Each new year, I love to set new piano goals with my students. It’s time to start fresh and examine what is working as well as what we need to change. Now I could set awesome goals for my teaching and my students but have you ever found that your perfect lesson plans never seems to quite work out? I’ve had so much more success when the students themselves set the goals. I often find out surprising goals they’ve never told me – such as they really would like to play a certain Christmas song or that they have dreamed of playing the recital piece performed by so and so at the last recital. Often I need a few months to find the perfect arrangement (or to write one myself that actually fits their level right then) so this is great for me! Students also own their goals and work towards them so much harder!
So today I’m sharing my goal sheet for students this year. Students are not required to fill in everything and some areas are more for us to discuss and make sure we’re making progress (theory, sight reading…). I hope you’ll try this with your students as lessons begin for the fall semester at the end of this month! Can’t wait to hear what my students would like to do this year – I wonder how many of them hope to play music from Frozen?!
Download: MyPianoGoals
Author: Whitney
Whitney Hawker, NCTM, teaches group and private piano at Weber State University, Utah. She loves surprising students with the perfect piece or a new exciting game! After graduate school, she missed sharing ideas and resources daily with colleagues so she and her friend, Spring, began blogging together at 4DPianoTeaching.com