Nightmare teacher rant! Options

[recollect]

Wow,very powerful statements from the last few messagees if there is such a word!I am sure that we all agree that parents/teachers/students can be challenging at times and may I state for the very last time that my comments were sarcastic in a humerous way,and not an attack on anyone who reads this forum. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[notmusimum]

and where there IS discord let us bring harmony


I use another forum which uses the acronym PFB which stands for perfect first born, I suspect that some parents possibly see their musical offspring in this light...perhaps it is worth considering that the experienced teacher may have met more than one gifted student in their career?

I can only speak for myself but I've never been of the opinion my child was gifted musically. I'm not sure in reality many forum parents do. They may start out as excited at how fast their child can progress initially (it scared me more than anything cos I didn't understand it at all) but eventually most end up realising it takes work guidance and support from the pupil/teacher/parent triangle.

Personally I'd hate it if someone built my child up, telling someone they are good is no use to them at all, so experienced teacher who put her in her place would be fine by me. Providing they were giving her the right support to move forward.

For us it's always been about helping daughter to be the best that she be can in a very personal way (not compared to someone else). It's probably much easier for musical families to achieve than non-musical ones. The whole thing still frightens me and I worry about the decisions I make especially in these crucial few months. Whilst getting where she wants to go is totally in my daughters hands I still have to make decisions on what to fund and how much chauferring I'm prepared to do.


I can't wait until she's settled somewhere to be totally free of it.

[recollect]

You seem to me notmusimum to be the model parent who supports,encourages.finances and helps in every way possible.Its a great pity that all parents are not like you!Dont understand your comments about being totally free of it?

[chraze1]

Maybe as parents when looking for teachers we should look at our own criteria for suitability, rather than just going on reputation, qualifications, geographic location etc.
I know I would be prepared to travel miles if it was the only way of accessing the most suitable tuition.
There are good and bad teachers, the same as there are parents.
We all have our opinions and sites like this are here for us to voice them.
Part of my criteria is foremost instrumental specialist, extensive professional performance experience , knowledge of education of music and ability to offer advice and guidance.
Not important is the ability to accompany in exams.
Personally I look for the higher musical qualifications rather than grade 8 and feel this is not a level to offer tuition. But this is my opinion.

Hi onemoretime,

I'm curious to know why you feel grade 8 isn't a suitable level to offer tuition?,
I teach piano and have done for a while now. I'm working on my grade 8 practical at the moment and grade 6 theory. I would hope to have acheived both by next spring at the very latest.

All of my parents were told of my level before I took on any pupils (I have 14). I categorically told them that I'm not at the top of my game and that I'm still studying.
No one had a problem with that.
I'm currently on the Being an Effective Teacher Course that the ABRSM offer and I'm having excellent feedback on my assignments.

Now here's my opinion!, I think it's good to continue with personal, professional development. I think it might be rather easy to attain some wonderful qualifications and rest thereafter.

Here's a little point to ponder on, although it's regarding a different subject. My daughter who is in 2nd yr at high school has muddled through maths since primary school, she's never grasped it completely and she had as much support at home as we could give. When she started high school, I raised my concerns and was told that the maths dept/teacher would ensure she understood the lessons. Her teacher took great delight in rhyming off his qualifications at parents night last year however couldn't seem to convey his skills to my daughter. I then paid good money for a private tutor who was a DOCTOR of maths, and low and behold, she was still none the wiser!. Now any normal parent would, by this point, be possibly accepting that perhaps it was just my child and that was the way things were going to be in this subject.
However she started 2nd year and has a young teacher who hasn't been teaching very long, doesn't appear to have any airs and graces about her, and would you believe it, my daughter was practically in tears because suddenly she understands the subject. She describes it as "everything has fallen into place", She cannot believe that this teacher speaks to her in a way that she understands!
Just for the record my daughter doesn't have any learning difficulties!

So why do you believe that only those and such as those are worthy of teaching?.

By the way 10 of my 14 pupils have all sat exams grade 1, 2 & 3 and with the exception of 1, they all have merit passes, one who missed distinction by 2 marks! Am I really doing that badly?

Also, I perform every weekend with a band in various venues, I sing, play alto saxophone and keyboards, and have done for over 20 years. Does that make me suitable in the extensive professional performance experience department that you speak of?

[violincjj]

It's a lot easier to believe that the teacher at the conservatoire or the teacher with all the paper qualifications will automatically make your kid the best musician but it is not the case! They may also make the kid miserable in their learning as the poster above says.

It's a lot more work for parents to make the (sometimes) enormous efforts needed to find the right teacher for their kid and to recognise when that teacher needs to be changed at some point down the line too. Most teachers will work for most kids most of the time. The exceptional need more care in matching up student and teacher - either because they are very gifted or because they are very disadvantaged in some way that inhibits learning.

Although I have a lot of kids of my own I have taught hundreds more - I don't know everything by any means. But my experience IS worth something! So I am glad when parents seek me out, even if I don't end up teaching their kid. Nor do I feel bothered if they don't want to buy what I am selling - I don't feel personally attacked and neither should the parent in a situation where the teacher/student combination does not work for their kid.

[notmusimum]

You seem to me notmusimum to be the model parent who supports,encourages.finances and helps in every way possible.Its a great pity that all parents are not like you!Dont understand your comments about being totally free of it?

No I blunder along like everyone else and get things wrong in just the same way. I've made mistakes along the way but most of them have damaged my reputation rather than my child. As the parent it's my duty to make the tough calls and I'm prepared to do that for my children if required. Usually things have worked out the best for her in the end.

It takes an enormous amount of time effort and money to support my daughter (I am aware it's the same for others). Until she knows what's going to be happening to her next year I have to keep supporting. regardless of emotional or financial costs (big problem at the moment). Once there is a resolution then I won't have to carry that burden in the same way.

Recollect I don't know if you realise but my daughter is 17 and a few months away from Consevatoire auditions. Once she's off to Conservatoire or Uni then I can have my life back. She knows what she wants but there is nothing to say she will get it. It's only in the last few days we've had more idea as to where we stand and what work needs to be done to give her the best chance.

I will miss her when she goes but no more chauferring in the same way and there will be time to persue my own hobbies, classical music is not one of them.

[andante]

I was having a similar coversation elsewhere recently. Is it better to stick with school peri, who teaches a couple of instruments, so the one my daughter plays is probably her second instrument, and I have no idea of her qualifications, or to search out the best specialist teacher I can outside school? My view is that the school peri is the best teacher for L, because she is the only adult I have ever known L have an animated conversation with. She comes home and tells me they have discussed all sorts of things totally unrelated to music, but my uncommunicative, shy child is clearly getting huge amounts out of the lesson. And seems to be learning to play an instrument too, but in a way I'm not so bothered about that. After all why do we want them to have music lessons, it is not usually because we want them to be professional musicians.

[notmusimum]

It's a lot easier to believe that the teacher at the conservatoire or the teacher with all the paper qualifications will automatically make your kid the best musician but it is not the case! They may also make the kid miserable in their learning as the poster above says.

I can see why that happens it's the security of the institution. parents feel like someone has their back covered. Personally having expereinced both I'd rather have a solid private teacher. Paper qualifications have never really been my thing the ability to support, guide and empathise is much more important.

I do though think there is a big difference in not having those higher level qualifications on an instrument the teacher has been taught themselves and has experience of than one they teach without any of that detail.

In light of andante post it's more of a problem if the child wants to study music post 18 than if they don't.

[saxophile]

I was having a similar coversation elsewhere recently. Is it better to stick with school peri, who teaches a couple of instruments, so the one my daughter plays is probably her second instrument, and I have no idea of her qualifications, or to search out the best specialist teacher I can outside school? My view is that the school peri is the best teacher for L, because she is the only adult I have ever known L have an animated conversation with. She comes home and tells me they have discussed all sorts of things totally unrelated to music, but my uncommunicative, shy child is clearly getting huge amounts out of the lesson. And seems to be learning to play an instrument too, but in a way I'm not so bothered about that. After all why do we want them to have music lessons, it is not usually because we want them to be professional musicians.

Different perspective here - I'm about to switch Son No.2 (for clarinet lessons) away from school peri onto a temporary arrangement with my own sax teacher, who doesn't normally teach clarinet (though he did take it as a 2nd or 3rd study instrument at music college). The arrangement is to tide us over until he goes to secondary school in about 15 months time, and we have a clearer idea of how our daily timetable is going to change [there are other things altering for us over the next couple of school years as well, so lots up in the air].

School peri is not a clari specialist either, so you could say - why make the change now, rather than doing it as part of the change to high school? But I'm increasingly unhappy with the approach taken by the current teacher (largely unmitigated diet of exam pieces, plus other factors), whereas I know my own teacher will be fab at dealing with core skills - tonguing, fingerwork, breathing - and will also introduce Son No.2 to some more interesting repertoire. Plus he is already teaching Son No.2 piano and they get on really well. So I can see big pluses in the change, even though it will only be temporary, and even though it will mean 2 changes rather than 1 (since we will need to find another teacher in due course).

As notmusimum says, the best we can do as parents is muddle through (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif)

[flobiano]

Reflecting more about choosing my own teacher but hopefully helpful.

I think the ideal teacher has to combine two different but equally important skills neither of which is necessarily reflected in the current qualifications.

1. They need to technically know their stuff - e.g. they need to know what is "good technique" on their instrument, how to recognise (and fix) poor technique, including issues that they personally haven't had to deal with, a knowledge of the repertoire of the instrument.

2. They need the skills to be able to teach - they need to be able to communicate their knowledge effectively, build rapport with the pupil, inspire them to learn etc.

Having either one missing leads to problems. A lot of examples quoted here seem to be around teachers that have knowledge but can't teach. This is an easy one to spot as it becomes immediately apparent, lessons aren't enjoyable, you don't build rapport with the teacher.

But I think having teaching skills without knowledge is a bit more of a problem as it can take a long time to reveal itself (especially as a beginner). It often doesn't manifest itself for a few years when you reach a plateau that you just can't get beyond because of a fundamental problem in technique that your teacher doesn't have the skill to recognise, or the teacher is unable to identify suitable repertoire for you. The lessons become increasingly frustrating and as a pupil you wonder if it is just you and whether you are really suited to this instrument. But you don't want to change teachers because your teacher is really nice and you get on with them so well......This was the case with my first oboe teacher and I ended up stopping lessons.

So while I agree that qualifications are not the be all and end all. So someone with "only" Grade 8 may actually have a very sound understanding of technique and the instrument and be perfectly qualified to teach but equally some won't. It is very difficult as pupil though to gauge whether you are being taught the right things and whether you are developing good technique which is why people tend to look for evidence of higher qualifications. But, as has been said, teaching skills are needed, but these should really be AS WELL AS, but not INSTEAD OF technical competence on the instrument.

[FullofWind]

I probably wouldn't employ a teacher that did not have some sort of teaching diploma, and would definitely not if they hadn't achieved grade 8 in their instrument. After all, I wouldn't send my child to a school where the teachers were not qualified, nor would I go and see a doctor who had not qualified - not that that would happen of course.

Does that mean a teacher with a teaching qualification is good? Well not necessarily but I'm sure there are plenty good teachers out their with qualifications so why would I pick a teacher who hadn't even reached grade 8?

I've also read on here that once you get to grade 8, especially on piano, you are just starting to really play and up until then you are learning.

[Seer_Green]

I probably wouldn't employ a teacher that did not have some sort of teaching diploma, and would definitely not if they hadn't achieved grade 8 in their instrument. After all, I wouldn't send my child to a school where the teachers were not qualified, nor would I go and see a doctor who had not qualified - not that that would happen of course.

Does that mean a teacher with a teaching qualification is good? Well not necessarily but I'm sure there are plenty good teachers out their with qualifications so why would I pick a teacher who hadn't even reached grade 8?

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/ohmy.gif)
The main difference is that doctors have to be qualified - it's the law. This is not the case for instrumental teachers, so I don't buy into that one. It's impossible to compare the two - as you quite rightly say, it wouldn't happen.

All you parents must be very astute because in 11 years teaching and about 200 pupils later, I've yet to be asked about my qualifications (IMG:style_emoticons/default/party1.gif)

[Claudia's Mum]

It often doesn't manifest itself for a few years when you reach a plateau that you just can't get beyond because of a fundamental problem in technique that your teacher doesn't have the skill to recognise

This is the issue that caused us extensive problems - now remedied thankfully - but nevertheless which should not have arisen in the first place.

The problem, when your children are starting out and you are clueless as a parent and think it doesn't matter who teaches them, is that you don't know how your child is going to take to the instrument and what your child might want to do in the future. And then the initial teaching does become important retrospectively.

All you parents must be very astute because in 11 years teaching and about 200 pupils later, I've yet to be asked about my qualifications (IMG:style_emoticons/default/party1.gif)

That's because we look you up on the internet!

[owainsutton]

I probably wouldn't employ a teacher that did not have some sort of teaching diploma

Some of the best instrumental teachers I've had the good fortune to work with have had no teaching qualifications. (Nor do I...)

[ExpressYourself]

Actually when I was a school teacher in secondary school I taught a number of subjects that I had no more than a GCSE in! Quite commonplace, especially in science.

So although I have a degree and a PGCE, they may not be in the subject in which I am teaching your children!

Meanwhile I am now teaching singing and piano with no diplomas in music but far more subject knowledge than I ever had teaching biology (I'm a physicist!). In fact a lot of the Physics I taught was stuff I hadn't covered myself but I had the skills to research them before hand.

Of course my lack of music diplomas are not because I have failed them, just that I haven't sat them. So my abilities could be way beyond them! Since none of my students or their parents have ever asked about my qualifications then I see the acquisition of them as my own personal targets rather than a requirement to teach.

I am working towards getting them, but only for my own peace of mind.