I have had an interesting life of moving. I was born in Taiwan, immigrated to New Zealand with my family when I was a teenager, moved to Long Island, New York with my husband in 2005, and most recently moved to southern California in 2009. After graduating from university, I had a very successful full time teaching career before moving to the United States, then after much effort, just as I finally re-established a full time studio in New York, I had to move again! It has been a year since my last move, and I am happy to say that my studio is once again healthy. I am going to share the secrets of how I rebuilt my studio from scratch, twice!
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Posted in Promoting Your Studio, Using Music Teacher's Helper
I have been using Music Teacher’s Helper for years now as I was an early adopter –and I love the system, but I have had to manage two calendars for all of those years: My “life” calendar- Franklin Covey , and my MTH calendar. Of course this broke the cardinal rule of the Franklin Covey system! Keep one calendar!
A year ago we downloaded “calengoo” in an attempt to manage my multiple calendars because it could talk to MTH and gather that calendar information, however every time I tried to open the app it had to run a tedious download of information that took 5-7 minutes – not usable for entering quick information or scheduling meetings and events when you are on the go, or for quickly knowing where you needed to be next!
Now, thanks to google cal – I can see my MTH calendar, my daughter’s school calendar (it links directly), several rehearsal schedules for shows I am directing, my performance calendar, my husband’s calendar (can we ever have a date?) and my family’s life calendars. Not only that, but they can all be color coded- yet be in one calendar! The page loads very quickly – I use an Iphone 4 now and I keep it on my home page of apps. You can sort by calendar… (ie: hide my current show calendar) or see them all and then some! I added US holidays and my favorite football teams game schedule from the options listed on the google calendar site!
The combination of MTH’s improved calendar sharing and the Google Cal app has drastically improved my ability to manage my life efficiently when away from my desktop. I highly recommend you give it a try!
Posted in Music & Technology, Product Reviews, Studio Management, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Have you ever requested that a student buy a certain book and had them turn up with something similar, but not quite right? Or have you waited weeks and weeks for them to find the time to head to the store, while you lose precious lesson time and momentum?
I became so fed up with the situation that I used to supply all of the books necessary for my students, and add it to their next invoice (this can be done using the Music Teacher’s Helper ‘Charge a Fee’ feature). However, the music store closest to me has recently closed down and now the extra time it takes to travel to another store, combined with the large number of students that I teach makes it near impossible to continue to do this. So I have started to explore other options. Read more…
Posted in Financial Business, Product Reviews, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Since the start of the year I have been producing a monthly Studio Newsletter. I initially started the newsletter as a method of communicating with parents of the students that I teach in schools. In contrast to the parents of my home studio students, whom I usually see weekly as they drop off/pick up their children, there are some of the ‘in school’ parents that I only see once or twice a year at recitals. So far I have found that there are three main uses for my newsletter. Read more…
Posted in Customer Support, Promoting Your Studio, Studio Management, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Have you ever wanted to record a student’s performance prior to a recital, or a difficult passage that the student needs to work on, but lacked the equipment or knowledge to do so? I would like to share the ways in which I use recordings in my studio, and the very accessible and simple equipment that I use to produce recordings. Read more…
Posted in Composing & Arranging, Music & Technology, Performing, Teaching Tips, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Here is a list of the latest new features, enhancements, and bug fixes we’ve added to Music Teacher’s Helper. Thank you for your feedback and support.
New Features
- Reconcile All Events for one Day. You can now reconcile all events for a specific day. To do this, click the down down arrow on any day of the calendar and choose “Reconcile All”.
- Repertoire Columns Split. In the Repertoire Tracker, the title and composer fields are now showing in separate columns.
- Day of Week. Added the name of the day of the week at the top of the calendar in Day View.
Recent Bug Fixes
- When e-mailing all students on a day, it now e-mails the parents as well.
- Manage Student Logins page was not always resetting the logins properly or showing all the parents. This is fixed.
- Current day highlighted on the calendar is now taking time zone into account.
- Added warning message before recurring events are deleted. Also disabled Google Calendar->MTH sync temporarily. MTH->Google is fine.
- European date format now saving properly on the Reconcile Events page.
- Photos page now shows the correct amount of space left for uploading photos.
- When parents login, if they have a credit, the “Amount Due” now shows zero, rather than a negative amount due.
Posted in Site Announcements, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Follow-up is extremely important to growing your home-based studio. Like anything worthwhile, consistent follow-up requires a lot of effort, but over time you’ll reap the benefits of a solid group of students and referrals. After all, it takes far less time and money to keep an existing student than market to prospective students. Here are 9 follow-up tools sure to motivate your students to stay loyal to your studio:
Thank-you notes: This is a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised at how many business owners neglect to write thank-you notes–especially when they get really busy. Take the time to show your students that you genuinely appreciate their business. After an initial lesson with a new student, or after semester recitals, send a note thanking them for their time and hard work. They’ll remember your thoughtfulness! Read more…
Posted in Promoting Your Studio, Studio Management, Using Music Teacher's Helper
May is that time of year when year-end recitals are happening, exams are right around the corner, and music teachers are working at a feverish pace to get students ready for their upcoming performances. Often students need that extra push to work just a bit harder in order to meet upcoming goals, deadlines, and expectations.
How can teachers use MTH’s functionality to drive home the importance of what the goals are and what date they need to be accomplished by? Here’s a quick tutorial on how to add goal-setting language to lesson reminders:
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Posted in Studio Management, Teaching Tips, Using Music Teacher's Helper
Keeping good records of your students is imperative for good communication, and for continued growth in musical study. Here is a checklist of things I keep on file for each student, from the first lesson and beyond:
Personal Data
Detailed information on each student is essential. Gather this data at the interview or online via the “Register” website feature on MTH, rather than at the first lesson. Parents and students will appreciate your not taking teaching time for administrative details.
Posted in Studio Management, Teaching Tips, Using Music Teacher's Helper
I am a teacher who does not usually struggle with fixing a vocal problem or finessing a vocal line, but does struggle with keeping herself organized! I have three assistants at this time who help me overcome this deficiency. One manages my scheduling, a second manages my billing, and the third manages and arranges my student’s and vocal group’s performances. The latter two work just a few hours a month. The former oversees any lesson changes I need to make to accommodate my directing and performing or changes that may be requested by my students and their families, and she usually works 10 hours or so a month. Read more…
Posted in Financial Business, Studio Management, Using Music Teacher's Helper