Linking the words art and learning reminds us of their fundamental connectedness. The great twentieth-century physicist David Bohm gave an instruction that I try to live by: when one is faced with seeming opposites, look for the larger truth that contains them both.
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The philosopher John Dewey once remarked that he was unable to define the word aesthetic, but that he did know its opposite was anesthetic. That is the aesthetic development teaching artists most value - waking people up from the somnolence propagated by our aggressively anesthetizing commercial culture, to see the beauty, meaning, humanity, courage, and joy around us.
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The most common gig I am asked to do with businesses is to teach "creativity but no art." ... How glorious will it be when we need not apologize for the word, and Americans think of art as powerful, relevant and fun.
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(some of the) Guidelines for Teaching Artistry:
Using Engagement before Information
Turning the Responsibility for the Learning Over to the Learner
Witnessing
Staying Fresh
The Law of 80% -- 80% of what you teach is who you are
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Your authenticity as a artist is one of your greatest strengths. Don't feel you must hide your artistic enthusiasm, your personality, your abilities, or your personal passions behind a "teacher" mask... As an artist, it is a spiritual responsibility to bring the best of ourselves to each opportunity, and not just pretend. Because they can tell.
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Play is more than just a peppy warm up... play is an attitude you bring, an atmosphere you create, a freedom you lead participants into..
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Deep inside, artists know that the heart of their work does not originate with the self. Rather it is an offering, a blessing. Lewis Hyde reminds us that a gift perishes unless it is moved along. We continue to receive that gift of art only when we pass it on as often, and in as many ways as we can.
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He compared the fate of a young tree in the middle of a meadow with that of an identical sapling sprouting in a clearing in the woods. He said that a sapling in the woods would grow faster and stronger. This surprised me- wouldn't the open space without arboreal competition nurture a healthier tree? He informed me that young trees in a forest clearing have one advantage that makes all the difference. The tender roots of that tree will "find" the old roots of trees now gone, and then grow along those old roots to quickly reach deeper, richer soil. What an astonishingly apt metaphor for the power of mentoring!
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Good mentoring is more about asking great questions than telling great stories. The mentor's crucial skill is listening.
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Mentors model not just how to solve problems, but also how to think about problems, and how to turn them into learning.
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Does mentoring sound like a lot of work? The only work is paying attention. The rest feels like play. Being selected, formally or informally, as a mentor is a gift - to the learner and the mentor.
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Misconception 1: Teach means tell.
Many people think that because they said something, they have performed an act of education.
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The school day offers few opportunities for students to consider how they feel about - and value - the information being presented to them... Consistently providing learners with opportunities to reflect builds habits of mind that students rely on throughout their lives. We cannot stint them, relegating reflection to a group discussion left for the last five minutes of class (which we often run out of time to include).
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You can spot musicians whose learning did not contain or develop a healthy self-assessment culture. They need feedback from others to get a sense of how they did. They often overact to input because they don't know how to fit other's opinions and observations into the more important context of their own understanding. They tend to stop learning on their own, unprompted by external demand or critique. They are a lot less happy inside a life of musical learning.
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What do you notice? Describe without judgement. ("I notice...")
What questions does this work, activity, or subject of inquiry raise for you? ("I wonder...")
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The private lesson is an improvised teaching and learning duet, a work of art as much as of science, and it succeeds as much from the interpersonal as from the technical, just as an ensemble performance does.
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Two ultimate goals for private lessons that always apply: nurturing motivation and developing musicality.
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Many (students) report that their teacher is encouraging and happy only when they have practiced a lot, but they don't feel that the teacher cares about or fosters their love of music.
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Learners like to master a technical challenge - but what they love is music.
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To assess your teaching, ask yourself at the end of every lesson whether or not the student leaves more invested in music, hungrier to discover its mysteries and find its locations in himself.
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I find the best teachers routinely improve technique without the learner overtly knowing it.
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The good teacher "searches deeply to find the best way to stimulate each individual student's musical motivation." (Rachel Shapiro, a violist and faculty of the New York Philharmonic). We can compel many kinds of behavior and action, but not the action of the heart and the spirit that lead to curiosity, hunger, and dedication. There are many things teachers do to create those inner commitments.
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Pleasure - It feels good to learn. If learning doesn't feel good, it slows or stops.
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Don't just teach a great lesson; send the playfulness, the attention to process, the musical expressiveness home with the student.
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Don't make assumption about practice. Experiment with it. It's interesting to note that almost all of us assume homework helps learning, although there is no evidence to support that assumption. Researchers report that students would be better off, would do better in school, if they spent the time required by homework in socializing play... Let's not let practice become like homework- tedious and probably not helpful if undertaken in a mindless way.
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The Witness -- the capacity to recognize what is going on inside the learner (both on the surface and underneath), and mirror it back to her clearly, is the single most important thing we do.
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Listen hard for the future you want to create; some part of it sounds in every student.
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We must nurture the skills of inquiry and affirm the importance of curiosity.
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... with just a few words that say, "You are on the right track. Keep going." And let your subtext say, "Keep going for the rest of your life. As I have done."
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May we find joy in this lifetime of chances to let what we love as lifelong learners be what we do.
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