arrange • compose • conduct
Posts discussing education, both in and outside of music
This school year is easier and harder than last year. Everyone I talk to seems to agree. It’s easier because we’re closer to normal interaction; there are concerts, regular rehearsals, and more of the normal events we associate with the school year. It’s easier because we can connect as humans […]
I used to get frustrated as the conductor of a tenor-bass a cappella ensemble, because of the easy fandom they received. They could give a good performance and get screams from their peers, even when an outstanding performance by another choir on the same concert didn’t receive the same level […]
My downtime app of choice, lately, is a corner of the Lichess app devoted to chess puzzles. They take a minute or so to solve a puzzle, and it gives a good mini-brain break from concentration-intense projects. It also helps me keep up with my kids, who keep proving themselves […]
“The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.” – Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, describing Flow in Wired Magazine I think most children naturally experience flow state when […]
Be flexible with your expectations, so that students can try as many activities as interest them. Offer retakes on all tests and quizzes. “If they haven’t learned, you haven’t taught,” so let them keep proving that they’ve learned, as many times as they care to. Help them get back up […]
I am a firm believer in offering grace for our students. Grace for their struggle, grace for their growth. Here’s why. I want my students to bite off more than they can chew. I know they won’t know their limits until they blow past them, and when they figure out […]
Change isn’t always bad, and we’re often bad at separating the positivity of the change from our resistance to it. The road to my kids’ middle school is full of truly unbearable pot holes and shoddy repairs. I should say was. The road has recently been repaved. My first time […]
The idea of a perfectly efficient education system is an oxymoron. The best teachers know that there has to be a give-and-take in the pacing, including sufficient slack and downtime, because humans don’t process learning at the same pace. The push to make learning more efficient comes with several big […]
I’ve seen repeatedly the following education aphorism: “Getting mad at people for making mistakes doesn’t teach them not to make mistakes. It teaches them to hide their mistakes.” If tests can’t be retaken, then students are not rewarded for learning except on a prescribed timeline. Don’t you want them to […]
Recently asked online: “Are part recordings cheating?” That is, does providing part recordings diminish an ensemble experience because we don’t force our students to develop the reading and keyboard skills to learn the music on their own? The answer is: of course not. In fact, I think our music education […]