What makes a good teacher... (1 Viewer)

[JoeysBoy]

Hello! This is coming from a student making observations of various teachers. I'm not a teacher myself, so I don't know if what I'm saying is actually wrong or not.

I've just wanted to make a thread for new teachers (including me... maybe)... what and what not, generally, to do, even though the best method of learning how to teach is through experience. A lot of people miss out on the key points of making a GOOD teacher (I've noticed a lot throughout kindy to Year 12) and what points make a BAD teacher.

I'd say the best point to make a good teacher is to help their students to really get stuck into their instruments, motivating them to actually do some practice. No technique building in the lesson is useful by a LONG shot if the student has mediocre feelings about the whole thing.

The best teacher that has done this for me has given me the "blossoming flower" (shes a hippy female teacher... SO cool...) analogy. I've started late (Year 10) playing Cello, and consequently felt a little behind all the guys that I met in a big school combined orchestra (happened in sept last year)... not to mention all the students I met at the Newcastle Con (Their Cello ensemble ROCKS!) She helped me understand that if I "stuck at it" (I hate that expression but neway..) I would in her words "blossom".

I think that you really have to be understand a student's emotions to really be able to relate to them well. You can't just work through the text... If they are ambitious and want to succeed, throw them in the deep end (i.e. introduce them to orchestras, ensembles, etc.). If they are shy about it, throw them in the medium depth area slowly, exposing them to what the instrument can do, etc. As they get pumped up about it, start exposing them to the deepend.

So many people at my school HATE music because they KNOW they sound crap, have a lot of peer pressure to hate it and they don't get excited with music. (Note that all year 7 and 8 have to learn an instrument) . I joined the Senior strings 4 months after I started playing... and basically ruined the ensemble because I was SO out of tune and couldn't play for crap. I learnt quickly and got a lot better, but that was because I was excited with what the instrument could do. I was excited with the instrument because I had been exposed to magic performances, including live ones (Live is SO much better... especially when you get to meet the performer) And also my music elective teacher was just so cool... Yeah Mr. Dunn, thats you Another way of relating them to their instrumnt to you and back to them (lol... if that makes sense) is by actually getting your own instrument out and jamming with em... It just makes explaining a lot easier when a teacher actually DOES it for me instead of via word of mouth.

Going back to two paragraphs, if the excited person starts to lose motivation, remind them that you too struggled and that you too are human (with a lot of my former techers, I found that they had an arrogance about them), trying to be as much a friend as you can be. Don't act as though you know everything, ignoring the fact that you're their teacher. My old trumpet teacher (I stopped trumpet in year 8...) always spoke to me about his wartime experiences (he is a wwII veteran), and made me love him for it... even though I didn't do any practice Maybe I was too young to really go for broke...

Also be patient! My present teacher told me that if I didn't "get" what she was trying to convey, it was bascally her fault. I LOVED HER FOR THIS!!!!1111ONE11!!! SO MANY TIMES I have felt I was the villian because I didn't understand wtf my teacher was trying to tell me, even though it may have been the simplest of techniques. She uses a SHIT load of analogies to explain stuff... often quite humerous (which you have a better change of remembering) She also tells me about her troubles... very similiar to what obstacles I have today, always relating it indirectly or directly to what we're doing at the moment... i.e. talking to me about a Cellist she studies under that she really related to and was able to convey the information accross VERY effectively, using various teaching techniques. Ironic huh

Also DON'T make the student play a piece they HATE . Take the hint, especially if they're shy and can't tell you directly. *Grumbles about HSC pieces...* (chosen by another teacher at my school... not the godly one... long story...)

And I know its obvious, but the good teachers I've had have never told me I sound like shit. DON'T do it. It'll kill a student's dignity and motivation. Help them to build the best sound they can, NOT how to stop making that cat-choir sound (lol@scots for their bagpipes ) Optimism vs Pesimism. My mother personally finds the pesimistic side of things more appealing. She then wonders why I don't want to play/perform infront of her (bad memories...)

I maybe a little biased towards my present teacher as she's a head of her section at a con, though all in all, I find her a great teacher to work "with" (NOT for...)

Please discuss! Sorry this post has been a shamble... its basically come out of my head without any thought or planning.

 

[Emma-Jayde]

I think that good teachers are people that can communicate and understand their students, at the same time enjoying what they're teaching and being able to admit when they're wrong. I hate it when they can't do that!!!!
You should be able to talk to your teacher outside of class time too, and I think that they should help you with (music) questions that aren't necessarily school related aswell.

I also think that good teachers allow you to have a little bit of flexiblity in what you're doing. For example, you don't like a certain piece so they'll let you do another piece that is similar.
For music teachers outside of school, they need to relate with their students and allow them to proceed at their own pace, not try to push them too fast.

 

[white lady]

I think that good teachers are people that can communicate and understand their students, at the same time enjoying what they're teaching and being able to admit when they're wrong. I hate it when they can't do that!!!!
You should be able to talk to your teacher outside of class time too, and I think that they should help you with (music) questions that aren't necessarily school related aswell.

I also think that good teachers allow you to have a little bit of flexiblity in what you're doing. For example, you don't like a certain piece so they'll let you do another piece that is similar.
For music teachers outside of school, they need to relate with their students and allow them to proceed at their own pace, not try to push them too fast.

Ride on Ringo........

 

[Not-That-Bright]

A nice arse.

 

[JoeysBoy]

You should be able to talk to your teacher outside of class time too, and I think that they should help you with (music) questions that aren't necessarily school related aswell.

Good point!

Also... I want to expand on the "deep-end" thing... What I meant was for... students who don't think they'll progress very fast --> introduce them to the biggest band/orchestra/ensemble you can find. Remember when you jumped a few ameb grades in a few weeks, and examine what you were doing around them. I can GUARENTEE you'll say you were really involved with musical people somewhat better then you. I know I was...

 

[Emma-Jayde]

Singing is different though..It's impossible to skip grades or suddenly have a dramatic improvement, you have to wait for your voice to mature...Which sucks, you voice isn't fully developed until you're about 21-22...And I do Trinity College of London exams, they're better for singing...lol
But I know what you mean. Choirs, vocal ensembles, etc always help singers to understand how to sing as part of an ensemble instead of solo all the time, which is a really important skill to have. And I guess it would be the same for any instrumentalist, you need to know how to work with an ensemble.

 

[chopsticks0209]

Man, your teacher sounds like a goddess compared to my teacher.

He literally doesn't do any work. AT. ALL. We actually had to get our year adviser to talk to the principle to talk to him and THEN he decided to do some work. The worst part of it is, I joined last year and I haven't been doing any musicology at all, and he just said, "Just look up what we did last year" and didn't say anything else.

He talks about orchestra pieces and what they plan to do after school too. Sounds good right? Well, I'm NOT in orchestra, so i sit there like a wet duck for the bell to ring. And even then, you know the only thing that I’ve learnt? The only thing I remember is "if you put the distance between Pluto and the Sun at a ration of 10km: 1cm [or something like that] it would still be more than ________km long." Pretty pathetic huh.

That's why I'm REALLY not looking forward to go back to school because i DREAD this subject. Seriously, I hate it more than anything because i keep failing all the time, and i wish i could drop music but i've only got 10 units.

You know what pisses me off the most? The fact that people get 9/10 for things, and his excuse is “I just don’t think it deserved a 10/10.” WHAT KIND OF F*CKED LOGIC IS THAT?!

[on a side note, can anyone direct me to anyone that can help me in musicology? Because that stupid fat pig won't help me at all, even when i asked him for help.]

 

[slickerthnsleek]

A good music teacher = the exact opposite of my music teacher.

 

[Cerry]

Our music teacher is pretty good - he can tell when there's no point trying to get us to work, and we'll do performance that lesson, and do the theory later. And he's been working with us long enough so that he knows that before you start picking apart one of my pieces, you have to tell me what was good about it, or I'm just going to get frustrated, but that one of the other girls in our class would rather hear what needs improving before she gets any praise, and that kind of thing. And unlike the teacher we had while he was on sick leave, he's willing to accept the fact that there was good music written well after the romantic period ended.

 

[Silent_Sniper]

A good teacher is funny and understanding

 

[bennytheemo12]

oh i can tell you what makes a bad teacher
biasd to the "classically trained" students in the class, ie passing them with nearly full marks and failing everyone else becuase were not as good as them.
seriously wtf. i am soooooo going to get 90% of my class to go to the principal and have an inquest into the teachers teaching methods and how she doesnt actually teach us anything.
every lesson "go and research your topic areas".....
well wtf do i do miss?
"idk, google it"
*facepalms*
returns to /b/

 

[caffeinated4]

I had an EPIC science teacher last year, my science marks improved by 20%. He was incredibly epic, and awesome. I also had an equally epic maths teacher last year, marks went up by 18%.

Good teachers: listen to you, are organised, have a solution to your problems, give you lots of relevant material and also point out which parts or the most important (syllabus, exams etc), if you have a question actually answer it rather than waffling around and teling you what they said before, give you interest in the subject by 'fun' experiments or demostrations.

Bad teachers: do not speak clearly, do not explain concepts clearly, if you have trouble in class just ignore you, if you have a question just ignore or say what they said before, contradict themselves.