The title of this post was my minor in college. Piano Pedagogy. Basically studying how to teach piano. There are a couple of things that stand out from my lessons as a piano pedagogy student as a teacher for the university community music school during my time in college, and they mainly are about what you say during lessons.
The first comes from a teaching class in which we were discussing how to praise students. Basically, the question was "How many different ways do you tell them they are doing a good job?" Good. Great. Fantastic. Well done. All things that come up in class. I am still always looking for more ways to encourage students with my words...especially in online lessons since I can't just give them a sticker or a high five. So here are words and expressions I try to include in my lessons: Good work! Great work! Nicely done! I enjoyed listening to you play that. Wow! Brilliant! I'm proud of you. See, you CAN do it! Fabulous! So pretty. Beautiful. Excellent.
Can you think of any more?
Secondly, when my boss at the community music school did a review of my teaching, one thing he pointed out was that I asked "Does that make sense?" A LOT. At that time, I couldn't think of any other way of seeing if the student understood what I said. To this day, I am VERY aware of when I ask "Does that make sense?" and try to use it more sparingly. Other ways I have learned to gauge understanding. Things like asking the student to demonstrate what I just said. Asking a question based off what I just said. Simply asking "Understand?" or "Any questions?" or "Get it?" Playing a game that requires applying the information I just gave them. And once I know the student, their face and body language normally show when they don't understand even if they don't want to say it. In that case, I go with, "do you want to see it again?" or "should we take it in smaller pieces?" So much better than a generic "does that make sense" to which they reply that it does...much like I used to do with high school math...yes, I'm sure it does make sense, just not to me.
And in case you are wondering, the phrase that I now overuse and am trying to replace is "All righty." Yes, I know I'm doing it and trying to stop.
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