I have the article here in Florida with me and will relate just the part of
it here about tailoring lessons to individuals.
From: The Psychology of Becoming a Harp Player
In TA, there is a whole study in what is called bodyscript. There are bodily
clues that signal when a person has moved into another script. As a teacher,
I have seen this happen very often. When a person is at home and is relaxed
in their own room, they are playing for themself, however, when in front of a
teacher, some of the old messages from childhood can creep in causing the
student to become tense. Some of the common bodily signals for different
scripts that we experience are as follows. Ther person who has a strong
"Please me" message in their upbringing may experience stomach aches and
tightening in that are. They say to themselves that they are not good enough
and refuse to believe that they ever will become good enough. They are the
people who are always trying to work hard, they have rigid parent driven
behavior. If they are not pleasing, then they often believe that they
shouldn't exist, that they are not important.
The person who tries hard but feels that they should always try harder and
harder carries with them the counterinjunction of "Don't Succeed". One can
see this portrayed in the body by tension in the shoulders, a tight stomach
and a furrowed brow indicating "I don't know if this is good enough"
attitude. This body can often look like the famous statue of the "Thinker".
If we have been given signals in our life or not getting too close to
comeone, we might have grown up in a hurried atmosphere. You can't hurry and
be close at the same time. The hurry-up person is often agitated and
anxious. This is the person who starts a piece of music but never really
quite finishes it. There are always loose ends. Often this person is late
for a lesson. They jump to playing a phrase before the teacher has a chance
to demonstrate all of the points that should be made, they tend to play too
fast and shift from one position to another. Their eyes will also shift a
lot.
The "Be Perfect" person will tend to be tense all over. They will keep
saying, "it's not perfect yet" and make many excuses. You might evern hear
this person say, "yes, it's perfectly clear to me!" Other indicators of the
"Be Perfect" person are motions of scratching the head, grooming themself,
primping, or using words such as "obviously", "I think", and "clearly".
Then there is the counterinjunction "Be Strong". In other words, don't feel,
don't get too close. This person may appear to be numb and rigid. They
can't let people know who they really are, heaven forbid if people should
know that they have weaknesses. These people usually suffer from circulatory
problems, things concerning the heart and strokes. Their words tend to run
like, "No Comment", of "I don't care". Sometimes they are almost like a
computer communicator.
As teachers, there are some ways that we can help people with these drivers
and injunctions. But most often we need to realize that students are not
aware of these things and it is not wise to blurt out, "hey, you suffer from
a Be Perfect Complex!" without knowing the person a bit that you are dealing
with. What people have lived with their whole life is the core of who they
are. If people pull the core out from one another, then we end up with
people not feeling very good. There are some ways however of addressing
these drivers in injunctions in people. Let's say there is a student who is
"trying hard". A teacher may simply say, "It's O.K. to play it". For the
"Don't Succeed" syndrome, the teacher may say, "It's O.K. to goof up and make
some mistakes, you're wroth does not depend on your trying". If the student
is trying to "Please", a response can be: "It's O.K. to decided what you
want to do. You can decide what you would like to start with. You can also
disagree with me if you would like to pick another chord or harmony or if you
would like to phrase the piece differently. It's nice you can choose for
yourself and decide". What these are called are "allowers". They give
permission to the student so that the student feels safe and protected and
willing to step beyond the roles they have created for themselves. When we
study these aspects of TA, as people we can identify ourselves and what kind
of drivers we are responding to in out lives. It makes us more more aware to
the messages that we are responding to within us that tend to keep us from
getting to where we want to be.
THIS IS ONLY and exerpt of the whole article and might appear out of text
because there was much information that preceeded and then follows this part.
If you do not have access to the article in the journal and would like a
copy, email with your address and I'll send you a copy. I hope that this
helps to answer your question, Pamela, about how teachers can tailor teaching
styles to students. It's about imparting knowledge and at the same time
empowering the student to be successful. Tina
---------------------
Forwarded message:
From: LSP09@ccstaff.wpo.ukans.edu (Pamela Bruner)
Sender: harp-errors@cayenne.lcs.mit.edu
To: harp@MIT.EDU
Date: 97-01-03 19:04:49 EST
Barbara has eloquently brought up an interesting question in her post: how
do we improve as teachers? How can we more effectively impart both the
love of music and our instrument, as well as the necessary technical
skills?
Since lessons seemed to be a topic that many people feel passionately
about, I hope that the teachers on the list (and the students) will
respond. What motivates a student? Barbara (or was it Tina?) talked about
tailoring your teaching to a particular student - of course, we all would
like to do that! How about some examples? Does anyone have any literature
to recommend as well?
The previous posts seem to me to speak ABOUT great teachers, without more
concretely specifying how and what made them great. I'd love to see a
discussion on that!
Pamela Bruner
University of Kansas