How Important Is the First Lesson When Learning

A student must want to learn. The first lesson is the all-important one to draw out a pupil's desire to succeed. How terrifying it must be for a young student to be taken to a strange house and to be left alone with a complete stranger! For this reason, an introductory meeting with prospective pupils and their parents is essential before the start of the first lesson.

This meeting has numerous benefits. Firstly, it gives the teacher an insight into the family unit. This may prove to be invaluable later on when working on a one-to-one basis with a child. Bear in mind that the parents may be as nervous at leaving their child with a teacher, as the child is of being left. A teacher, therefore, needs to be seen to be in control, but relaxed with a student, and this initial introduction gives a parent confidence to leave their child with a new teacher once the ice has been broken.

Another aspect of this introduction is to assess the personality of the pupil. Whether the pupil is outgoing or shy will determine how a teacher continues. With an outgoing child, a teacher can question the child directly with regard to his musical knowledge and preferences to date. An outgoing child will happily talk about himself. It is not so easy to draw this information from a child who is shy. Rather than questioning a shy child directly, it may be more successful to draw him out subtly, such as asking him what he enjoys doing at school and what sort of music he likes.

Students should not be given too much to do for the first lesson, but it is important to get through a variety of topics in order to hold the child's interest. If time allows it, get the child to play some singing and clapping games. This always goes down well. If the lesson is made to be enjoyable, there is more chance that pupils will want to continue to attend lessons, to learn, and hopefully to become our musicians of the future.