Piano Lessons – Teachers Listen To Be Heard

If you’re like most piano teachers you want to be heard by your students. You are trying to help someone learn how to play the piano and you have the answers. So why then is it sometimes difficult to get students to listen to the message in their piano lessons? If this is true in some or all of your lessons, you have to listen to be heard.
 

Listen To This Piano Teachers

Johnny, your make believe piano student is playing everything he touches to fast. Because of this, his tempo is erratic and instead of presenting a melody with his playing, he’s just trying to be done, and he’s not listening to your advice to slow down. So let Johnny know you hear him.
 

Johnny I Hear You

“Wow Johnny, you know how to play this piece very fast, you also can play it loud you are really good at that.” Acknowledging what Johnny knows how to do by listening will win you his attention. It’s really the first step to building to trust with a student like this. Johnny in fact might be used to not being listened to. You can change this, and believe me he’ll appreciate it.
 

Set The Hook

Setting the hook is a term fishermen use. It means, the fish has bit your bait and if you pull a little (set the hook), you hook the fish so it can’t get away. Once you’ve listened to your piano student, you’ll need to set the hook yourself.
“Great Johnny, I wonder if you can now play it in SLOW MOTION? Lets pretend you’re in a movie and it’s one of those slow motion scenes, the slower you play it the cooler it will be.
 

“Hey Piano Teachers”, It Works, Trust Me

My degree is in music not psychology so I’m not going to claim to understand this technique on more then a common sense basis. If you are a psychology major please feel free to comment below. Give (listen) and you shall be given to (listened to).
It shouldn’t be our way or the highway. Teach every student like they need to be taught. It’s the golden rule of teaching piano lessons.