The reluctant learner: maybe it’s you- you’re in a slump but you have work to get done (& why does the work never get in a slump??? What is that about?? Not fair.). Maybe it’s your child… there is almost certainly a subject area where he or she isn’t easily motivated. Maybe it’s your student: this kid doesn’t even want to be here at the lessons, let alone doing the work. One way or another, we have a reluctant learner on our hands.

(I’m going to write this from the teacher’s perspective. This is how I most naturally think… I’m just a teacher at heart. But also when I’m working on my own, I often get best results from channeling my inner teacher. When I happen upon a problem or confusion, I make that part of myself into the student and problem-solve with the rest of myself as the teacher. That sounds a little crazy when I write it out like that but I swear it works.)

The student is a puzzle. Let’s (quite randomly) say she’s a 13 year old girl. It is our job to figure out how she works. She is reluctant in lessons, which means she is almost certainly not playing at home. (Notice I said playing not practicing: no way is this kid practicing.) So now we need to figure out how she ticks. Some kids are super quiet, and it may take time. Between asking her (and her parents) questions and just generally taking in any cues they give us, we need to figure out what she is in to. The easiest bridge might be music… if she’s obsessed with Adele, we’re going to arrange a song of hers for viola duet so she can play it with her best friend. If she’s in school orchestra, she’s probably eager to learn how to do vibrato (and she’s going to do it super-incorrectly if we don’t teach it to her), and it’s time to start introducing pre-vibrato exercises. If she’s not in orchestra, maybe we can make a contest for her to compete with other students in her age group in the studio. (I have Suzuki book contests each year, and whoever gets the farthest by the end of the school year gets a ribbon or a trophy, or if they are older, maybe a $10 gift card to Starbucks or Forever 21. I keep the tally of who is where in the book, and put it up on the wall to motivate. This obviously isn’t for every kind of learner, but when it works it really works.)

One student of mine, a very reluctant learner and particularly quiet girl, kept bringing manga to her lessons and setting it on the piano. I started asking about the books, and suddenly she was a super-talkative girl, obsessed with video games and anime and Japanese culture. I unlocked the weirdest little motivational trick for her: instead of the normal stickers, she gets her own special Japanese stickers when she learns a new song. For every great week of practice, she gets a small prize. Japanese candies & little figurines have her practicing like a fierce viola monster. I got a set of sushi erasers for her, and each great week meant one more eraser for the tiny adorable collection. And a bonus: every 2 pages of music she learns, I transcribe a tune from one of her video games for her. Suddenly she is obsessed with music, too.

Each student is going to be different and it can take some serious detective work for us to figure it out. There are plenty of tricks and tools, and not all of them are going to work for each child. For some of my students, a practice chart is enough. For others, it takes an embarrassing performance at a recital to wake them up. I think that it’s up to us to never give up on the kid; music is for everybody.