All About Choosing Piano Schools And Teachers

[kathyh]

hi

I am new here. I would like to know more about NAFA piano course for kids, any mummies or daddies here can share your precious experience with me? thanks a lot

[sleepy]

kathyh:

hi

I am new here. I would like to know more about NAFA piano course for kids, any mummies or daddies here can share your precious experience with me? thanks a lot

Threads on nafa piano fyi
http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=5493&hilit=+nafa
http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=6604&hilit=nafa

[phankao]

sacredmusicals:

I don't like to generalize, but most traveling piano teachers are very average or simply sucks. Same goes for most music schools' teachers. Exception maybe new graduates who need to make ends meet.


Speaking from personal experience as a student last time.

Your generalization is not entirely incorrect. Although I do personally know two \"traveling\" piano teachers who are very dedicated and good as reaches. Rare, but they are willing to travel as their homes are not so conducive for using as teaching areas. Their SCHEDULES Are rather full, so not easy to engage them either.

[jce]

MOST teachers who travel aren’t good and have less experience (the ones traveling are younger, fresh grads). Think about it, those who are good, generally will have a high demand, so you want to learn, then come. Why does the teacher need to waste time traveling when that time can be used to teach and earn more? Of course, there are exceptions. Just like, not all teachers who teach from home are good teachers. As I have mentioned before, need to give a chance and have an open mind. Fresh grad doesn’t equal not good, given some time, they can excel too. So give some time to the teacher before making a decision to change. There are exceptions too… and those are the ones where immediately you know, cannot make it.

[Dreamaurora]

I would like the present the flip side of the coins; I apologize in advance if I anger anyone here.


Just like teachers who travel are generally not good, the same is true for the parents or students that ask teachers to travel. I used to travel to student place for around half a year and quickly realized it is not a viable environment to teach. Students get distracted easily and parents were generally not so interested in the children.

I have since fully switched to full private and i can’t be happier. By forcing students to travel, this effectively eliminates the not serious ones. Also because the students have to sacrifice their times to come for lesson, they will work harder to ensure they get the most from the lessons. It is also easier to organize extra activities such as group lessons or duets with a proper home studio.

I have to admit it is considerably harder to get more students as a non traveling teacher, especially that I am considered still relatively new to the field. But hey, quality over quantity.

[sleepy]

From parents’ perspective, ideally prefer teacher to come to student’s house.


It’s rather disruptive to child’s busy schedule if need to travel to & fro. Say for example lesson on afternoon 3pm, need to start preparing at 2:15pm, leave the house latest by 2:30pm depending how far is teacher’s house or music school, sometimes need to leave house even earlier if congested carpark. Don’t want to be late since every minute counts in piano lesson.

Lesson ends at 3:45pm. By the time reach home, assuming 4:15pm. Again, child needs time to settle down, change clothes, dilly dally almost 5pm then can really sit down to start doing school work. Between 2:15pm to 5pm, it’s 2 hours & 45 minutes in total although actual lesson time is merely 45 minutes.

That extra 2 hours child could have finish up school work earlier & rest or read books.

Having said that, I believe parents are still willing to travel to teacher’s house if convinced of higher teaching quality & if within reasonable travelling distance.

[peanut_butter]

Many of my home-tuition parents are involved in their children’s practices.


I may not be a world class teacher. But I am not those inferior ones either. It also takes a lot of teaching 'intuition' to do the job besides the qualifications and experiences. I do lots of traveling (50%) because I am not established yet. I charge more than the schools around my studio. I do quarterly class-hour to weed out the bad students. I also turned down parents who ask for discounts.

The down side is that I ended up home-tutoring in the ‘rich’ areas. When they change their school schedule next year, we will run into some schedule problems. And yes, organising extra activities is a serious problem and doing a duet is a fantasy.

[sleepy]

nissin:

O gosh..really? Gd teachers dun travel?

I have just found one who is willing to travel to my plc..$130 for 45min,4 lessons.She has a diploma, 11 years of teaching experience. Hope she is good! :xedfingers:

Equally important is the chemistry & whether teacher can engage the child especially for beginner learner.

I engaged a diploma teacher many years ago. Teacher taught for 20 years & willing to travel to my place. $90 for 30 minutes. On paper sounds good & fee reasonable.

But teacher cannot engage my dd. dd1 totally gave up learning piano after 1 year because she felt that piano lesson was way too boring. We were too inexprienced at that time to realise that teacher's teaching style is not appealing to very young children. We should have change teacher.

Hence, finding the right teacher is very important. Check for chemistry & make sure teacher doesn't kill interests instead.

[nissin]

sleepy:

nissin:

O gosh..really? Gd teachers dun travel?

I have just found one who is willing to travel to my plc..$130 for 45min,4 lessons.She has a diploma, 11 years of teaching experience. Hope she is good! :xedfingers:

Sometimes cannot simply look at qualification or teaching experience. Equally important is the chemistry & whether teacher can engage the child especially for beginner learner.

I engaged a diploma teacher many years ago. Teacher taught for 20 years & willing to travel to my place. $90 for 30 minutes. On paper sounds good & fee reasonable.

But teacher cannot engage my dd. dd1 totally gave up learning piano after 1 year because she felt that piano lesson was
way too boring. We were too inexprienced at that time to realise that teacher's teaching style is not appealing to very young children. We should
have change teacher.
Hence, finding the right teacher is very important. Check for chemistry &
make sure teacher doesn't kill interests instead.

This is a problem. How do we parents,with no music background know if the teacher is good.? I can only engage them thru sourcing on my own, recommendations or hearsay based on my budget and location preference. It's really not easy at all..

Yes, I believe if the kid likes the teacher, he will love the lessons but loving and enjoying is one thing, is he learning all the techniques correctly is
another issue(though I will not know cos i really know nuts about it :scratchhead: ) best is to have it all within my budget. Kekeke

Argggg...anyway I m still sourcing around. Is your current teacher ok? Can u give me his/her contact so I can include her in my list of potential teachers? Tks!

[Dreamaurora]

peanut_butter:

Many of my home-tuition parents are involved in their children’s practices.


I may not be a world class teacher. But I am not those inferior ones either. It also takes a lot of teaching 'intuition' to do the job besides the qualifications and experiences. I do lots of traveling (50%) because I am not established yet. I charge more than the schools around my studio. I do quarterly class-hour to weed out the bad students. I also turned down parents who ask for discounts.

The down side is that I ended up home-tutoring in the ‘rich’ areas. When they change their school schedule next year, we will run into some schedule problems. And yes, organising extra activities is a serious problem and doing a duet is a fantasy.

I share your view. Unfortunately many parents or students do not realize the importance of these extra activities. Without extra activities outside lesson, learning piano is a very dry process that is devoid of any social interaction. Take for example performance class. School of young talents have it once a week. I like most other teachers have it once a month. Ever since I started it, I have noticed an enormous improvement in students' motivation level. The impact of watching other students play well can inspire students. Stude concerts are a necessity too to provide avenues for students to perform beside music exams.

and I said this plenty of times already, students are a teacher's best advertisement. Visit a teacher's student concerts or group class to see the students in action.

And I am going to say this out even though I know I am going to offend so many teachers. Any teacher who does not provide students performance oppurtunities is a mediocre teacher.