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Teachers,

On a pay per lesson basis, how do you treat situations where parents ask to cancel because their child has not had enough practice time due to being away for part of the week?

In my case, the student in question is usually well-prepared for lessons and I have a good relationship with the family.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Practice is important so is consistency of lessons on both the part of the student and the teacher. There is always something to learn.Charging for lessons monthly might help too.

rada

My first reaction is to reiterate that lessons are not commodities and should, as a general rule, not be taught on a per lesson basis. There are obvious exceptions which we don't need to reiterate here, but for teaching students throughout the school year, teachers are well advised to introduce parents to the concept that they're purchasing an educational process very similar to taking a course at a local university. Best results are achieved by constant attendance, even when lesson preparation falls short.

Students (or their parents) are often tempted to cancel lessons for lack of practice. It's up to you what to do in such a situation: many of us charge tuition, based on weekly lessons, so that we are not hurt in the wallet when little Johnny doesn't show up.

Educationally, rada and John have both explained it well: regular lessons are best, even in the absence of practicing.

If you see your student weekly, you could simply explain you will charge for the missed lesson (even if you are paid per lesson), though I doubt the parents would accept this. But that's ok, they would just decide in such case to send little Johnny over for his lesson.

Basically you have to decide which is more important to you: students' home practice or your steady income. It's a goofy trade-off, but there we are.

Mmm... so the parent is punishing YOU for their child not practicing. Is that something you wish to continue?

Summer time, ok. Regular school term, NO. Reiterate the fact that the kid works best under a regular lesson routine. Even if he does not practice, coming for lessons still helps since you are supervising his playing/practice. Tell the parent that weekly lesson is hard enough, and you don't want him to practice the wrong stuff.

I started telling parents that I don't accept cancellations, I will accept rescheduling if there is enough notice.

I have them pay at least a month in advance, and the lesson has to be made up within the month. If they can't fit into a slot I offer them, they lose a lesson they've paid for.

So far so good.

(I don't teach piano, but I do teach private lessons - many of the problems piano teachers have, I have too).

Great thoughts. I am transitioning over to a tuition basis which makes 100% more sense than a per lesson basis as some teachers here have brought up. Thanks for the posts.

Not really anything you can do if you are going pay per lesson basis. Try even going pay a month in advance and I about guarantee you that will stop. If you lose a student or two because of it, they weren't serious anyway (their parents at least!)

There is ALWAYS something productive to be done at a lesson. After a week, it will be soon enough to check for rough spots, to find out what's been forgotten or to lay the groundwork for moving further into a piece. Rhythm practice. Follow the leader ear training, improv games, etc. etc. Stress to the parent the value in the opportunity to do these change of pace exercises. Do your best to to send the child home with a "victory" so the child answers positively when asked how the lesson went and you should see these kinds of requests reduced. Heck, I was at time tempted not to practice so I could talk my teacher into some easy duets. ; )

Kurt

That makes me so mad for you! Just because a kid doesn't do homework doesn't mean he should miss the next day of school, why should piano be different? If you miss something, you just work harder to catch up.

I would make sure to talk to the parent about how the student gets even more behind when he not only doesn't do homework, but doesn't come to his lesson. At the least, the lesson can just re-cover what was learned. There is no way the student could have retained it for so long.

You will be pleasantly surprised at how few cancellations you will get when you have a no-cancellation policy. Suddenly kids are sick as much, and they actually practice more because their parents know they are still paying for the lessons.

I agree with KurtZ.

I don't accept lack of practise as an excuse. But every once in a while, it happens to the best of us. I encourage my students to come anyway, saying "OK, we'll do something different this week!"

I use this as a great opportunity to explore something else. To record some pieces from the student's repertoire, or to talk about jazz, or improvisation, or how a piano works, OR sight-read some duets!

I often find that these lessons are the most productive and the most fascinating!

But you will also see kids show up who ARE sick, and then it is very hard to tell them that they can't be there.

Hi Gary,

It's not hard at all. You stand "en loco parentis". Grow a spine.

I don't follow the logic of these three sentences.

Get your money up front ... with the agreement that cancellations
are to the account of the student.

It takes "spine" to have a sense of FAIRNESS. If you have a policy that will not allow a sick child to postpone a lesson, then it is unfair to turn away a sick child who shows up for lessons. That is the specific thing that was being addressed.

I also think it wrong to not allow for sickness. Any business contract between businesses will have clauses for such events. And IF you are giving rules for parents to abide by, then you are not "en loco parentis" because you are addressing the parents, and giving them rules.

I have a strictish no cancellations policy which works most of the time although I am forever having some parents trying to get round it or ignore it. This does mean that some kids turn up to lessons when they are sick which is unfortunate. Ideally I would like to be able to say that cancellations due to illness were acceptable but it just ends up getting abused. Every time someone wants to cancel they will simply say they are sick in order to get round your policy.

Something which happens frequently is the parent will call me to tell me their child is sick and ask if I would still like them to come to the lesson. If I say no then technically it's me who has cancelled and they are then entitled to a make up or refund. This can be a problem.

Going back to the original question though, cancellations due to lack of practice are not at all acceptable.

That is very true. That is why I stop asking the reasons for canceling and start offering unlimited make up lesson with no credit forward next month and no refund as my backbone.

Parents can cancel as much as they want, but they also pay for those lessons that they cancel, and need to find extra time to make those lesson up. Furthermore, now my scheduling is automated by website software, so, I do not need to deal with scheduling the make up lesson, parents just have to do it themselves online