Please demystify the "Sample lesson" situation

musicprnt
Sat, 27 Aug 2011 09:46:37 +0000

I don’t think it is ‘killing the child’ to give them help with this process, I don’t think anyone is commenting when parents help with the process or ‘fill in the cracks’ and so forth. What I believe and I suspect others are driving at is that it is important that parents not drive everything, not do everything from deciding which schools to apply to to what teacher to study with, or do everything. Among other things, as overloaded as kids are at that age they need to start learning to take responsibility for themselves, to handle the things they will as an adult starting in college.

And yes, there is also the impression it gives schools, while admissions is a fairly anonymous process, from what admissions people and teachers have told me they also deal with a lot of helicopter parents, and it can generate a negative vision of the applicant (that said, it probably takes a lot for them to notice such things, if you as parent ask questions occassionally NBD; if the parent is doing everything, they may notice).

I see this all the time in my weird journey as a parent, I see kids in the music programs who are in their latter teens (15-18) where you would think they were still in suzuki school, parents sit in the lessons, recording everything, ask the teacher questions and so forth, and almost everything the kid does in the program, the parent is involved, fight with the teachers over what is being taught, etc…and when it comes time for college, the parent often chooses the schools, the teachers, goes with them to auditions and drives the whole process (including, as I have been told, getting into arguments at the school trying to sit in on the actual audition, etc etc).

Obviously, these are extreme examples but they do serve a point (what happens to these kids when they are actually on their own). I guess my take is that handling as much of this stuff as they are able is part of the process of learhing and growing up, as much as the teaching in the school will:).

As far as sample lessons go, I would be really hard pressed to try and argue that it directly increases the chance of admission, plenty of kids go to schools where they have never had sample lessons and get in. About the only edge it gives I suspect is that the teacher has seen the student, and if they remember them by audition time, it might make them more willing to check off on the magic box “I am willing to teach this student, if they get in” , but that doesn’t guarantee admit, only that you have at least one teacher willing to teach you, which is as far as I can tell needed for admission to most music programs.

And no, one lesson will not tell you long term if the teacher is a good teacher or will work out for the student, that takes more then a few lessons, but on the other hand it eliminates teachers that you have a lesson with them, and sit there scratching your head saying “what the heck is he doing?” and so forth. There is a downside to this, you could also reject someone who might turn out to be a great teacher, because that day the teacher could have been having a bad day and was gruff and short and seemed like a jerk…whereas someone who doesn’t do the sample lesson, gets this guy as a teacher, might find them to be great:).