Have you ever noticed that you seem to be able to teach some students better than others? While some students seem to instantly grasp your every instruction and leave your studio walking away on a cloud of enthusiasm, there are others for whom getting them to respond as well is much like trying to drink the last few marshmallows in your cup of hot cocoa: You can’t reach them and the more you tip your cup up, the further away they move.
Perhaps for these seemingly impossible students, all they require is a teacher who understands their learning style, adapts to it, and communicates through it. In other words, a teacher who is able to chameleonize.
How do you identify a student’s learning style?
I personally love the animal personality typing that Keith Golay presented In the Autumn 1990 edition of Keyboard Companion. He identifies four main types of students/teacher learning styles: The Ape, The Bear, The Dolphin, and The Owl. I will summarize both the teacher and student personalities, and include the suggested teaching stradegy for each learning type.
The Ape
Teacher Characteristics: The Ape teacher is almost always enjoyable. Will put on a great show and do a great deal of demonstration and hands-on activity. Tends to de-emphasize mechanics, theory, and personal relationships, and focus instead on being spontaneous, and on “expressing” the music. Want students to develop a grace, or a flair for playing. They are the best at getting students to improvise.
Student Characteristics: Our little Apes are definitely hazards as students. They don’t want to sit still, don’t want to practice scales, don’t want to pay attention. All they want to do is play the piano, and they want you to show them playing which is stimulating and exciting. Chances are that you won’t get many apes, but if you can handle them, you may find the opportunity to unleash extraordinary musical potential.
Teaching Stradegies: Make playing the piano fun! You must adapt to this student’s need to be great and to have fun here and now. Model and demonstrate, then he or she will mimic. Once the action is taken and found enjoyable the thirst for more information in order to pursue the fun will follow. You may not have the kind of program that’s compatible with this student – find out early and don’t waste everybody’s time.
The Bear
Teacher Characteristics: Tend to be traditionalists in music education. Stick to the basics. Get the mechanics down! Their first objective is to make sure that every student they teach is a good citizen – that students sit quietly, follow the rules, pay attention, and practice diligently at home. Strong believer in skill and drill. Most likely, there will be a strong emphasis on memorization and on playing scales. Spend the lesson sitting next to the student on the piano bench seeing to it that the student doesn’t skip a beat. Teaching improvisation will be difficult for this teacher due to a strong reliance on structure and mechanics.
Student Characteristics: Bear students want to be prepared for their lessons, want to do as they are told, like to pay attention, like to do their scales, and are good at memorizing. But if they have no real interest in learning music, they may be quite difficult to motivate.
Teaching Stradegies: The standard “skill and drill” approach will be very successful, but don’t overload. Perceived failure will demonstrate in a big hurry. Problems will also come when you are ready to have this student interpret or improvise. Appreciate that such a student will find these activities stressful and show the way carefully.
The Dolphin
Teacher Characteristics: Live in another world. They tend to be the progressives. They want new ideas, new techniques. And they want students to be creative and spontaneous. They have a primary objective, too – to make sure that their students become better human beings and learn to enjoy expressing themselves through music. This teacher strives for a personal relationship with each student, and seeks to develop the potential that resides deep within the student. The emphasis will be more on the student gaining an understanding of music than on the mechanics.
Student Characteristics: Dolphins are well-motivated, high-acheivers too, but only to the degree that they have a good personal relationship with the teacher. Also, rather than just a brilliant technical display, or exciting performance, they want to use the music as a form of self-expression to communicate their inner feelings to the world with music.
Teaching Stradegies: Recognition is very important. These students love to perform if they get strokes for the effort, if they know that the teacher thinks they are something special. But drilling bores them. Show this Johnnie how to create his own music and he will soar.
The Owl
Teacher Characteristics: The Owl teacher is more cool in his/her approach. The focus will be on how to analyze and interpret a piece of music, and on how to accurately express the intention of the composer. The personal relationship with the student will be de-emphasized and replaced with the importance of gaining insight.
Student Characteristics: Owl students want to do more than just memorize. They want to learn the theory behind what they are doing, and they want to perfect their skills to the highest degree possible. They have an interest in gaining insight into the structure and function of a piece. They will enjoy learning about the different compositional styles and impact these styles had on the development of music in culture.
Teaching Stradegies: The teaching should be theory-oriented, with the emphasis on musical structure and on music’s beautiful precision. Great technical skill can be fostered in the exploration of its precise structure. Be organized and be sure the student understands where he’s headed and why.
Understanding and exploring both yours and your students’ learning styles will help everyone get more out of lesson time and further progress. Not to mention you will find yourself being able to tackle those “hard to teach” students with more confidence.
In Part II of this topic, I will go into other types of individual learning characteristics such as a student’s modality preference (Is he/she a visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learner?).
About the Author
Jennifer is a composer, recording artist, and piano teacher from Seattle, Washington. She has been teaching the piano for 14 years, and currently maintains a small studio of 15 piano students and 2 violin students, where she encourages creativity, and fun.
In addition to teaching, she records and composes her own music, and she performs publicly. Last year she toured the northwest including shows in Seattle at Benaroya Hall, Salt Lake City, Idaho Falls featuring guest artists Emmy award winning composer/pianist Jace Vek, and pianist Michele McLaughlin. She released her debut album "Key of Sea" in January of 2007, and just released a 2nd album, "The Lullaby Album" in July of 2009. The 2-Disc release features 13 original and traditional lullabies in both Solo piano and fully Orchestrated versions. The album includes the talents of Emmy Award winning composer/pianist Jace Vek, Ourstage Grand prize winner Jillian Goldin, and Grammy Award nominated producer Paul Speer.
Jennifer's music has been featured on NBC Universal sports, as well as several independent films, most recently Poor Boyz Productions 2008 International Free Skiing Festival award winning release "Reasons". She won a publicly voted award for her music in the 2008 Swan Lake Moving Image and Music Awards in Germany, and her song "Fly Away" won 1st place in the 2007 SLM: IM Awards, three 1st place channel prizes for Instrumental Music on OurStage.com, and was included in Kathy Parson's "Top 20 of 2007" list (Solo Piano Publications).
Jennifer started playing the piano and violin at age 5, and went on to study Piano Pedigogy at Brigham Young University (Idaho). She has performed as a soloist with the Murray Symphony Orchestra on the MacDowel 2nd Piano Concerto, and won the silver prize in her university's concerto competition for Prokofiev's 3rd Piano Concerto. She has worked with the Seattle Symphony, participated with the Seattle Composer’s Salon at Benaroya Hall, and was a featured soloist at the Roosevelt Hotel. Jennifer performed with the Salt Lake Temple Square Concert Series for 3 years, and has also performed on the violin with various symphonies including the Oregon Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra.
Jennifer recently had her first baby, Preston, with her husband Will in June 2008. She is enjoying new motherhood and learning to juggle her music career along with it. She enjoys writing, chocolate, cooking, fashion, blogging, and a variety of outdoor sports. www.jenniferthomasmusic.com www.myspace.com/jenniferthomasmusic www.ourstage.com/fanclub/jenniferthomas
I know that many teachers out there have a set curriculum that they use, but if you can't break out of the mould or think outside the square, then teaching becomes mundane as well - imagine how this is for your students! I like to expand my students to think in a little of all ways above, but mainly concentrate on their main personal goals and ways of learning.
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