Has anyone here trained a teacher?

[Bob]

What areas do you cover?  What is the ideal teacher you would expect to turn out?

How in the world do you go about doing this?   And balancing the ideal of what you want to create with the realities of the world?

[pianonut]

not that i know.  far from it.  but i did find some money for you:

www.banknotes.com/UFOMILL.JPG      it is motivating for kids to have money, somehow! 

maybe they can be set in different increments.  what if they had composer's heads on them?  say the head of beethoven like on www.cascadeheadmusic.org/images/beethoven.jpg

there's some teacher education sites that i passed through five minutes ago.  funny, i was thinking of you.  will look again.

[pianonut]

pfooy.  can't find the one i really liked, and just happened upon it.

from my limited experience - daily work is much better than once a week.  it makes you look like a poor teacher, when in actuality, you are probably a very fine teacher.   maybe you should quit and work in a district that likes music.  pennsylvania schools are really great.  probably massachusettes, too.   they spend a bit more on the music program.

what about private schools?

[ptmidwest]

In USA, that's the music ed dept of colleges and universities.

Of course, piano pedagogy is big business here now.

[pianonut]

i like that idea, but the realities of the world are big school debts and small returns.  real estate, that's where it's at.  then you can afford all the incentives that you have to buy (pencils, erasers, stickers, $5 gift certificates) and still go out to eat after work.

SERIOUSLY, if you spend money on school - you have to look at the return you'll get from the job.  maybe music teachers travel a lot from school to school and work several schools in the area?  not knowing.  pondering.  wondering about marching bands.  they look so fun to coordinate.  how much do they get paid.  possibly the teachers do it for free after school?  AND YET...look how important to school patriotism.  i just don't get it!

one thing i HAVE noticed - is that once you invest everything in music (uni) you CAN teach more subjects.  maybe swing choir, concert choir, AND regular band, AND marching band AND maybe a math class or art class.  of course, if you take enough classes, then you can go for community college and do similar thing.  (plus private lessons)

[ptmidwest]

Continuing ed, through seminars, perhaps, puts you side-by-side with teachers who teach the same things.

You have experience it to understand it.  But you come back after hearing other teachers' situations, solutions, and desperations, and take home some new angles and some ideas that suit your style of teaching.  It really recharges your batteries.

So then you start up again with a little more energy and freshness, and an outlook that is better, and yes, you actually enjoy what you do.  At least more than before, that is.  It's a good thing.

[ptmidwest]

        (There are several people on this forum whose career is to train teachers.  I know some of them.  Why are they not speaking right up?)