On Friday, I gave a presentation for the local MTNA chapter back in my hometown, the Piano Teachers’ Forum of Grand Rapids. This association was the first one I joined as an undergraduate music major and piano teacher. I learned so much from the presentations I attended during those years! It was so fun to [...]
The last Forum Q&A post was about assignment notebooks/pages for students. It was wonderful to read all the great responses! Click here to read the comments, and click here to read my follow-up where I share my method of tracking assignments. Being able to attend state and national-level conferences is one of the many benefits [...]
Whew! After that blast of posts today, I am finished posting my conference notes from the recent MTNA National Conference in NYC! During the conference, I ate lunch a few times with Natalie Wickham and her friends, as well as with Sheryl Welles and her friend Becky, and Jennifer Fink too! I also had the pleasure of [...]
The last session of the conference I attended was a wonderful one! It was called: Get Out of That Musical Box: Teach Students How To Compose! Dianne Higgins gave a delightful presentation about the summer composition camps she holds each year. It has been a great success even since the first year she tried it! [...]
Wednesday morning of the conference, I attended a session called “it’s More Than Just Being Nice” by Kathy Strickland, the Washington State Ethics Chair with help from Amy Grinsteiner. Kathy covered a variety of topics about our responsibility as teachers. Here’s some of her points: Treat students with respect. Don’t accept just the talented students. [...]
On Tuesday during the conference, I went on a tour of the Steinway Factory! Getting off the bus.
Monday afternoon at the conference, I attended a wonderful session on teaching students with disabilities. Click here to view Natalie’s thorough notes! After that, I attended an open forum for discussing ideas and solutions for local associations. To start, a representative from the Fox Valley Association of Wisconsin told us the story of how they [...]
On Monday of the conference, I attended the Faber Exhibitor Showcase and the Keynote Address given by the wonderful Benjamin Zander! Natalie has already posted notes on these sessions that are very similar to mine, so I’ll let you read her summaries here and here. The next session I attended was given by the MTNA [...]
On Sunday morning of the conference, I attended the Alfred Exhibitor Showcase and the Keynote Presentation given by Norman Horowitz and Melvin Stecher. My notes are very similar to Natalie’s from Music Matters Blog, so I will let you read her summaries here and here! (We somehow attended a lot of the same sessions…great minds [...]
3:00pm – Ignorance Is Not Bliss: Legal Issues for the IMT Led by Lee Galloway, Beth Gigante Klingenstein, and Scott McBride Smith. Health insurance - policies are available for self-employed people through MTNA, MENC, and other organizations. Add an extra policy to your homeowner’s or renter’s insurance policy to protect your studio materials and your piano against theft, flood, [...]
1:30pm – Financial Success: Taking Control of the Present and the Future Led by Lee Galloway, Beth Gigante Klingenstein, and Scott McBride Smith. Why are independent music teachers (IMT) so underpaid? Beth had quite a list of contributing reasons! Here’s a few: Most IMTs are women. We do not raise rates often or by enough.
11:30am – Finding & Keeping Students Led by Lee Galloway, Beth Gigante Klingenstein, and Scott McBride Smith. This session involved a lot of discussion as a group. Attendees raised their hands to share ideas for finding and keeping students. Here’s a few ideas that I jotted down: On your registration form, ask how the student heard [...]
Joy Morin is a piano teacher in Ohio. She enjoys keeping her teaching fresh with new ideas & resources.
