Well, the year isn’t quite over yet, but I want to share some of my favorite books of 2019. Specifically this list applies to teachers and parents who are part of the Suzuki Triangle Community. I also read a lot of fiction (one of my favorite ways to relax), but I wanted to share some of my favorite books that I think you might enjoy too. Whether you go out and buy your copy (the amazon links here are affiliate…
A topic I have been thinking a lot about over the past few months is the importance of making practice a habit and not something we make happen through our willpower. Families who practice daily and have a long-term commitment to learning an instrument often learn this through experience. When I conducted research with over 100 practice parents (read more about it here), I asked what the one thing was that made this all work in their family. 56% of…
The topic of teens and motivation is one that I thought a lot about when my children were in this age group & one I think about all the time as a teacher. What motivates our teens to keep practicing and keep improving? How can we, as educators, and parents, help? What do the teens we work with need more of so that they stay engaged and interested in improving? What keeps them motivated to continue playing through the teen…
One of the best things I’ve started doing in my studio is connecting with parents to help them feel empowered to help their children be successful through the process of learning to play a musical instrument.
Holding a regular parent meeting to share information about the studio and give parents time to connect is a great way to do this.
Research shows that the parent’s commitment to the process of learning music has a huge impact on their child’s long-term success (see Daniel Coyle’s book The Talent Code) & I would argue that the teacher’s commitment to supporting parents is equally important.
One of my favorite things to do to support parents is to get them together to talk, share ideas and experiences and to feel less alone in their journey supporting their child(ren).
I can’t recommend this enough!
If you feel unsure how to get started or worry what you will ask them that won’t result in silence or blank stares I am sharing 10 questions below that have really helped me get conversation started.
First, if you have more than 5 people attending, have them break into small groups of 2-4 to talk first and then report back to the group.
Second, ask an experienced parent or two to speak up first to get things going. Just ask them before things get started if they’d be willing to share when you ask the question. This will help people feel more comfortable.
Fall is a great time to set goals for the school year. As a teacher, I always find myself finding ways to think intentionally about how I want to structure things in my studio and what I want to work on with my students as a group.
It can also be an excellent time for students and their families to set goals for the year ahead. For students:
What do we want to learn this year? What skills do we want to improve?
How can we support our student this year? What can we do to help provide an environment for them to excel in?
You can find an additional article about the skills needed for a student to practice independently here Is your child ready to start practicing independently? Will it be a while before they practice alone, but you’re wondering how the process will work? Helping our children learn to practice is important at any level! Right now in my studio, I have a big group of late grade school and early middle school students, and we are starting to have many conversations…
A few conversations both online and in person, this week had me thinking about my top advice for students and their families if they feel their progress is too slow. Maybe you’re even just unsure about how your progress compares and want to know how to improve it.
First, off while it’s human nature to compare try not too. Do everything you can to give your child the right environment to be successful but then know everyone takes their own time to get to that end result. How fast you go in the beginning stages is really not important in the long run!
It’s like planting a seed in the garden – we can give it good soil, sunlight, water, and may fertilizer, so it has all the right conditions to grow, but we cannot control how fast the growth actually happens.
It’s not productive to compare various seed and their speed of growth to one another. A lot is happening underground that we cannot even see!
Because I have written a few articles about Suzuki ECE (Dispelling a Myth about Suzuki ECE & The Impact of Music from Birth) I get into a lot of conversations about training and who should take it.
Teachers wonder if they should take the training if they aren’t 100% sure they want to start a class of their own.
My answer is always this: take the training, even if you never teach your own SECE class.
In our instrumental teacher training, we may spend some time on the Pre-twinkle stages, but it’s often a few ideas, and then we have to move on so we can get through the rest of the material in the course.
Often we get some great ideas to get started, and then much of what we do we learn through trial and error or observing other teachers – both of which are great ways to come up with what works for you.
However, when you take SECE training, you will spend a week of in-depth study about how very young children learn, how we can support them as teachers, and how we can support their parents as they watch tiny bits of growth happen in front of them.
What makes a good practice session? Or a good lesson? Sometimes I think we only count sessions where all the starts align, everyone is in a great mood, and what we're working on comes easy to us. I'll take a practice or lesson like that any day. But it's not the reality most of the time. A good practice can mean: We get started with out a battle. Our child is able to focus for longer than yesterday. We focused…
Because I teach very young children to play the violin, their parents are an integral part of their practice sessions at home for quite some time. I literally couldn’t do it without them! Every student though eventually makes the transition to practicing independently. When and how this happens can be very individual, and if you’re wondering when your family will start this process, it’s an important conversation to have with your teacher. Regardless of exactly when this process starts, it…