Polyphony. (Professional Resources).

Connections

Welcome to this inaugural posting for Polyphony, American Music Teacher's new column! This column is meant to hear and share the many voices of teachers throughout the United States. In exchanging ideas, sharing philosophies and trusting ourselves to change, experimentation and challenges, we grow and deepen as musicians and teachers. In the coming months I welcome your questions, thoughts, reflections and insights on the art of teaching and on what has been meaningful for your students and your art.

Teacher Connection Through Student Expression

Recently, Carolyn Reisinger, NCTM, from Lakeville, Minnesota, wrote that after teaching music for more than twenty-plus years, many of her students are still fresh in her memory; however, there are some who, regretfully, have become forgotten history. Last year, as a project, she started a student portrait album, where one page is devoted to each student. Students are asked to bring a photo labeled with their name and the date and are asked to write something about themselves and their piano experience. From there she lets them have control over producing their "works of art." Afterward, each portrait page is placed in a photo album in her waiting room. What surprises her is how much time the students and their families spend looking through the portrait book that now serves as a memento of student accomplishments and, most importantly, her lasting connection to all of her students.

As the teaching year for many moves toward the end, this might be a time to undertake such a project to complete the year's cycle. One can then continue on into the fall and begin the creation of another page during the year. It strikes me that one of the most important parts of the page can be students' writing, where they share something about themselves and about their musical experience. This is the place where their passions and joys have an opportunity to be expressed. Sometimes something can be expressed that may not be heard in the student's playing or attitude.

Our Personal Connections with Students

I think it is important to reflect on the contributions that each of our students makes to our lives--the connection we have with them and they with us, for they all in their own ways bring us gifts and insights--if we connect. After all, we are moving with them through one of the powerful experiences of humanity--that of experiencing the art of music making firsthand, with the inherent peaks and frustrations along the way. We are there with them when triumphs are encountered. The triumphs can be as varied as performing well in a competition, giving a musically and personally satisfying solo recital, breaking through in the counting of three against two, or performing a piece hands together for the first time. Students' gifts to us can come through the lessons of patience we give to a child struggling to coordinate difficult rhythms, a teen who genuinely loves the sound more than the practice routine, or a diligent student who struggles too hard to achieve perfection, losing sight of the joy in the process of making music. I myself find it easy to forget that I need patience for my student, and also myself, to grow.

Many special moments in teaching at any level and in any circumstance can be lost if we do not allow the connections to take place. Connections come from opportunities we allow ourselves, such as taking time to see and feel the warmth of the student's secret smile from the rewarding performance of a piece at a lesson; the opportunity to read what music means to a student who has written this in a music studio scrapbook. The connections can come too in the tears of a student disappointed in a performance. We help him realize that he grew enormously in learning a piece and he experienced the piece many times well in the preparation stages.

Connection, in Part, as Listening

Perhaps connecting with our students means trying to understand them, and an effective way might be to really listen to what they want to tell us. Even now I work daily to accomplish more of that: more listening and less talking. I strive for authentic listening so that I hear, accept and reflect on what a student says and does. A student who forgets his music books is not always saying that he hasn't practiced or that he doesn't want to come to a lesson, nor is that what a college student may be saying when she is late to a lesson. The child could be saying that there are problems in his home or that he doesn't understand the music we think he should be playing ... or that some learning/perceptional problem exists ... or many other things, as may be the case with the university student as well. A young student who refuses to attend group classes or theory classes may not be saying that he is not interested, but rather that he is terribly afraid.

Teachers Connecting with Teachers

While this issue's column is primarily about teachers connecting with their students, one story of teachers connecting with teachers waits to be told. This past fall as I had the privilege to have lunch during a workshop break with the piano teachers in Midland, Michigan, I was amazed at the connections that had developed in this wonderful MTNA organization through their annual sponsorship of a multi-piano festival for the students of teachers in the organization. I found an incredible spirit of camaraderie and cooperation, enthusiasm and collegiality, as the teachers talked with passion about the benefits of the ensemble experience for themselves and their students. In working toward a common goal to benefit their students, they connected with each other. The warm feelings they expressed with one another still are fresh in my memory.

Connection--Listening

Listening to what our students are really telling us can hold enormous potential for our own growth at any stage. We connect to our students' pride in their smile as they reflect on their accomplishments, in their voices as they tell about the festival they played in, in their proud demonstration of a page in a studio scrapbook, and in their request to have us hear a piece of music they play with less than perfect technique and inflection, but with heartfelt emotion nevertheless.

This is a time in the academic year where students are at their busiest and most pressured in terms of school/academic activity as well as in some cases in terms of piano and other instrumental performance activity. Perhaps it is most critical that we listen and connect with--listen to--students at this time. This gives meaning to my days. It is something too that Carolyn Reisinger, in Minnesota, has discovered.

I invite you to share with us your successful experiences in connecting with your students or colleagues. Perhaps you'll share your creativity, curiosity and candor through questions and writings that can become part of this ongoing column.

Questions and other items may be sent to: American Music Teacher, Attn: Polyphony; 441 Vine St., Ste. 505, Cincinnati, OH 45202-2811; fax [phone]; or e-mail to [e-mail]. I look forward to hearing from you.

AMT debuts this column that is for--and by--the many voices of MTNA's members. Jane Magrath, NCTM, serves as editor. Magrath is an internationally known pianist, author, clinician and teacher. She was the first recipient of the MTNA Frances Clark Awarder for her book The Pianist's Guide to Standard Teaching and Performance Literature. Magrath's work in the area of the standard classical teaching literature has been central to the current revival of interest in this music throughout the United States. Her music editions are used widely throughout the United States and abroad. She is professor and director of piano pedagogy at the University of Oklahoma.

--Jane Magrath
Norman, Oklahoma