Now more than ever, future music teachers want to know what to expect when teaching online music lessons. It has never been a favorite way to teach music lessons for most. Many music teachers feel that the full experience of taking and teaching music lessons is lost with the online music lesson.
Here are our top 3 things to expect when you are teaching online music lessons. Keep these in mind for yourself, not only as a music teacher, but also for your students to know as well.
Knowing what to expect ahead of time will help bridge the gaps between the glitches that are bound to happen when everything is happening through a flat screen, microphone and speakers.
Your Internet Connection Won’t Always be Good
As a music teacher, you should make sure that you have a good internet connection and that when there is a bad connection, it’s not coming from your end of things.
This means finding your teaching space and knowing the internet connection in that space. Maybe you’ve designated a corner in your living space for teaching or maybe you have a studio outside of your home.
Teaching consistently from the same space helps eliminate extra internet connection issues. We definitely don’t recommend teaching your online music lessons here, there, and everywhere. Instead, it’s best to stick to the same place and get to know the isms of that spot so that if and when things do go wrong with the internet on your end, you know that space and may have a better idea of what’s going on.
So, if you want to look professional and you want to give as much of a consistent experience as you can to your students, just keep your space and internet connection in that space in mind.
The Sound Quality When Teaching Online Music Lessons Won’t be the Same as Live
Many teachers don’t think to take into consideration the fact that most standard microphones that come with a phone, laptop, etc, are not created to capture the full spectrum of frequencies that the original sound creates.
Those kinds of microphones that do capture more frequencies are more expensive to produce and are more fragile. The electronic devices and their basic microphones are made for basic communication and not the finesse of creating music.
It’s important to keep this in mind and to warn your students about it as well so that they know not to completely judge themselves by the electronic version of their sounds. Especially voice students.
You and/or your student can upgrade your microphones to something that captures a better sound quality if you so desire but we don’t necessarily “highly suggest it”.
You Will Have More Challenges Keeping Your Younger Students Focused
Kids interact better with learning music lessons when they are face to face with another person.
We have found that with our younger music students, we have to ask an adult to be in the room to help the child stay focused on the music lesson.
But it’s not that big of a deal and parents have always been understanding and do want the best experience for their child.