Teaching Strategies

Purpose

Teaching Strategies is designed to support and guide teacher participants in how to become more effective in their teaching. Strategies will reinforce the positive aspects and offer constructive feedback on each participant’s lessons. Current SAA teacher development opportunities for feedback also include Consultations, Certificates of Achievement, SPA, and Practicum.

Starting in January 2025, Teaching Strategies will be a prerequisite for Unit 3. Teachers who have already taken Unit 3 will not be required to take Strategies, although we highly recommend it to all teachers.

Teaching Strategies is designed for teachers who have already registered Unit 2 or above and available to anyone who wishes feedback on their teaching and has registered at least Unit 1. It is meant to be instrument-specific, although occasional exceptions may be made. Time management is especially important in this course to ensure each participant receives equal time. A maximum of 10 participants can join the course.

SCHEDULES AND FORMATS

Stand-alone Course Format

  • Course Time: 10 hours
  • In-Person Courses should be a minimum of 2 days; 5 hours/day, but it may be spread over several days or weeks. 
  • Online Courses, should be a minimum of 3 days (not more than 4 hours/day*). It may be spread over weeks or months, allowing time for participants to work on the suggestions and make a later video showing the recommended changes. 
    • Ideally, there would not be more than 4 hours/day online, but there may be exceptions, such as a mostly in-person course meeting for 5 hours/day with 2-3 people joining online.

Integrated with Unit 2 Format

  • Course Time: 10 hours, making Unit 2 a 25-hour course (plus 8 hours of observations)
  • The entire course may be spread out over weeks or months, allowing time for participants to work on the suggestions and make a later video showing the recommended changes. 
  • The ten hours of Strategies may be spread throughout the course, enabling a connection with observations and giving participants a chance to work on recommendations throughout the course. It may also be done as a block at the end after bonds have been well-established with participants. 
Long-term training (University-based) and Suzuki Early Childhood Education (SECE)

Most long-term University programs include a great deal of mentorship and guided teaching.  These programs have the flexibility to put those components into their program wherever they feel they are best suited.  However, for their participants to receive SAA registration for Strategies, the Teacher Trainers need to attest that at least 10 hours of guided teaching have been completed.

SECE includes guided teaching in their unit courses, so again, they have the flexibility to incorporate it wherever it fits best into their program.  To receive Strategies registration, there will have to be some sort of documentation that at least 10 hours of Strategies-similar guided teaching has taken place. 

Video Recordings: 
  • Each participant brings 2 recordings of 6-10 minutes each. At least one of the recordings should be of an individual lesson. In some situations, longer lesson clips may be shown. 
  • If a participant is not currently teaching individual lessons, they need to contact the trainer to set up an alternative, such as teaching a student from the trainer’s studio, from another teacher’s studio, or teaching an Institute student.
  • Recommended criteria
    • Student working on Suzuki repertoire, with the teacher actively teaching (i.e. more teaching than student just playing) 
    • Student playing from memory 
    • Student and teacher are in camera view, if possible, and parent is present 
    • If Teaching Strategies is incorporated in a Unit 2 course, the repertoire in the recording should be from book 1. In stand-alone courses, repertoire may be from any unit the teacher has registered.
  • Participants may bring any recording they choose. Some possible options are those that:
    • Show challenging situations 
    • Include a topic they are having trouble getting across 
    • Best represent them as a teacher 
    • Show a group class 
    • Show an entire lesson (if time permits) 
Technical Specifications: 
  • Recordings should be edited to 6-10 minutes. 
  • If participants are unable to edit their videos, they should have the exact start and end times noted. In some situations, with advance permission from the Teacher Trainer, longer lesson clips may be shared.
  • For online and in-person classes, it is recommended that participants upload videos to Google Drive, Dropbox, Vimeo, or YouTube,  and after double-checking the links, send them to the Teacher Trainer. This allows the trainer to compile all the participants’ links.
  • For online classes,  links can be shared via Zoom chat or using the screen share function
  • For in-person classes, it is also possible to bring recordings on USB flash drives, if needed.
  • For in-person classes, It is the course host’s responsibility to verify the technology available at the venue and communicate this clearly in advance to all course participants.
Class Content: 

Each class session is similar to a “pedagogy masterclass” where the participants watch their recordings together, receive positive comments from the trainer on what they did well, then be given a suggestion or two on something they could improve. It is recommended that the trainer identify one point that would make the biggest difference in the Participant’s teaching. 

For beginning teachers, these may be basic items central to Suzuki teaching: 

  • Including the parent 
  • Addressing basic posture issues 
  • Giving specific praise 
  • Using positive language when making corrections or observations 
  • Talking less, demonstrating more 
  • When to use and not use the score (how students learn a new piece) 
  • Breaking a concept down 
  • Using repetition in a lesson 
  • Using review in a lesson 
  • Moving on only when a step is mastered 
  • Working on Tone 
  • Giving succinct assignments to student and parent 

For more experienced teachers, it may be possible to work on more than one thing and hone in on the finer points of teaching.