Re: Learning Styles and Teaching Piano

I wanted to clarify after my last post that learning styles are not the "end-all" of how we all learn -- they only indicate our tendencies as people. However, as I applied my (limited!) research to each of my students, I found that kids just like to know that people care enough to try to get to know them as individuals. So many times we lump them all into the same group as "good," "frustrating," or "unable to focus," but I found that the more I take the time to get to know my own students, the more I am able to overcome those stigmas and really teach them.

One interesting "experiment" I did with one of my "visual" students went like this: he has a problem with playing only with his fingers, and not using his whole arm's muscles, so I gave him an analogy to help him "visualize" what I was getting at. I told him his elbow is kind of like a door hinge, and that when he plays, his whole arm from his elbow on should be moving up and down. It stuck with him apparently, because at the end of the lesson, I asked him what he learned, and he said, "That my elbow is like a hinge and that I shouldn't play only using my fingers." I felt like cheering!

This summer, I will have a few students that will keep taking lessons, and I want to take the opportunity to try some new things with them. Instead of teaching only classical pieces and theory, I want, not to replace, but to supplement that with teaching chords and improvisation. I have tested most of my students, and almost three-fourths of them are primarily kinesthetic learners. This means that they do well when I physically show them things, and when they are playing things that literally "feel good" to play. So, I am hoping that if I begin to teach them chords and how to improvise music, they will begin to enjoy the "playing" part of piano instead of only focusing on the music-reading aspect of it. This is not to say that music reading is not important; however, not everyone learns to enjoy music through reading it, but rather many of us have to hear or experience it first. I don't know if that makes much sense, but I'm hoping that it will sort of unfold as I keep trying to redefine teaching piano.