Benefits of Group Piano StudyI mentioned in my post last week that I recently added Christopher Fisher’s book Teaching Piano in Groups to my reference library.  I’ve already scanned through this book and highlighted many helpful ideas and concepts.  One of the first topics he discusses is the efficacy of group piano teaching and why this is a valuable model for piano study.  I really appreciated how he outlined all of the ways that students benefit from learning in the group.

The traditional model of piano study for many years has been private lessons, one on one with a teacher.  Although there are advantages of the private lesson environment, there are also many benefits of the group class of which parents may not be aware.  I’ve had several parents of students in group classes approach me as we begin the new semester and ask about moving their child to private lessons.  Aside from the value of keeping the classes full, I feel there are also benefits to the student that they will miss out on by moving to private lessons.  In order to address this issue with parents I created a hand-out to send home with all my group piano students.  I took all of the information from Dr. Fisher’s book, but tried to put it in a concise format that parents would at least glance over.  You can download the PDF file below and use this in your studio as you wish:

Benefits of Group Piano Study

Author: Spring

Spring Seals, NCTM, teaches 60 piano students ranging from age 3 to 70 in Fort Worth, Texas. She also serves as the Director of Certification for TMTA. She is passionate about helping teachers become more effective in their studios through professional development, new resources, and fresh ideas.