Does anyone else feel limited by traditional lessons?

[Bob]

The teacher.  And the time schedule, those weekly meetings.


I think most of the teachers I've had expected the student to instantly pick up on something and fix it completely by the next week, if not do more than that.

And then the weekly meeting doesn't leave anytime for experimenting with things or for figuring much out yourself.

[db05]

Assuming that my piano lessons are traditional... as opposed to my guitar, that are far from it. My guitar teacher is like a good friend.

Yes, I feel limited by it, but it has both good and bad points. Am glad am getting lessons from both worlds so I can compare and balance things. Would you rather have a teacher who is like a friend, talking 50% of the time, and having no syllabus/ structure to your lessons? Sometimes. Not always.

I think most of the teachers I've had expected the student to instantly pick up on something and fix it completely by the next week, if not do more than that.

And then the weekly meeting doesn't leave anytime for experimenting with things or for figuring much out yourself.

Forget thinking what your teacher expects of you. Once I stopped trying to polish every piece assigned to me in a week, and just worked everything to a point with no pressure, I found much better progress.

You have the entire week to experiment and figure things for yourself; use it. My problem is that we have little time to figure out with my teacher, and thus, I am doing all the thinking in my pieces. If my teacher would give me a lot of pointers, or at least play the piece for me several times, I wouldn't need a week to think!

[Bob]

I'd rather have a teacher I had confidence in.  None, not even one, seemed to have it all.  Strengths and weaknesses of course, but if I had follow one teacher completely, I wouldn't have made progress.  They didn't cover everything well enough for that to happen.  And not just theory and ear training.  I mean how to learn music.  Just on the classical side.  NOthing with jazz. 

What I would really like is a teacher who does know all that and has a plan.  Then I just have to follow the path and get their advice.  That's the mentor-apprentice ideal.

With the weekly lesson schedule, if they give you a section to work on and it's too difficult, then you end up spending all your time on that and still walk into the next lesson not able to play it.

And there is the wear and tear issue with lessons, but that's probably more of an issue just for me on a piano forum.

[faulty_damper]

With the weekly lesson schedule, if they give you a section to work on and it's too difficult, then you end up spending all your time on that and still walk into the next lesson not able to play it.

You get what you are willing to pay for.  Most people won't pay for more than one lesson a week.  There is only so much that can be "taught" once a week.  The most important skills that can be learned can only be learned by careful guidance every day.

[rc]

I feel pretty lucky to have my teacher.  Her ear catches things I miss, her knowledge is huge, she can demonstrate the ideas and will explain things from a variety of angles until I get it (not just the what, but also the why).  The lessons are quite a mental workout for me, she gives so much insightful feedback, but also seems to understand that there's no way I could master everything she tells me in the span of a week.

Not only that, very generous.  So far every lesson has been overtime, significantly.  She puts so much into the lessons, I want to practice as much as I can to try and match her as a student.

She's the best teacher I've had...  I don't think she can do much improv, but she does think it's something that should be covered more and encourages my own study into it.

[db05]

rc, you're so lucky to have such a teacher!  That must be faaaaaar from the "traditional lessons" Bob was referring to.

[rc]

I've had a lot of guitar teachers in the past that were just kind of aimless too.  One used to sit down, eat his lunch, and just tell me "play it again" over and over, week after week.  It was a paid lunch break for him.

Another wanted to fit me into his classical guitar mold, when at the time I had no interest in that (a few years later would have been a good fit!).

I had a good match for a guitar teacher (for about 2 months before he moved)

and one I will always remember for letting me go when the lessons got stale.  Many others would have milked it for money indefinitely but he cut it off when I'd learned what he offered.

The first piano teacher wanted to teach me jazz, when all I wanted was classical. 

The next was a good fit for a while, seemed to follow the graded RCM pretty close.  This might be the closest to what I've experienced as a traditional lesson.  Otherwise, each teacher seemed to have a unique approach.  Most would have been well matched with a certain kind of student, others were probably not meant to be teachers at all. 

I think a lot of this journey was so that I could learn to be a more discerning student - the better I know what I want, the better I could spot a good match.  Maybe there's some of that "when the student is ready, the teacher will appear", because I don't think I'd have been a good match at an earlier time.

[Bob]

Maybe my teachers had their plan set.  No room for trying different things.  Except they didn't tell me much of how to go about doing things either so that didn't help, ie how to develop technique. 

[tsagari]

I agree that there is huge problem with traditional teaching for all kinds of students - different age, different levels. I would personaly like to have someone to quide me when I am practicing a piece or someone to teach me how I can make music without a score, I think we learn music the wrong way. The thing is, can we change the system? 

[Bob]

We can do whatever we want.  I suppose it's just a matter of find the right teacher and student.

[momopi]

I like my lessons. I feel happy whenever I see her. I dunno what you mean by traditional lessons or what but from my experience (I changed teachers often during my beginning stage) = Lessons are practically all the same. 1 hour lesson. Play exercises, play pieces, assess progress, work on something etc... What's important is you're in the same wavelength with the teacher. You must have same goals. You must respect each other. You have to enjoy each other's company. The student (esp adult students) must be able to know the teacher's strength and weaknesses, so s/he knows how to maximize their learning time.

Of course, there's a point in your life where you have to leave each other. My former teacher is very good. At first I didn't like but I realized I have to discipline myself and accept her "plan" if I want to learn more about the piano. But her forte is teaching Beginners to Grade 2 level and sadly, we  find ourselves doing the same things. The learning stops. (Former teacher and I are still on very good terms - no hard feelings. Leaving each other always happens)

My new teacher is actually former teacher's former teacher. She's good at teaching intermediate to advanced students and I learn a lot from her. She's great. What I like about her is that she's very open-minded (even if she's already 85 and I'm in my early 20s) and welcome suggestions from me. She can spot problems and can easily tell if I have a wrong way of playing or simply nervous.

I also look for resources in the uni library and I share them with her. I photocopied some parts of Jane Magrath's book so have some "advice" regarding intermediate pieces she's not familiar with. Since she doesn't have access to uni library anymore, she's happy whenever I bring such resources because it refreshes her knowledge.

My belief is that student should also actively participate on how the lesson would be done. I don't expect my teacher to know all that; she's just human. But what's good about her is that she can teach pieces she's never played before. Sometimes, she'd have difficulty understanding an unfamiliar piece on the spot, so what we do - we learn and discover this new piece together. And this is a good experience for both of us.

Of course there are bad teachers out there and so many students complain about them. But this "bad" teacher may be good for some. Maybe you just need someone else. Why don't you find another teacher?

It's always easy to complain. As students, it's our responsibility to help our teacher teach us and because they cannot read our minds at the time. I study Modern Languages at the uni. Do teachers teach everything? No. They can guide us as much. Students should help themselves learn.

As for for flawed traditional systems - well, all systems are flawed anyway. You have to think of way to make it work for you.

As for your question "Does anyone else feel limited by traditional lessons?"
No, I don't. Actually I dunno what you mean by traditional. Because my teachers - in piano or in something else - at home or abroad - are all old-school. They just mix teaching methods depending on the class.

As for classes where I don't learn anything, I just ditch the class (even uni classes). Who cares what others think? Who cares if I got delayed studying? I prefer not to waste my time on teachers and classes that will not teach me anything. So I don't have many bad memories with teachers.

PS: i'm not saying my teacher is perfect. neither are my lessons. but we can always work to make it better.