Helping your older piano student learn to love music and keep playing piano for a life-time is really easy. All you have to do is clearly define your parental role and your piano student will know what to do. Older children in piano lessons need a different kind of support from their parents than younger children do. Older children who want to be their own person become very confused when parents start being the student and the piano teacher has to be the parent. For older children piano lessons involve three clearly defined roles - the students role, the teachers role, and the parents role. When the boundaries defined by these roles become fuzzy, older children do not learn how to take responsibility for their success and feel their effort is unimportant. This is because there is nothing that drives a kid crazier than to have two adults telling them different things and being unable to please them both. Here are three Universal Laws of Piano Lessons for Parents of Children Ages 12 and Up. Follow these and your older child in piano lessons will be a lot more likely play piano for a life-time. 1. The Law of Who is the Student - Your child is the piano student, not you. It is not your job to decide what music your child will play. Thats the students and the teachers job. 2. The Law of Piano Progress - Progress is the students department. They will make the progress they want to make. If you dont compare them to every other piano student youve ever known, theyll probably make more progress. 3. The Seven to One Law of Piano Support - Give your child in piano lessons seven encouragements to every one criticism. If you use the word but in your encouragement it doesnt count. Follow these Universal Laws for Parents of Piano Students and your child in piano lessons will be a lot more likely to learn to love music. |
