Building strong relationships with piano parents is extremely high on my list of studio priorities. I want them to know, without a doubt, that I completely “get” their children… and that I have their children’s best interests at heart.
However, being able to understand someone else’s child can be a real guessing game. Each new student comes with learning needs, strengths and weaknesses, behaviours, and anxieties that can be a real maze to figure out. You may hit several walls before finding the path that leads to the greatest success with each child.
The problem, however, is that hitting those walls can sometimes cause a breakdown in the parent-teacher relationship.
As you get to know what works and what does not work with individual children, the difficulties that sometimes arise from this kind of experimentation can then be misinterpreted as a lack of enjoyment for the piano… which is often not the case at all!
So rather than waste precious time hitting walls, I prefer to find ways to have my piano students’ parents guide me through this maze before lessons even begin. And one way to do this is with the Piano Parent Questionnaire I am sharing today.
Five Things I Ask of Every Single Piano Parent
I’d love to have the time to go for coffee and have a good chat with every single parent who registers a child for piano lessons. Wouldn’t it be fabulous to start lessons off having had a two hour heart-to-heart with the person who knows my new students best?
But, dreamland aside, there is a far more practical way of getting the information you need to start off on the right path.
In my studio, every parent who registers a new student for piano lessons receives this printable.
I ask them to fill it out and return it to me (or email me back the questions) a week before their children begin lessons. Lots of information can be gleaned from a piano student interview, but I have found that asking parents to take some time to truly reflect on these questions, and to form their thoughts and ideas into sentences intended to educate someone about their child, has been invaluable.
Sometimes I get really short answers back… but often times parents write me a novel. In either case, I get a really good feel for what they think is important for me to know, they immediately see that I am invested in their children from the get-go and, most importantly, our relationship begins with a clear mutual understanding.
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What else strengthens the Parent-Teacher bond? Involved parents! And if you’re looking for a great resource to get your piano parents sitting down at the piano with their children, TEDDtales is THE place to start. With exciting, story-based technical exercises, even not-so-musical parents can participate by narrating the hilarious technical tales while their children improve their technique and musicality.
What You Add To My Questionnaire?
This is the sheet I’ve been using for my piano studio, but I’d love to know… If I were to re-vamp this sheet, what kinds of things would you suggest I add to the list?
Share the questions you think are important to ask your piano student parents in the comments below.
Hi
I ask the parents how easily their child gets frustrated.
I ask them, what is the child’s favorite game and favorite subject in school.
Great question Silvi – gives you an insight into their interests so you can use those to relate piano concepts. Thanks for commenting!
Hi Linda – yes, this is similar to my “what makes your child shut-down” question – and the answers to that have surprised me sometimes… and I’ve been very glad to know in advance!
I ask them about their preferred learning style: “at school, do you learn the facts from what the teacher says? Or do you need to see it written on the board? Or does it work better to take notes and draw examples?
This is a great question Vicki – knowing this in advance saves you time in using the “not-so-effective” techniques to teach them. Thanks for sharing!
I try to find out how many OTHER activities this child is enrolled in. Is balancing time going to be a problem?
Good point Sandra – it’s nice to know before you begin how busy your student is so you can adjust your expectations.
I hand parents a lengthy questionnaire asking what their aspirations are for their child (from a music career to hobby level self-entertainment); the music background of the parents; whether the child has special needs; whether the child is independent; whether the child sings or does other music activities; how long is his/her attention span; how well he/she follows instructions; whether the child is creative, self-motivated and disciplined; what challenges they expect and how they plan to deal with them; where music study ranks in terms of priority with other activities; how often the family attends cultural events; how many days per week they expect the child to practice; and unusual circumstances the family is facing (medical treatments, shared custody, etc.).
This questionnaire is great! I used it today two families whose parents came in and feel like I have amazing insight into how each sibling is different from the other and how best to help motivate them, as well as what to be wary of. Thanks for sharing this for freeeee! I wasn’t sure how helpful it would be, but who knows kids better than their parents? Once I read the responses I was so glad I did it!
Brilliant idea. Is this editable (can you put child’s name in the parenthesis, etc.)? In what program?
Hi Karen – it’s not editable, but you can copy and paste the text if you like and make your own. If I have time I’ll try to make it editable 🙂