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Share your struggles with your teachers and your school
At PianoAlpharetta, we thrive to bring quality music education every single day and we know that we can continue accomplishing that by listening to our students and their families. Therefore, several times a year, we send out surveys to hear from them (find the link below). In this week’s tip, we will share comments in response to the struggles our students shared with us regarding music education in the most recent survey.
“Having a difficult time with music practice at home”
We know that home practice gets difficult at times due to not having enough time, not being motivated, finding it difficult, etc. We would like to let you know that you are not alone! Even professional musicians go through periods of being too busy, not being motivated or taking a short break from practice because they find it hard. It is important to remember that music education is a journey and some parts of it are unpredictable. This unexpected nature of it should not be a cause of disappointment. Struggling times can be opportunities for learning personal patterns and healthy self-reflection.
Another principle to remember is considering music education a life long journey and accepting the fact that every day, week, month, even year will be different than each other with some having lots of practice time and some not. (TIP #1)
When we commit to pursuing music education, we expect drawbacks and work collectively to find specific reasons and solutions.
“My child/I don’t remember the instructions from the lessons”
At PianoAlpharetta, all of our teachers use practice sheets for general comments and write notes on the scores for specific comments. Please make sure to read or remind your children to read those every time they practice. If the assignments are exactly the same as the previous week, you might not see new assignments. Feel free to discuss with your teacher if you would like more detailed instructions and contact us during the week if you have any questions. (TIP #3)
“Not knowing if the progress is enough”
Every music student has different capabilities and a pace of learning. Once we determine expectations, decide what it takes to accomplish those and try our best to stick to it, then whatever progress we have is a true accomplishment. (TIP #6)
“I don’t know anything about piano”
The majority of the parents of our students do not have any music background.
Therefore we wanted to reach out to students/parents by sending out our practice tips to support them with their home practice. We would love to hear from you on any topics you would like us to cover!
“Not sure how to help and correct music students at home”
For parents who would like to be more involved in home practice by helping their children and making corrections, we gladly invite parents to stay in the lessons and listen to the teacher as they go through the assignments. On top of that, asking the right questions after the lessons (TIP#2), being involved at the first practice (TIP #3), and always being in touch with the teachers would help tremendously.
“Practice tips are too long to read”
We understand that parents have busy lives. At the same time, while we expect consistent music practice from our children, as their role models (TIP #13) it is important for us to put in the time to educate ourselves so we help the longevity of their music journey.
We are thrilled to hear many comments from parents who mention that after reading all the tips carefully, they started bonding with their children during music practice at home.
Another important aspect to remember is that while we invest in our children’s education financially, we should consider making it a goal to invest time as well.
Our goal is to share all the knowledge we have with our students and their families and not keep any information to ourselves. As we make sure to include bullet notes, a good way to approach is to keep our practice tip emails in a folder in our email account and take a couple of days to read, just like how we ask our children to do it with their practice.
If you have not filled out our survey or would like to do it again, you can find out about it here.
May you know you are making a difference, even if your children never tell you themselves.
We would be more than happy to answer any questions and provide more specific consultancy if needed.
Thank you for being a part of the PianoAlpharetta community!
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