Students who struggle despite their best efforts break my heart. If you happen to feel the same way about your stoic strugglers, then I have a quick little strategy to share that will make you feel good, me feel good, and most importantly, our struggling piano students feel good.
The Stoic Struggler
The stoic struggler is the piano student personality that keeps me awake at night. I worry myself sick that one of these hard little workers might finally reach their breaking point and quit piano altogether. Because, for the stoic struggler, nothing comes easy.
And while there are many strategies we can implement and tools we can employ, sometimes the best thing we can do for our stoic strugglers is take a trip down memory lane.
This Week It’s FlashBack Friday For My Stoic Strugglers
Flashback Friday could really be called “Feel Good Friday”. Because on this day, me and my stoic strugglers revisit the early days of their piano journey. More specifically, we do the following simple things:
1) We do a first-lesson fly-through: That’s right! I take my stoic strugglers right back to Day 1 and revisit all of the activities we performed on the very first day. It’s a goofy little adventure where we emphasize how silly it seems to discover white keys, black keys, high sounds and low sounds.
2) I “strategically” select 15 books from my bookshelf and ask my stoic struggler to sort them into two categories; too easy and too hard. My stoic struggler’s face lights up when the “too easy” pile grows larger and larger.
3) We revisit the first piano piece my stoic struggler ever performed at a recital. We play it through together and have a good chuckle over how simple it is… and how we can probably even play it with our eyes closed 🙂
4) Finally, we revisit a recent piece that my stoic struggler has mastered, and compare it to the very first piano piece he ever played. Result… confidence restored.
It (most likely) won’t last forever
In most cases, the stoic struggler will not struggle forever. I’ve seen it over and over again; at some point, something clicks. And more often than not, because stoic strugglers are naturally hard workers, they take off! The challenge lies in maintaining confidence and self esteem while the stoic struggler prepares for take off.
Keeping Things Light For Stoic Strugglers
For stoic strugglers, piano lessons can become a chore… really fast! To fend off the feelings of frustration, my stoic strugglers and I play a lot of games and have a ton of fun. If you’re looking to lighten the day of your struggling piano students, you might want to add activities from our books, Shhhh… Your piano Teacher Thinks This Is Practice or Pssst… Your Piano Teacher Thinks This Is Theory. You’ll discover it’s impossible NOT to have fun.
Sandra says
I am another that lies awake worrying about certain students who are struggling. I do some detective work to discover what is the underlying problem. A concept? Coordinating hands? Slow note recognition? Then I try to address that problem at part of each lesson. Meanwhile I make sure they also have easy fun pieces to learn. The beauty of supplementary music is that it isn’t labelled as to level or grade. They don’t know if I have moved back a step to find their comfort zone. The important thing is to have music for them that is fun, but not making them anxious and frustrated.
CAROL says
I have a darling 7 1/2-yr-old beginning student who is progressing very slowly. She & I have a great relationship and enjoy the lessons together. Her parents aren’t musical but are supportive. After several months, she still can’t remember hand positions, finger numbers, and note names very well. Her mother tells me she tends to struggle with fine motor skills. We’re moving very slowly, but she should be reading the staff and isn’t ready. Games seem to help. I don’t feel like we’re making much progress and would like to help her.
suzy Reiser says
I often pull out duets when a student is really struggling….duets sound so much more difficult than they are and we always end up laughing.
Andrea says
Hi Suzy – such a great point!
Kat Parsons says
Can you tell me the age and level ranges that Shhhh… Your piano Teacher Thinks This Is Practice or Pssst… Your Piano Teacher Thinks This Is Theory address? I am a new teacher and have students who are only into their first couple of months and am thinking they need a little more piano under their belt before the Pssst books? PS. I just bought Wunderkids books!
Andrea says
Hi Kat! The books are designed for ages 6-12 and they can be used with any level of method book (as there are 88 activities in each book you can pick and choose the best ones as they progress further and further). You can get an idea of the activities by clicking the “learn more” beside the books in our online store (there are some free sample activities you can print and try for both books) We’re excited to have you start teaching WunderKeys 🙂