I'm SG Childs. Join me in building a community of inclusion. I'm holding a silent auction where you can bid on unique items and experiences for autism awareness and our International Autism Summit 2025. Every bid helps support autistic individuals and families worldwide. Find out more at sjchildsbetterworldorg. Hello, thank you so much for joining the SJ Child Show today. I promise this will be an engaging, fantastic conversation. As always. I have a wonderful guest that I've been waiting to catch up with, and sometimes that anticipation makes those conversations really exciting, because you're just like yes, come on, I want to get to this, I want to learn more about this. Today I have Craig Parks and he is coming from sunny San Diego. Oh, so lucky. I mean, it's sunny here in salt lake city today, so I'm gonna get out there later this afternoon and take advantage of that craig.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for being here today I'm honored to be with you, sarah, thanks for having me yeah, it's so, it's so great and I I love the work that you're doing and I'm excited of our conversation today to share it with my audience and tell us a little bit about yourself and what kind of got you started on this journey.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, I've always been fascinated by childhood and working with kids and you know, my whole adult life I've pretty much been working with kids. I've created two summer camps, I've done teen development, and so I have a lot of experience. I'm also a professional musician who has done a lot of music with kids as well. But then you know that moment you become a parent, the whole world changes dramatically and it's like whoa, mind and heart blown Right. And um, and my son who, I can't believe it, he turned 21 last January Um, it, just it changed my whole life to become a dad. And um, and the journey of it has been interesting because my son is on the autism spectrum.
Speaker 3:And you know when, when my wife and I were expecting you know this was over 21 years ago it it wasn't as prevalent back then, like it wasn't in the news, it wasn't, you know, and so it wasn't in our consciousness. You know we just thought, oh cool, we're pregnant, we'll have a kid, we'll raise it, it'll be, and we'll have our. You know, we just thought, oh cool, we're pregnant, we'll have a kid, we'll raise it, it'll be, and we'll have our. You know, we'll have our kids, it'll, we'll have our family. It'll be wonderful and and I think it's a little bit of a shock to the system we're like, oh whoa, this is going to be a different journey than what we anticipated. And and so we ended up and and my son Jonah got his diagnosis very, very early and he got an at-risk diagnosis when he was around 16 months old. So you know, we started working with OTs and PTs and ABA and floor time and RDI like very early. So I got to work with a lot of very, very talented and skilled people and also my own experience of working with and training a lot of people how to work with kids. I ended up, you know, a few years ago.
Speaker 3:I was like you know what I want, to have my influence go beyond San Diego and so I put together a course called Parenting A to E, from Stress to Smiles, and the A stands for affect. And you know, to get into my son's world when he was young and you know he didn't talk until he was well past the age of two. So when he got diagnosed I didn't know if I would ever hear my child say, daddy, or I love you. And I know for a lot of parents they have kids on the spectrum who are nonverbal and they don't get to hear that, and these are hard things and these are real things, but the affect part of it was really huge for me. I realized, oh, there are ways that we can get into our kids' world and ways that we can really be connected and they can feel connected to us if we learn to actually master our affect. So our affect actually is the physical manifestations of our emotions, so it's how we actually use our facial expressions, where we actually put our bodies in space, and our vocal affect too. You know, are we talking softly, loudly? So when we learn how to actually master and understand how to use our vocal and body affect, it opens up a whole new world of connection and sweetness with our kids. And so I put together this course called A to E, and the E is for effect, the effectiveness we want in connecting in that sweet, loving, trusting relationship with our kids. And so I put together this course and it teaches affect, how to use your body and your voice.
Speaker 3:And then also music has been a really, really profound connector for me with all kids I work with, but especially with my son.
Speaker 3:In fact, before he spoke he actually sang a melody. My son is an incredible musician, he has perfect pitch and he's an amazing drummer and he's also a DJ, so he's got music is where his gifts one of his gifts lies, and and so there's a whole section on music and songs that take the everyday part of parenting um, you know, bedtime, waking kids up, um, playing with them, like washing hands, all this kind of stuff that you just do every day and and turns it into memorable, connecting events, because most days of parenting are not taking our kids to disneyland, right, most of the days are the everyday slog. So I was, I was really interested in how do we create that as the joyful, memorable moments, and so, and then there's 10 activities as well, in the course that people do. They're screen-free and allows for really beautiful connection, and so the songs and the activities allow us to actually practice our affect and dive into joyful connection with our kids.
Speaker 1:That's incredible and so many things of your story and mine resonate the age of diagnosis for both of our sons um.
Speaker 1:my son's name is dj and he is musically inclined as well, and so I think that's hilarious um, yeah, he um, same kind of he wasn't speaking till after four, right around four, and it was. I wish that I had known about this course, you know, and it probably may or may not have been out by then. You know, our journey started in about 2010. So it's been quite some time too, and and I understand exactly what you're saying is that there wasn't so much information. Um, I was lucky that my husband, uh, had a sister with down syndrome and so he had this inner experience with this beautiful part of the special needs community and he had this just patience about life and his sister and our son that he taught me so much in that process. And, just like you, I'm sure my son taught me so much in this process and really taught me how to see things differently.
Speaker 1:And it is a shocking experience when you have to redefine those ideas. And you know it got me thinking when you had mentioned that that where do these and this is way deep for this conversation, this is way deep for this conversation but where do these ideas and where are they bred from? In, you know, are they in things we see in media, the things that churches or our families teach us? That, you know, when we have a child, we're going to, you know, play baseball and do all these other things then maybe it's smart that we start to redefine what raising a child looks like, so that when our kids have kids, that their experience is just going into parenting rather than shock or anything like that. I think that that is a really interesting topic that might need to be more, you know, more heavily worked on with those smaller kids.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean it is a deep conversation, but it's a, it's a worthy conversation because, you know I, I think when we come in with, with expectations, you know I mean, being a parent is a humbling, humbling experience.
Speaker 3:You know I, I've never had any job that's been harder and I've never had any job that's been more rewarding. In my own growth, and I think certainly the media, you know, and I think our own childhoods also, you know, inform us and you know it may not be realistic to like be a complete blank slate when you go into parenting, but I think if the goal is to, if the goal, instead of like, oh, we're going to play baseball or we're going to do this or that, it's the oh, I can't wait to meet this human and discover who they are and learn about them and just come in every day with curiosity, I think you know, and get in the practice of validating their experience, so that you know we were talking earlier. I think we all just want to be understood, not even always agreed with, but like, oh, I see, I hear where you're coming from, I get you you know, just for who we are and and not intended.
Speaker 1:We don't want people to want us to be different, we want to just be show up. Oh, that's Sarah, there she is with her, whatever you know her pale skin. No, just joking. But no, we just want to show up and be accepted for who we are and teaching our kids that that's what is supposed to be the case, you know, is like a really important thing, but also being realistic as to what's out in the world and getting them ready for that, and you know some of our kiddos have.
Speaker 1:You know, my son doesn't necessarily understand those social problems or situations, as my daughter is straight in the middle of it, right in it, understanding it, confused by it as we all were, and it's given me a different chance to take the lead, yet follow, if that makes sense, and really just understand like, okay, I love what you said too. They just want to. You want to show up with curiosity as much as possible, because I think that that is fueled with, like a positive energy behind it, with curiosity. So, and one of our quotes that I love to say is you know, knowledge turns fear into understanding and when we allow ourselves to accept the knowledge, it melts those fears away. You're able to see, with a new perception, oh, there's, there's a chance, there's a light, there's options, there's, you know, strategies, there's all of these different therapies I can try and and you really just like make your way.
Speaker 1:But music is, I, like you said, such an important and such a universal way to be able to express yourself, receive expressions from someone else. I think it's so beautiful and it definitely changed the way our son's ability to communicate with us. You know it was through music, the same way, so I love that yeah, it's, it's huge.
Speaker 3:Um, you know, my son got his first drum set, uh, shortly before he turned three years old and, um, he sat at this little little kid drum set and I couldn't believe it. He's like boom, bop, boom. I'm like, oh, wow, that's a beat, my son's playing a beat. And you know, it turned out he just was a phenomenal, phenomenal drummer and when he was, I don't know, maybe around 14 years old or so, like I said, I'm a professional musician, so I know a lot of musicians.
Speaker 3:I started this thing with him, them, and we didn't go all the way, but it's called Parks and Pals, where the concept was to do a number one hit song, cover a number one hit song from 1958 to the modern times we went up to like 1963, but it's on YouTube and if you look at Parks and Pals and you can see my son drumming and it was just the great thing about music too, especially as I see my son drumming, and it was just the the great thing about music too, especially as I see my son, you know, and look, he's got struggles because of his neurology. There's things that are hard for, really hard for him, but when he is playing music in the moment of actually playing music and and he's playing with other musicians. In that moment there is there is no neurotypical, there is no autistic, there is. There's just humans creating energy together and and I can tell like his anxiety goes down because he's confident, he feels it and music is just. It's a magical, magical experience.
Speaker 1:It is so magical. You know, I grew up not as in my voice, as my instrument. I was a singer, and so, for me, I remember saying to my husband once you know, there's not often times in your life that you can find yourself in a moment where you feel in perfect harmony with yourself, with the universe, with the people around you, with nature, with everything, with source, with whatever you want to call it. And it's in singing that when I'm just like so deep into that song and I'm right there, you know just it's that moment that I feel those things, that I just feel like in perfect harmony, and there's not a lot of like. Obviously, life isn't about perfection, there's nothing perfect about it, but that moment when you're just like locked in and the zone, you know that it is, it's perfect. I love that moment.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and what's great. So to this day I still have a band where my son is the drummer in this band and so you know, I get to, I get to rehearse with him once a week. I get you know, we talk often and he gets to share all sorts of music that he's into, and I'll tell you this too. You know you were mentioning earlier, sarah, that we learn a lot from our kids. My son has expanded my musical taste a lot. He'll turn me on to all sorts of music that maybe I was either close to or didn't really quite ever got exposed to or didn't like. And he's like, dad, check this out, and all of a sudden like wow, my son is teaching me to be more open-minded, you know, and more open-hearted.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Yeah, I can definitely see. I don't know. I'll have to ask DJ like what his kind of music he listens to classical all day long, every day. It's on a radio on the side of his room Wow.
Speaker 1:And so that's always going. But he also likes to create music on his computer, on his apps or whatever he's doing. And then my daughter, interestingly enough being you know 13, like she would have been my best friend in the 90s, Like we would have been best best friends Excuse me, and I've never, you know, with my oldest like our music, like we can never get on the same page. There was no music interests and you know alike. But this one man, she loves all of my music. She has it on her playlist. We get in the car and I'm like, how are you playing Smashing Pumpkins right now? Like all of these things, you know, she just like lights me up so much. But the same thing, she has her own music interests. She shares her playlist, her Spotify playlist, with me and it has such different types of music that I would have never known about that. Then I'm like, oh, I love this, you know, and I've never like had such a better experience, um, to be able to share that with her.
Speaker 3:And sometimes we'll just go for drives together and turn up the radio to all our both of our favorite musics and just, you know, roll down the windows and blast it, and it's such a great experience yeah, those and those memories that she's going to have with you, of like being in the car and listen to those tunes, like when you know, when she's older, and those same songs come up, it's like she's going to be brought right back to those sweet, happy, joyful moments with you. You know, and yeah, and, and that's what I really wanted to leverage with music. I was like you know what, if I know that music is one of the most powerful memory makers we have as humans, like I'm going to leverage this. And so, you know, when my son was young, I wrote a lullaby for him and and so every night, every night, at bedtime, I would sing this really, really sweet song and to this day, you know he, he knows it and it's just a very sweet memory and embedded in the lyrics are like snuggle, kiss on the, on the, on the face there, and it's like if, if we parents can use that and ritualistically use music for sweet connection, and and that's what these songs in my course do. It's like, yeah, you know what Waking up can have a song, washing hands can have a song. So, if you, you know, for any parents, like, if you really are conscious about how you're going to use music. You can use it to really, really make a huge difference and have childhood memories that will last forever.
Speaker 3:I was thinking about, like, my first grade year. I had a first grade teacher who and I don't remember all the day to day of first grade, like I don't know what I did in the classroom, you know, in first grade, but I do have a memory because at the end of every day she would sing the same song Goodbye everybody. Yes, indeed, yes, indeed, you know, she'd sing the song and decades later, like I still remember this song from when I was six years old, because the sweet teacher, every day saying the same tune in a ritualistic way, like the end of the day, we ended with this musical sweetness. I'm like, wow, I could do that with my own kids, with with all sorts of things. You know, I wrote a song called dancing on daddy's shoulders. That is so fun that, you know, pop up your little ones up on your shoulders and it's really sweet melody and um. So I know that my kids are going to have these really strong, beautiful memories and we have such joyful experiences associated with music and movement.
Speaker 1:It's so important. And yeah, it's like we live like this parallel lives in different places and different experiences. I swear I always made up songs too, and it probably is because you and I were both just musically inclined throughout our lives and unfortunately I never did anything professional with it. But I surely love it, it's one of my favorites. But throughout DJ's life, when he was really young, maybe in the three to five age, I found these dvds called rock and learn. I don't know if you've ever heard about those. I even ended up after years, years later, after dj had learned more than I could have ever imagined, I reached out to the creator of these and just kind of shared our experience and how they just changed our life and changed the trajectory and enhanced our kiddos experience by tenfold.
Speaker 1:Through these he learned the basically education from preschool to high school and before he was, you know, eight years old he had already mastered like high school math through music and you know, like all of these incredible things I mean he, he learned the periodic table of elements when he was four or five and he has a photographic memory and so we would go places and he would ask people like, how old are you?
Speaker 1:And they would tell him, and then he would tell them what element they were on the periodic table. I think that the oldest lady we ever found was a little gal in the grocery store and she was like 92 or 95, you know, so I think that was the highest one he ever got to say. But so fascinating what music can do. And I see that you know his little sister sees that as well and so I can hear her memorizing her states to the music song or you know, kind of those things. It's just so powerful and you know I love that you're using it in a space where parents are confused and concerned and unsure of how to really reach their child and sometimes you just, like you said, the child will actually communicate through the music before even you know physically or any verbally. So yeah, it can be such a great tool. What a smart way to put that into, into something to share with people.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I want to actually offer your audience, you know, a special deal. So if they if they're, if they're interested in the parenting ATE course, they can write to me at Craig parts, at parenting harmonycom, and I, you know, I want this to be accessible to whoever, whoever wants it. I know a lot of parents have really, really benefited from this course and from the music and mastering their affect. And, you know, especially in the special needs community, I know there's so many parents struggle and a lot of parents feel very isolated in their journey and and I know that that's a very, very common experience I actually have led support groups for parents who have kids with special needs and and you get in a room with other parents who have kids with special needs and there's this great exhale of like, oh, finally, other people who just kind of get it and understand you know what, what I'm going through, yeah definitely is that right parentingharmonycom yeah spelling is correct at the moment oh, that's great.
Speaker 1:I love that. What um are you doing? Do you have any plans coming up? Are you working on projects, kind of what's in the works?
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, actually what I'm working on now. So I, so I, you know I have a book called how to Stress Less and have More Fun with your Kids.
Speaker 3:Oh that's fun, yeah. And then I put together this, this course, which took a lot of years. You know it's 14 songs and you know and and these and there's, there's videos and there's all this stuff to put together the course. But I wanted it to be very simple, very easy. Parents could watch like a three minute video and be like, oh, I can go do that with my kid now, you know.
Speaker 3:And so the thing I'm working on right now is when the pandemic hit, I started a show with my daughter, who was five years old at the time and called Parks Party Central. It was an interactive live show. It was music and games and activities and just silliness and comedy so that people could come and just have some joy during a very, very difficult time. And I'm going back, we did. We ended up doing 70 episodes, but I'm I'm going back now and looking back at these episodes because every episode we my daughter and I did activities that they were just really silly but super fun, activities that parents could do with their kids.
Speaker 3:So I'm I'm in the process of writing a book called the Park to Party Central Activity Book that parents can do these things with their kids. So they'll get to read about what the activities are. They'll be able to click on a link and it'll be the little clip from the show of my daughter and I doing these really fun, silly activities. So that's something I'm working on right now. I just, you know, I'm just. I think the world gets transformed when there's more love and connection in it, you know, and the world needs more love and connection, and and so that's, you know, I know, like my gift was not to cure cancer or anything like that. My gift is to work with kids and work with parents, and I'm leaning all the way into it through the music and through my own experiences as a coach of parents as well.
Speaker 1:I love that and thank you so much for your work as well, because it is it is such an important part of, and when people see the value that it can bring to their lives, it's just it's priceless, really Gosh. I like totally had something, and then you know.
Speaker 3:Well, I wanted to thank you, too, for the work that you're doing because you know it, it is really important that parents who have kids of special needs have a place where they can again like realize they're not alone. You know, and and I just think it's it's a very common experience as a as a long-time camp director. I just ended my camp director career just about a year ago but. But I directed summer camps for 27 summers and you know there were a lot of kids who came to my camp who were on the spectrum or had special needs, and you know we were talking earlier about places where you can go, where you can just be yourself and be accepted, and that was one thing that I really prided myself on.
Speaker 3:My camp's focus was on creating communities where that could happen. You know, I remember I had one kid on the spectrum who he used to come to camp every day wearing a bow tie and a Home Depot apron, right, and you can imagine in other spaces a kid like that would get bullied, would get teased, and one of the things I'm most proud of is to create spaces where a kid like that can come to camp like that and be treated well, with respect and be celebrated, and so I want to encourage parents I know we're going to be coming up on summer months soon that talk to camp. If you're going to send your kids to camp, you know it's really important that our kids can have spaces where they are celebrated and they're cared for and there's a culture of kindness.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more, and that's what I was. My my brain came back into play there and I wanted to just challenge my audience. I want to challenge the teachers and the afterschool teacher programs and the coaches and outside of parenting to use this program as well. Why not? Why not be able to reach your students in a new way that would be engaging and fun and creative? So not only for you parents out there listening, but also professionals that you know might work with children, or, if you not even the children, I mean even the young adults and the, you know, autistic adults. I don't think that there's an age that music can't be effective for a person. So one to 99, go ahead and give it a try.
Speaker 3:I agree, I think people who are, you know, teachers or even grandparents or anybody who's working with kids, will will benefit from this a lot.
Speaker 3:And you know, one of the songs that um that I wrote is called give and get and um, and it's.
Speaker 3:I'm also a firm believer in education, you know, and I would often like, at the camp that I used to run, we would, we had a lot of kids on the spectrum and I'd bring parents in or um, we'd even have autistic kids themselves talk about what it's like to be autistic and really educate, so that these kids then they were, they were known, they were seen and they were, they were cared for, and so if they did behaviors that were a little bit out of the norm, the other campers had an understanding and they, they'd be kind about it.
Speaker 3:But this song give and get, you know one, you know, one of the lines in there is that we all have special needs, right, because and we all do some people need more sleep or less sleep, some people have peanut allergies, some people need, you know, have sensory stuff going on, like, we all have stuff that make us a little bit different, a little bit unique, and when we could dig into that common humanity. I think it makes a big, big difference. But that that song is also part of the part of the course too and it was just great hearing a whole community, you know, singing the song of really of compassion, understanding isn't that the truth?
Speaker 1:I'm so grateful for that and I look forward to going and following on those YouTube channels and everything and checking it out. So I'll be doing that. Please go and do that as well. If you're listening, if you're watching, you can see the website I just put up, parentingharmonycom. You can go there to get Craig's information, to go see all of his projects and services that he has available. So don't miss out. You know, make these connections with your kiddos as quickly as you can, because really fostering connections with your child is so important. Connections with your child is so important and your child will be so grateful when they're older and they realize that you took the time to form this meaningful connection with them. So please take the time to do that. Parents, craig, thank you so much for your time today. This has been a wonderful, wonderful half hour to spend with you and I hope we can stay in touch.
Speaker 3:I hope so too. Thank you, Sarah. It's been a real pleasure being with you.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:In the heart of a city. She's shining bright. Oh yeah, stories of love and courage All throughout the night, her voice resonating An anthem for all. Through trials and trials, she answers the call. A mother and a fighter, breaking barriers and strife, with love as her guide. She'll never hide. She's changing the world for you With her heart and speech and strong Empathies and melody. In her journey we all belong. Followers gather Like stars in the night. So bright, 44,000 voices sharing in the light. She stands for family, advocates for more Movement of compassion, ways we'll soar Podcasts together, symphony of support In life change and rapport. She's changing the world for you With her heart. That's fierce and strong. Hypothese and melody A journey we all belong Through her eyes, a vision clear. Together we rise, shedding fears In every heart. She plants the seed Of understanding and love for dearly me. She changed the world for you, thank you.
