Teaching Advanced Students
Found in: Other Methods, Students, Students with Prior Experience
Elisa J., New Jersey
There was a subject brought up during the last conference call with Kerry about not taking on advanced students. Up until then, I had it in my mind that I could pretty much teach whomever I like advanced or not because after all, everyone starts from the very beginning. I did say that I’ve had 3 or 4 years of traditional lessons which started when I was 9 (I’m 38 now). I did not stop playing after lessons. I do know how to read music (not the SM way, though) I’ve been playing since I was 7 (both hands together). I did have about 30 or so songs I can play without sheet music before SM. Right now, I am on Level 3, working on Acc 1 and have about 30?(not sure how many exactly) variations/arrangements in my head. I was under the impression that anyone can teach but didn’t realize there were conditions. My question is should I stop feeling that I’ll be able to teach anyone, then? Is this overconfidence on my part? I did realize that I may end up with students who can play better than I can or better music readers than I am but that was ok from what I understood (analogy about that swim coach comes to mind). With what I’ve learned so far not be enough to guide the “advanced” student through SM? I do know what my limits are and have be forthcoming about them to all my students. Please reply at your convenience (reply all if you’d like to hear each other’s comments).
Gordon Harvey, Australia
I don’t actually remember much about the conversation on the conference call, but I’ll respond briefly. There are no official restrictions to who you can teach, except that there are requirements for you to qualify for teacher and student materials. You can check the detail of these in the Status, Accreditation and Program Guidelines. Essentially they are requirements that you send us proof (via Teacher Evaluation Forms) that you have students at a certain level in order to acquire materials for later levels. This requirement is principally intended to ensure that you’re unfolding the syllabus in the correct order and not missing anything out. It doesn’t restrict you from teaching advanced students. You would probably use your most advanced student for the Evaluation Forms. Obviously that student would be the one who is pushing you forward, and if we saw that, for example, you’d been teaching for two years and were ordering Level 9, we may contact you and check that you were doing the right thing.
Beyond that, I think you can teach anyone you feel comfortable with. Your background will help in the sense that, at least in the early stages, you shouldn’t have too much trouble playing the pieces, but the main thing you’d need would be to be thoroughly familiar with the training materials for what you’re teaching, and to resist the temptation to borrow from your non-SM past. You’d also need to be confident about the small ways in which you might alter the order of presenting projects, for example starting Accompaniments or Arrangements earlier than normal. This is the kind of thing that only comes with experience. When I started teaching (before Simply Music) I had less playing experience than you, but I basically took on any student who asked for lessons, some of whom were already better musicians than me. Sometimes it worked, other times it didn’t work so well, but it was the best on-the-job training I could ask for.
I’d suggest you watch your advanced students’ progress carefully, and continue to be honest about your limitations, and perhaps prepare the students for the possibility of moving them to another teacher if you feel that’s best.
Original discussion started August 15, 2011