Some of you may remember my post about a pupil some time ago who was driving me up the wall - she did no practice and had difficulty with the basics such as keeping a steady beat. After 5 years of lessons (half with me) I finally crowbarred her through grade 1, swearing that it would be the end of the association either way.

Fast forward 2 months and there has been a transformation - suddenly she is practising, and (surprise!) making progress. I can hardly believe it - this week she spontaneously learnt a new piece, in an unfamiliar time signature, and has put another together to a pretty reasonable standard. In the space of a month she has learnt 4 or 5 new pieces. I am surprised and delighted for her - I doubt she will ever be a concert pianist, but it is so lovely to see a child turn a corner, just when I had almost given up hope. I have heaped praise (and stickers) on her. Who knows how long this will last..

The cause of this reform? Well, the new book helped - Princess Piano Book - but she has been working on her other stuff as well - theory, scales, exercises, other pieces.

Hallelujah!

Congratulations!
It must be so frustrating when pupils aren't progressing and you'd love them to be...maybe the exam has given her a confidence boost?

It just takes time with some and finding the key.

Very pleased for you both.

Brilliant news. And well done to you for the patience!

I've a young man who comes along for piano lessons and was in the doldrums until he got the twin to the Princess Piano Book, Superheros (I think). Now the family are getting James Bond, Superman and Star Wars theme tunes ad lib and his "cool" rating at school has shot up.

Brilliant - this is the sort of thing that makes teaching SOOO rewarding and the best job in the world!

Well done (and I'm glad you gave her stickers )!

Agreed! Apart from the friggin' stickers....

Joking aside, congratulations Sue!

Everyone loves stickers!!!!

Well done! You hung on in there and it paid off. Great!

Thanks all - don't think I can really take any credit, though. I think she has just grown up a bit, and perhaps had more 'stickability' than I gave her credit for!

I shall leave it a few more weeks, and then have a little chat about how things have changed, and see if we can work out what the magic formula was - I'd like to try it on some of my other little darlings....!



Stickers rool! I have some particularly nice pink light-bulbs with Cool! on them

Stickerbility?

Yup, forget the fancy pedagogical theories, people - just go get yourself a job-lot of groovy stickers....

...fancy pedagogical theories PLUS job-lot of groovy stickers EQUALS a winning combination!

Oh gawd!

You must have done something even without realising it.

Hope it contiues

You seem to have a problem with my sticker fetish, HG...I can recommend a really good counsellor if it would help??

I suggest you visit him, then, to see if he can sort you out! Good luck (to the counsellor)!

Charming, HG, quite charming.

It's a well-known fact that kids LOVE stickers (and so do quite a few grown-ups too!) . If it works, don't knock it!

I put this kid in for grade 1 as a last-ditch attempt to motivate her (and if I'm brutally honest, I half expected her to fail). It didn't work at the time, as she continued to drift along until a week or so before the exam. I dare say passing has given her some more confidence, but that wasn't really lacking. Now the exam is over, I've given her some slightly easier materials in order to consolidate before moving on. I think that is the key to the current 'feel-good' factor. We shall see..

Great news, Sue ! a lovely boost for you and your pupil.

Of course all kids love stickers! (yes and quite a few grown-ups do too).

I recently came across a cache of brightly coloured cardboard stars that I had bought a while ago and forgotten, slightly larger than a pound coin. The sort of thing that gets put on displays and posters. They make a nice change from stickers: being non-shiny you can write on them. They are also non-adhesive so you need a tiny bit of double-sided sticky tape on the back - I do a few ready to use when needed. They look really effective stuck on a lesson page in a pupil's notebook with a 'well done' message or similar.

(sorry Sue - off topic )

As a recent convert to stickers, I can affirm that they really do work - my students love them!! I bought mine from the Sticker Factory and I'm so glad I did.

yes - quite !

I've recently had a similar experience with a girl who has always been very difficult to teach (I've mentioned her several times on this forum) and who managed a scrape-through pass at Grade 1 two years ago. I never imagined she would take another exam, or even that she would keep playing, but she did and then she decided she wanted to take Grade 2 this summer. Now she's working really hard and is impressing me every week. It just makes me realise how students we're ready to give up on can turn things around and surprise us!