At Your Pace

One thing that is great about private lessons is that the teacher can go at the student's pace. This means that the student is able to have whatever level of success works for them, introduction of new material, and assignments that they can handle. This is wonderful. It's also a challenge when you are the teacher. Not only do you have to figure out what pace the student needs, you have to adjust what you are used to doing for each student. On average, I normally give two or three pieces to work on each week. Some students can handle four. Others can on do one or two. That's fine. I'm also finding that there are some that cannot handle even an entire one each week. That's where it becomes more of a challenge for me personally. I see myself as longsuffering (I'll put up with a lot before I get upset about it) but not particularly patient (able to wait without getting flustered). So, though in my head I understand that there are some students who cannot wrap their heads around the whole thing yet, but can do a great job with just a couple of lines of the song, I want to just do the whole thing and be done. But that isn't my job. My job is to teach them at their pace. Maybe as we work through the smaller pieces, they will learn the skills they need to handle bigger chunks. As they work through figuring out how to understand the notes on the page and how that translates to playing the keys on the piano, they will gain the confidence to try more and have the skills to be successful. Or maybe they will always feel overwhelmed by the whole and need little pieces and steady progress. That's fine too. It's teaching me how to be more patient. I know that no matter how hard it may be for me to have to keep going over the same thing, it's more frustrating for the student who is really trying to understand, but for whatever reason just doesn't get it yet. As Plato said, "Never discourage anyone... who continually makes progress no matter how slow."