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Remembering Your Childhood Piano Lessons
Remembering your childhood piano lessons may give you some idea of what your children are going through. A frequent subject of conversation with parents is their own childhood experiences with piano lessons. It's very interesting how similar their feelings are.
It is a common thing to have had an awful experience with piano lessons. Almost all parents reply in the same way. "I hated it. I was forced to take lessons and practice." Some tell tales of knuckle rapping and mean teachers. Others had great teachers and admit they were kids and didn't pay attention.
Piano Is Easy
Terrible Negative Memories
I then ask, "Do you still play piano today?" They always reply, "No, I have such terrible memories of piano lessons." Only a very few retain positive memories. I ask why they want their child to learn piano, given their own negative experiences.
They always reply, "Well, I heard about you, and wanted to see if I could have my child enjoy playing the piano." What really astounds me is that memories can have such an effect, all the way from childhood to the present.
Selling Memories
What a piano teacher is giving a child is memories of playing the piano. And, depending on that teacher's attitude, those memories can be positive or negative. Consciously or not, what I do in lessons is create positive memories and impressions. I never care exactly how much material a child learns. I care that something, no matter how small, has been learned, and that learning it has been enjoyable.
Make sure their desire to learn music is not diminished, and hopefully increased. Your piano teacher's moment of short temper, repeated over and over, becomes a child's memory of the piano.
Since the teacher's temper was caused by the child's failure, why doesn't the teacher let go and embrace their failure, and try to find out what really caused it?
Teachers Consider Themselves Blameless
If you look at it very carefully, you will find that it is the piano teacher's rigid method that gets in the child's way. Find a piano method that suits the child. That method could be nothing, no book at all.
You have to be clever enough to disguise that "nothing" as something exciting to the child. Think of the child in the future tense. Someday they will look back and decide to play the piano again, if their memories of it are happy enough. Resolve to make their memories of the piano be emotionally positive.
Better to create a hobbyist 30 years in the future. There's no point in fuming over your piano method and making a child hate the piano because of it.
REFERENCES
Parents
Why Piano Number Stickers Work
Why Nagging Your Child To Practice Won't Work
Mom and Dad Make Kids Hate Piano
How To Make Your Kid Hate Piano
Ten Ways To Be A Bad Piano Teacher
Your Piano Expectations Are Too High
Visit Your Child’s Piano Lesson
Help Your Child With Piano Lessons
If A Child Succeeds At The Piano, It’s the Parents
Carnegie Hall Starts In Your Living Room
Should Parents Force Kids To Take Piano?
The Long Term Kid’s Piano Strategy
Longevity and Piano Lessons
Does It Matter Which Kid’s Piano Book I Buy?
Your Kid Needs A Good Piano Teacher
Piano Benefits Are Not About The Piano
The Biggest Mistake In Kid’s Piano
What Type Of Pianist Will Your Child Be?
What To Expect From Piano Lessons
Piano Teachers: Home Or Travel
A Child’s Classical Music Listening List
Parents Help Kids Enjoy Piano
Ten Things Parents Can Do To Help With Piano
