It’s fashionable now, among progressive educators, to speak about teaching entrepreneurship.
What most of these folks are actually doing is teaching small business ownership. However admirable that may be, it is not the same thing.
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A popular tactic of guitar teachers is to play along with their students. It’s easy and natural — two guitars sound good together.
The problem comes if the teacher never lets the student play by themselves, whether in a performance situation or a lesson. The student will always sound good — in fact, they’ll sound better than they would on their own — and that’s the problem. They don’t have to work that hard to be steady and play with a strong tone. They will find themselves without much experience, and therefore confidence, when they try to play on their own.
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I wrote yesterday about my reluctance to push a student through developmentally inappropriate material on a too-fast timeline. There is a flip side, however. Learning is not linear, and it’s important to recognize when a student is actually ready to take a leap.
Here’s the uncomfortable part: It may be before you’re ready, and they may leap right over you.
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There are lots of kids out there who have never felt that a teacher understood them or liked them. The teacher who treats a student like a human being, giving them the benefit of the doubt (along with the space to mess up) is a teacher who will have a fan for life.
I'll never forget one moment with a student -- let's call her Anna -- where I saw this clearly.
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Every morning (along with lunchtime and after school), the piano at The Little Middle School is overtaken by a series of students. Each one informally shares the music they can play. This ranges from video game themes, classical pieces, folk songs, songs we’ve learned in class, to just messing around. Each student will continue to play until they have run through their repertoire to their own satisfaction or find themselves jostled off the bench by the next person (usually the latter).
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