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Recently I was pointed toward some resources on teaching that shed light on a topic I intuitively comprehended but had not seen laid out so clearly. It is a topic area not addressed at all in any of the classic horn methods, and is very worthy of a brief bonus article in the horn pedagogy series in the University of Horn Matters.
Four types of students
Essentially there are four types of students when analyzed around the metrics of motivation and skills. They would be:
- Low motivation/low skills
- Low motivation/high skills
- High motivation/low skills
- High motivation/high skills
Translating this out to horn, in a typical large university horn program there are probably examples of students from all four categories, but the top horn programs try to keep it all focused on the high motivation/high skills student (with perhaps a number of low motivation/high skills students in the mix), and lower level programs may actually have more students present with lowish motivation and/or skills.
Every student is an individual
From a teaching standpoint one teacher will find it a challenge to effectively serve students from each of those four groups, but you can get close by focusing on the needs of each individual student. It is an overall topic to be very aware of as most people who end up teaching horn were high motivation/high skills students but many of your first students may be low motivation/low skills. And your teachers that you liked the best had down their ways of working with high motivation/high skills students, so those students from other categories will be an additional puzzle for you to learn to work with effectively.
I have heard this said other ways. For example some teachers are great with working with high school students in private lessons but probably would not be good college professors. On the other hand, most of the people who wrote horn method books worked mostly with highly motivated and skilled students. That great, inspirational conservatory level teacher may not be able to effectively teach an average 7th grader just starting private lessons.
It is the type of topic that someone with a good music education degree will have a much better handle on than the average performance major. This is overall one of those topics that most horn teachers learn “on the job” over many years. Awareness is the first step. There are tons of resources out there and I will with that simply let readers give the topic some thought and search out their own further resources and ideas.
Two types of teachers
The additional topic is this, the two types of teachers. Essentially there are two extremes.
One extreme is the “system” teacher. They have a system they use, materials they use in a certain order to cover certain things. At an extreme this type of teacher will use something like Kopprasch in a way that you won’t get out of Kopprasch until they say you are ready to get out of Kopprasch.
The other extreme is what I would call a “free form” teacher. At a extreme, they don’t give any assignments, you are to work on what you feel you need to work on.
Aim for the middle ground
Myself, I try to be in the middle somewhere. I have definite materials I like but also I am flexible in their use.
Different students will work better with different teachers, so it is all a big topic to think out carefully. Either way can work. Part of your job, as a teacher, is to be consistent and do your best to connect with students. I have said elsewhere, an essential skill of the teacher is good problem solving skills, and those skills can be applied with any method of private teaching.
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