Polyphony. (Professional Resources).(new column)

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.