Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum What do you think about hitting young students?

Just now, I just saw teacher hitting(with a pencil and a violin bow)and yelling at a student for not curving the fingers and not practicing(supposedly), and it was awkward as heck for me. I'm wondering what the teachers here think about such behavior?

I think hitting a student is the perfect way to teach them not to take music lessons. I doubt they learn anything else from it.

Abusing children is also a prosecutable offense.

Elene

Wow... I would never hit a student. Nag, correct, even bribe maybe but never hit. As a child, I was extremely sensitive to authority and would easily be reduced to tears if I got in even just a little bit of trouble (like the time I got caught passing a note in class). I can't think of any remotely normal scenarios in which it would be appropriate to strike a student.

WOW! I agree with the above. WT*?!?!?! This is amazing!

I'm surprised you even need to ask.

I just need to further my post and say that you NEED to speak about this to the head of the department or something... This is obnoxious and ABSOLUTELY no action requires such reaction!

It's not a center or anything, so there's no one to report it to. The mother of the child is actually was actually sitting near her child and was knew that her child was being hit by the teacher, it seems like she doesn't mind that her child was getting "punished".

My first piano teacher did this to me ( a nun who seemed about a hundred years old at the time and probably was). I was terrified of her and it's a miracle I ever continued. I only recently told my mother this and she was horrified.

I would also say that you should report this, if there is someone to report it to. This kind of behaviour goes against everything that learning should be about.

OK. The mother was there. Unless you want to enter the morass of getting her classed as an "unfit parent" and having the child taken into care (and don't think that making trouble might not escalate that far) this is definitely NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS.

Anyway, as we've proved so often here, things overheard are often things misconstrued.

I'm thinking if you need to ask, perhaps it isn't as bad as what the word "hitting" sounds like.

Sometimes I touch the back of a student's fingers as she is playing to remind her to round them, as it seems less interrupting than speaking. If I have a pencil in my hand, I can imagine that it would be easy to touch them with the pencil (I don't think I've ever done that, but it's certainly something that could happen.) This is not hitting.

Is this hitting in the form that the student draws back, and says 'ow'? Does it make the finger red, or sting or hurt in any way?

I would be really careful about making accusations. Two objects coming in contact do not necessarily imply pain.

If it is causing pain or is in any way violent, of course it is wrong.

I have a student that i always need to hit. I think that there's no problem with it.

It's my girlfriend, btw. I love to hit her

Wow, just.....wow. First you need to define "hitting" a bit more clearly. I know I've tapped a student's hand with my own or possibly with a pencil if I had it in hand. But it NEVER was painful at all for the student, either emotionally or physically.

If in fact, it was something that caused the student emotional and/or physical pain, I think that you may want to approach the mother and suggest that this is not normal practice for a piano teacher. Perhaps she thinks it is good. It will be up to her, but you should definitely make sure you steer clear of that teacher.

I don't plan on doing anything about it, and I made this thread to ask what people think about using this kind of ways to teach students, not what I should do about the incident I describe. The child was crying. It was pretty obvious from my view that the teacher was hitting to cause physical pain. And I don't think me doing anything would be of any help, as hitting and screaming is a acceptable way to teach young children here unfortunately.

Yikes, something is seriously wrong there...

I wouldn't even think of employing such a technique - gentle or otherwise.

I don't find it necessary to hit anyone, except in self-defense. And while much which passes for modern education theory is psycho-babble, a physical approach to attention getting probably solves very few problems. To be fair, when my children were very young (pre-school), it was occasionally necessary to get their attention and sometimes words wouldn't do the trick.

As for this specific case, hearing one side of the story only makes evaluation difficult at best.

Seems like a child protection issue to me. I know in my country, I would contact social services. The fact that the mother was there makes no difference.

The reason is that protecting children is *everyone's* responsibility. Children are rarely able to get help for themselves. Maybe all is OK at home. Maybe it isn't.

I've also done that once with my older son. The first time he was continuously playing with the gas oven, back in London. This is NOT something you toy with! Another time he was playing with the hot iron, while my wife was using it. I didn't do anything to him and he got burned so that stopped him.

Hitting someone to cause pain, basically means that this is a punishment. If people think that such punishments can be used for educational purposes... I don't know what to say. But I'd like to know where in the world this is taken as the norm, please!

Yes, in the US, any kind of physical abuse is not allowed. Nor do I think it is really warranted. The child was crying! That poor thing...he probably trusted his teacher *and* his mother, and here they are the ones abusing him (his mother by her silent assent). Now, tears happen when a student doesn't practice or feels bad about their lack of progress...those are all things they have self-imposed and can correct. But it is due to someone causing them physical pain, I do not see the value. Obviously, their life or welfare was not threatened as in Nikolas's examples.

Oh, just about everywhere until we got all namby-pamby a relatively short while ago! And since we gave up on physical discipline, the world has become a much better place, right?