Studio Management
Redefining ‘Learning Difficulties’
I had a first grade student in her first shared lesson. This was her first SM music lesson, but she has had previous Suzuki lessons. She just covered her ears and refused to participate after the first instruction. I visited with her mother after the…
Top 40 Playlist
I have a lot of students in the Development Levels (10-18). My requirement is that they have their “Top 40” or an hour’s worth of music that they can just sit down and play. I require them to keep a lot of the more…
Playlist Review
The question has come up, “How do I review the playlist each week in a timely manner?” I’d like to suggest some things and open this up to more of you contributing your ideas of how to manage this important component of lessons. If…
Fitting it all In
Hello Teachers, I wanted to provide a bit of clarification here and repost information I’ve sent out. There are a number of questions here that I’d like to address, in no particular order. First, I want to clarify that once I start on an Arrangement Project,…
Teaching Foundation Only?
I am just covering my bases/honesty here – I just had a student inform me via email that she only enjoys learning the video-supported material and wonders if I can teach her only this, or if I know a teacher who teaches only the SHM…
Blues and Improv Program
The B&I training materials describe many of the projects, or groups of projects, as being able to be taught concurrently with earlier projects. It’s also mentioned that many or most of these should be done in different keys but not necessarily all keys. All of…
Arrangements
I have a quick question about the Arrangements program. Will every student eventually learn all of these? I know that the Foundation songs are absolutely ALL essential for learning and knowing but what about the arrangements? I thought they were but some how I got…
Chat – Justifying Arrangements
Gordon (Aus) The first part of this presentation will be mostly my pre-written notes. We’ll have time for questions after then. This chat is about introducing, justifying and ordering arrangements. We can get into specifics of presenting individual pieces at the next session [More Teaching Arrangements].…
Remembering Arrangements & Variations
Knowing that variations and arrangements are primarily memory exercises and secondarily exposure to different performance techniques and only after these things pieces for the repertoire, and if students forget them, it’s on some level “okay” in a way that is not true of Foundation pieces,…
Value of Accompaniment
I have an adult student who has had 7 lessons now. She is a very fast learner. She can play 11 songs at this point. (I have thrown in a couple extra accompaniments.) I would like some advice on helping her see the value of…