Piano Lessons

I love my girls. Aren't they just the cutest ever? (click on picture to see clearer version.) I feel so lucky to have them in my life. As it stands right now, I'm teaching Margie after work on Tuesdays, then rushing home to my mom's house to teach Alexis there while mom watches Jake. On Wednesdays I pick up Evie from school and we go to church for a piano lesson, then I help her with her homework and we goof off until dinnertime, when her parents get her. Wednesdays at church I've done the childcare for 5 years now (and I get paid! it's a big help to my budget) before dinner as the choir practices I watch their kids, and after the church has dinner together I watch the babies through 4 year olds. Lately, though, it's just two 3 year old girls and they're no trouble at all.

Anyway, piano lessons. I started teaching when I was 15. At first it was a fun little experiment but I grew to really love it. 10th, 11th, and 12th grade I had 10 students a week. In college I didn't teach the first year, then started volunteering at a "school" that gave music lessons to inner-city kids. I had two kids a year with them for 3 years, and that was a great learning experience. Senior year I took a part-time job teaching 25 kids a week with a near-by home studio, and for a semester after college I taught with a pretty upscale music studio in a snotty town and had like 35 kids a week.

Yeah, I didn't like that last one.

What I've learned about myself and about my teaching is that I do better with a couple, hand-picked kids, rather than working for someone else teaching a full studio of kids I have no choice in. I'm a patient person, but I have high behavior standards and there's nothing I find more frustrating than trying to teach a student who outright will not respect me. Worse is when said student's parents refuse to back me up as the teacher. I encountered this a LOT when working for those other 2 music studios, and I am so thankful I just have my 3 girls now.

Sometimes I wonder WHY I went to college and got a degree in piano pedagogy when the money I'm actually making as a direct result of my degree barely covers half my monthly student loan payment. (Yeah, think on that one for a minute.) I don't even play the piano anymore unelss it's a duet with one of the girls. But I know in my heart that I didn't go to college JUST for a piece of paper, JUST to get a certain job. College was a learning experience and a time for me to grow up and find myself and it's ok if I'm not in a field directly related to my degree or that I'm barely using my degree.

When I taught full-time, I didn't enjoy my kids. I barely knew most of them, couldn't remember their names or what they were playing (I even resorted to making a notebook of students with a few pages for each and a Polariod picture of each one at the top and notes about them so I could keep them straight. I don't think a teacher should have to do that -- how effective can you be teaching someone if every week you're re-learning who they are?)

Each lesson seemed like a chore, and I counted the minutes until the end of the lesson, then counted with each student how many I had left for the day. Now with my 3 girls, I really look forward to lessons, and this year I've extended lessons from 30 minutes to 45 minutes a week because we never have enough time for everything (and I'm nice and didn't raise my rates in doing this -- also I don't want the parents to think I extended the lessons so I could charge more.)  Teaching these girls makes me happy, and I think they're getting a lot out of it too.  Works for everyone.  :)

Comments

[Kelly]

cute pics! I hear ya on the student loan thing and using your degree.... I owe thousands in student loans and I am not even using my degree, I am probably going to look for full time work once Austin turns 2 if not before, we need to pay down some debt and I actually really look forward to using my social work degree. Good luck with the lesson! ttyl girl

[Leslie]

So promise that you will teach Ella someday and that you will make her learn to read the notes??

Love ya

Leslie

[Jen_Jake'smom]

Leslie, I will SO totally teach Ella piano lessons! With most kids we don't have trouble with learning the notes because I really focus on it their first year -- Alexis is different because she was 10 when we started (it's better to start at 6 or 7) and she's way too grown up (and thus impatient and stubborn) to just listen to me and let that be it. But it's all good! I know we are going to have a good lesson today and our problem will be solved.

As for Ella -- in 4 years I'm going to have a great student roster -- Jake, Ella, Sadie and Elauna, and maybe Zoe if she's still in town! Maybe Ryan, too, if we can get him to sit still long enough! But Elauna and Sadie's mom have both made me promise I'd teach them -- I think that makes me feel special!!!

Hope we see you soon!

Jen