Today marked the second day back at school for Term Four which saw a slight increase in the workload from a face-to-face point of view due to recommencing of my bassoon students and being the first Concert Band rehearsal. While this does add an additional “busy” factor to my days, I am forever grateful for the opportunities that teaching music has provided to me – without it I wouldn’t be who or where I am.
Connection with students.
The first lessons back after a holiday for some music teachers can be a frustrating one due to having the knowledge that many students won’t have spent the consistent time practising over the holidays – even the most diligent can sometimes slip up. If we stop as adults and think about this, we’d realise that there are many adults who would fall into this same category of when routines change (such as holidays) habits can also be impacted. I find that this doesn’t bother me, rather I am grateful for the opportunity to be able to reconnect with my students, find out what they have done over the holidays, and encourage them to pick things back up and start working in partnership towards whatever goals they have.
Mentoring.
My philosophy of teaching is that I am not necessarily just teaching content, but rather life skills and providing an example of how to be a good person. Due to its nature of being either one-on-one or small group settings the instrumental teaching that I do provides me with a unique opportunity to be doing this. I am grateful for the opportunity to be able (hopefully) make a positive impact on the lives of the students that I teach by being a mentor to them. Hopefully I can inspire them musically, but even above that inspire them to develop excellence of character that will positively impact the word in which we all live.
Opportunity.
I am grateful for my school providing me the opportunity to continue to teach instrumentally. Due to the other duties that I fulfil throughout my day close look has needed to be paid to the number of contact hours that I can have. I am grateful to the leadership who have worked in supporting me and acknowledge the additional things I have done including learning new instruments to a professional standard to provide opportunities for students at school.
