Let’s face it, teaching private lessons can be tough. You only see your students from 30 to 60 minutes per week, and not only need to fit in as much instruction as possible, but make sure that students remember what you taught and motivate them enough to put it to use in their practice sessions. Writing useful lesson notes can greatly extend the contact that you have with students through the week. Over the last few years, quite a number of articles here on the Music Teacher’s Helper blog have dealt with the issue of creating the most interesting lesson notes possible and in what format to deliver them.

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Dr. Foley, I forgot my notebook again. Can you just email the lesson notes to me so I can read them on my phone when I practice?

Often students arrive without their notebook, still expecting lesson notes to magically appear. If you’re able to use a laptop with an internet connection, it’s a snap to use Music Teacher’s Helper to type lesson notes that can be sent to the student and/or parent the minute they leave.  It’s relatively easy to wire your home studio with a reliable internet connection. However, many institutional and corporate music teachers work in studios without the benefits of ethernet or wifi connections. What to do? More…

One of my favourite features of Music Teacher’s Helper is the Lesson Notes. I imagine that teachers use this feature in a variety of ways. Perhaps you use the notes as a practice reminder for your students, as a way of communicating with their parents, or as a reminder for yourself. I use them in all three ways.

When I first started using Music Teacher’s Helper, I was surprised at the number of parents who commented on how much they valued the weekly feedback (despite the fact that I had been sending lesson notes home in a notebook for years prior!). I suppose the ease and immediacy of an email is decidedly better than relying on the parent to find & read the student’s notebook on a weekly basis. More…

I really enjoy having the option to send out lesson notes after a lesson through the Music Teacher’s Helper website. I find this is a great way to recap a lesson, reiterate the main theme of that lesson, and to remind me of what occurred in the student’s previous lesson, as the notes appear on my daily summary. As I teach solidly with very few breaks in between lessons, I keep a notebook on my piano that I jot notes into for lesson notes. When I sit down at my computer (sometimes that evening, and often times the next morning) I have a reference to go to on what happened at a student’s lesson and what comments I would like them to take away from that lesson.

When creating lesson notes each week, I always try to touch on something positive that happened in the lesson. Sometimes that may be as small as “Nice job being on time three weeks in a row!” or as large as “Great improvement! You are on to a new level!” I also have my students keep a “Voice Notebook” that I write in, as well as they write in. More…

Time put into lesson notes is well worth it for yourself, for students, and if the students are kids, for their parents as well.  Lesson notes are added when you reconcile a lesson; while you’re doing it, you can check off the box to have the notes emailed to the student.  For tips on reconciling see this post.

One great benefit of lesson notes for students is that they are read on emails (if you checked the box), at a quiet time away from the lesson, when the student can think over what you say and remember pointers from their lesson to good effect.

For yourself, you’ll gain the benefit of viewing the lesson notes from the last time you saw each student when you use the Daily Summary Report, which you can view, print out, or have emailed to you each day.  This is invaluable for tuning you into each student as you see them.  My own preference is to print the Daily Summmary report (see earlier post for more info on this) and use that sheet as a place to make notes about the current lesson.  You can use codes to speed the process:  for example, circle or underline relevant comments from the previous lesson to show that these items were reviewed, along with a comment about it, or use initials or code words to help you write new lesson notes.

Below are 4 types of comments, and examples of each, that I think are worth including in your lesson notes: More…

Invoicing is a tremendously useful part of Music Teachers Helper.  But it can be confusing.  Here’s a tour through the way one teacher (that’s me!) makes use of the invoicing system — plus a few extra comments.

I have found invoicing to be increasingly helpful, and more of my students are requesting it.  First I’ll describe a few situations where I use invoicing, and then I’ll explain how I work with invoices.  (Please note that, technically, an “invoice” is a bill that requests payment, while a “statement” is a record of a student’s charges and payments, showing the balance owed, if any.  For the purposes of this discussion, I’m just using the word “invoice” to talk about everything we do on the “Create Invoices” window.)

Here are some reasons to use invoices:

1. Some students don’t want to have to remember to bring cash or a checkbook to the lesson, or else they simply prefer to handle or track their lesson payments via credit card.  These students have requested that I invoice them.

2. In a few cases, a student seems to have trouble remembering to pay, and although they may not request an invoice, creating and emailing them one is a very clear and effective request for payment, and gives them the option to pay immediately by credit card.

3. Where there might be some complication in the student’s account, it is easiest to explain the problems by setting up an invoice that summarizes all the charges and payments in question, and emailing it to the student.

4. When a student is taking a class, or a combination of classes and private lessons, I can schedule them for the month or sometimes for longer – many of my classes are 8 weeks long – and by emailing an invoice, I not only can make clear how much the student owes, but also make clear to them the dates of all the classes and lessons.

5. When a flat monthly rate is in effect, some students may prefer an automatic invoice to be emailed at the beginning of the month, and a few may even choose automatic payments.

Here’s how I go about making different kinds of invoices

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It’s that crazy time of the year for music teachers when students are getting sick, canceling, rescheduling, and requiring extra lessons before that upcoming festival or studio recital. If you’re adding a large number of one-time events to your schedule, how can you do it quickly, without the need to go through the front door of your teaching website?

If you’re a Firefox user, you can quickly add a bookmarklet to your browser’s bookmarks toolbar so you can add an event with only one click. Here’s how to do it:

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One of the ongoing challenges of using Music Teacher’s Helper is getting students and parents to regularly login to their teacher’s site and make use of the student-only features. The solution: create a regularly updated stream of cool content so that they’ll get hooked. Just below the Upcoming Events section is a list of Announcements, which can be created and tweaked using the Studio Announcements feature.

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Recently, our neighborhood in suburban Denver enjoyed the grand opening of the “Streets of Southglenn”. Once a mall, it is now a village of specialty shops, restaurants, flower-pot-adorned streets, department stores, fountains and a natural foods grocery store. This national chain store features local rock bands and small ensembles during special store functions.

One evening, while shopping and dining–yes there is even a place to dine at this organic market–a band was playing up on the balcony, an extension of the dining area. Inspired by the live music instead of the typical “musack”, I envisioned a piano up in the balcony and opening performance opportunities to local teachers and their students and local artists. More…

MTH, fabulous website that it is, doesn’t yet support Arizona not using Daylight Savings Time.  This morning, when I went to reconcile my lessons, some weren’t yet showing.  I had forgotten that I’d set my Time Zone to Pacific (GMT-8:00), because there is not yet a support for Arizona (GMT-7:00, no DST).  In this way, I work around the website, and make sure lessons always come up to be reconciled.

So, after brief confusion, I swiftly changed my Time Zone (in preferences) back to Mountain Standard Time.  All fixed!  MTH is working on this, but it’s down the list.  Since the fix is so easy, I’d much rather other problems be fixed first.  So, no worries!  Easy to fix.

Happy November!

Remember, November is Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month (Pancreatic Cancer afflicted: Luciano Pavarotti, Marilyn Horne (currently fighting it well), Patrick Swayze, Michael Landon – to name a few).  Learn more at http://www.knowitfightitendit.org/