Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum Keeping track of students' motivation

In the other thread on firing the teacher, someone commented that parents know their kids better than teachers do and may have a different perspective on how motivated their kids are and what motivates them. Is there a good way to find out how practicing is really going at home? I've toyed with the idea of asking for feedback on how the parent thinks lessons and motivation are going and whether I can change things to be more effective before thoughts of quitting piano or switching teachers arise. However, I don't want to open the communication lines to frequent criticism.

I think if you concentrate on building a good relationship with the students/ parents in your studio that you'll be able to head off many issues. However, you won't be able to please everyone no matter what and some people aren't worth trying or are impossible to please.

Do you have your students keep a practice diary? (This does not have to be anything more than "I practiced for x minutes on this day").

The amount of practice they're doing doesn't tell you everything, obviously, even when it *is* logged consistently. And some people will never even bother to do that, while a few here and there may be tempted to "cheat" by padding their numbers. But surely, when a student who used to consistently fill out their diary suddenly stops doing it, you've got a good indication there is something going on. And with the ones who are being honest about it, you can use the diary as a jumping-off point to talk about the reasons their consistency is going south.

Try videotaping/recording the practice sessions.

Have you tried just asking?

I've never had much luck with practice diaries to be honest. I find if students are progressing, then I know they're practicing and I'm happy with that. And everyone progresses at different rates.

I like to think I have a good relationship with my students so they openly tell me if they haven't practiced during the week. If it happens occasionally, I don't mind; I teach a lot of school pupils and if they are doing other activities plus homework, I know they don;t have a lot of time for music practice.

But if this continues for a while, I'll then talk to them about their schedule and see if we can find times during the week for piano practice. I try and be as understanding as I can, as I know they want free time to relax aswell. This usually has a positive response. If not, then I'll get the parent's involved.