Today’s piano teaching tip is all about the importance of positive reinforcement during piano lesson time. While it seems obvious that making your piano students feel good about themselves should be a part of your weekly piano lesson time – it is easy to forget just how important this simple strategy is to the success of your piano teaching studio. For most of us, word of mouth is the most effective means of advertising our piano teaching business. To get the wheels moving on the word-of-mouth train you need to really be on top of your game.
At our studio, students don’t leave their piano lesson without the teacher having said five specific things they did well. Sometimes it’s a stretch, but no matter what, every student leaves feeling as though they are fantastic.
In your position you hold a lot of power. You can influence a student so much that they identify themselves as a musician for life, love the piano and really commit to piano lessons, or you can forget how important it is to boost your student’s confidence and have them feel that piano is hard, they’re not very good and risk losing them down the road.
Keep in mind those simple comments that seem humorous to us (Wow! Your fingers just don’t want to behave today!”) can be devastating to a sensitive child.
Find some creative ways of complimenting your piano students as much as you can and reap the rewards of happy students, happy parents and a healthy waiting list for your piano teaching business.
Do you want to really grow your piano teaching business? Click here to learn more about our piano teaching guide, “Piano Hands Shouldn’t Flip Burgers”.
emily bennette says
These are some really good things to know if you want to teach children how to play the piano. I like what you said about how little jokes you think are funny can be damaging to a child. As a parent, it would be nice to know that my child’s teacher is positive and supportive. That might just be the difference when it comes to loving the piano.