u/Holiday_Banana_7859

Hi everyone, I'm a young piano teacher (F22) with 20 piano students, teaching in a big city. I've gotten a few requests from time to time from my piano students' parents that they'd like me to pick their kids up from school, then give a piano lesson, pick up from camp, babysit in the evening, etc. etc. I care deeply about my students, piano teaching is my full-time gig and I genuinely love kids, so in the past I've always been more than happy to be of extra help in any way. However, I'm starting to encounter the issue of parents negotiating my babysitting rate and trying to pair it with lessons so they pay me less than if we just did babysitting on their own. I'm starting to realize there's a potential conflict of interest with me being babysitter and piano teacher sometimes, not only in the minds of the kids, but mostly in the parents. It's a weird in between when I am serving as both. I'm curious, do y'all ever babysit your piano kids? Is this something I should stop offering going forward?

Hi everyone, I have a 7-year-old boy whom I started teaching about 2-3 months ago. He is very smart when it comes to musical concepts. He is taking to note reading very well, has a good sense of rhythm, and is very interested in music history/classical music in general. However, I'm having the most difficult time with him over any student I've had so far with his hand technique. He plays with completely straight, flat fingers.

So... just for some context: I have 20 students currently and have been teaching 7 years now, so I have a few tricks up my belt. I use this little crochet turtle called "Hermon" -- I place the toy under their palms to teach them to curve their fingers. If he flattens, he will send Hermon to the ER. I use various metaphors -- from "upside down beggar hands" to "waterfalls from a cliff." These tools tend to be enough for my students to get the point and curve their fingers. When they failed to work on him, I had him purchase a Dozen a Day mini book to combat his technique. As a last resort, I purchased "bubble handz" off of IG with is a wrist/hand corrector device (this was pretty much a waste of money).

Point is: No matter what I tell him or what I do, he can't seem to correct his technique. His fingers are very double-jointed, and his joints are hypermobile, and when I tell him to (for example) make the tips of his fingers strong and not collapse, the middle of his finger (the other joint closer to the knuckles) completely straightens and hyperextends. If I tell him to make that joint strong, he will collapse the tip. I keep working on it week by week, but at this point it is completely stunting his progress, and I can not move him forward in his books if he cannot correct it (and I can tell he is getting frustrated that we aren't really moving along)

Has anyone dealt with hypermobility finger issues in young students? What did they use to correct it? Should I keep pushing him along and hope it fixes naturally later? Any tips/tricks would be appreciated!

Hi everyone! I'm a young piano teacher (F) (20s), teaching piano students ages 3-adult exclusively on the UES. I have 20 piano students and am teaching full-time. Of course I went to music conservatory (outside of NYC) and have many musician friends but none are big on teaching and/or are local to Manhattan. I would love to build a community of other fellow independent Upper East Side piano teachers (if there are others!) to exchange advice on running their businesses/teaching/curriculum/etc. Please dm me if you are a fellow piano teacher! I would love to speak further!

I teach in NYC, I have a piano studio of 20 kids ages 4-13, ranging from beginner to early intermediate. Something I've been struggling with for a while is convincing parents and the kids that they need to be practicing outside of their lessons in order to make progress. Some things I'm already doing: I write down their homework at the end of each lesson in notebook and give the parents detailed instructions on how to do it (I sometimes stay 20 min after making sure the parent understands what they should do!). I also tell all parents they can text/call me during week and I can send audio messages or videos to help with practice. I give them a practice chart with every day of the week on it. If they fill out 5 days between lessons they earn 1 ticket. 1 ticket earns them something from my "small prize box" and 2 tickets earns them a toy from the "big prize box." I also offer extra lessons which I frequently offer where these serve as guided practice sessions. Even with these changes, and hosting 2x a year recitals, my students just won't practice or do their written homework. When I text parents about it, it's always the same conversation somewhere along lines of "we were too busy." Piano teaching is my full-time job and I love it so much and I'm so passionate about it, but teaching the same lesson every week and not seeing kids make any progress is absolutely demotivating for me to the point where I wonder if I should go back to school in pursuit of a different career. I would appreciate any advice on the above! I'm beyond frustrated and am trying everything in my power!

I have a student, 9 yr old girl, who is very talented. She's been playing piano for 1 yr and is playing in Journey Through the Classics Bk 1. She can read music but needs to write note names on her sheet music. Over the last 3 months, I've been having enormous difficulties getting her to look at the music while she is playing. I will point at music as she plays with pencil and tell her to follow along, I will have her read letters and play, but no matter what I say to remind her, she is always guessing and trying to rely on sound/memory to play her piece-- which results in her playing completely wrong notes and rhythm, and making it impossible to undo since she practiced it that way. Recently, I decided to take her out of her classical book and put her in Piano Adventures Accelerated Curriculum Lesson bk 1, with the idea that the music being significantly easier would retrain her to look at the music while she is playing and pay attention to things like dynamics and articulation on the spot. Sometimes I'm really second-guessing if I'm doing the right thing. She can physically play things that are much more difficult and I don't want to demotivate her in the "easier" book, but I also can't make progress with her if she is not looking at sheet music. Do any teachers have any suggestions or similar experiences?

Hi everyone, I am a piano teacher in NYC. I trained as a serious pianist/went to conservatory, and the like, but I never participated in any of the ABRSM exams. I'm interested in getting some of my piano students involved in the exams, but I don't really know how to get started. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I would go about starting to teach in preparation for these? Also, how do I decide which students should do it vs which should not? Is it generally for students who want to do piano more seriously? Also, do you think working in these levels could potentially stunt the progress/growth of students who would otherwise progress faster without it, or do you think the curriculum lends itself well to fast progress? Any and all advice is welcome! Thank you!