What should I ask a prospective piano teacher?

[MaggieW]

DS wants to learn the piano. I've been given a couple of numbers to contact but just want to know what sort of things I should be asking? Any advice appreciated.

I was wondering the same thing myself. I would love to learn to play the piano and then one day teach my dd. Sorry that dosn't really help you. I do know they are expencive though. About £20 for half an hour. I think how the teacher relates to your son would be very important. He needs a good relationship with his teacher in order to enjoy it and make progress. Good Luck.

bump

I can't think of what you should ask, except perhaps what their qualifications are. I would ask to sit in on the first couple of lessons if your child is quite young so you can find out a bit about how they respond to children etc.

I want piano lessons too, I played when I was young but gave up when it wasn't cool to play it and hung around street corners instead! Ah, youth!

Ask for a trial lesson and see how teacher/pupil get on together. My dd1 is on her 4th teacher - a mad one, a cross one, a useless one, and now a mad but excellent one. I don't think I'd have been able to pick out the useless one in advance. And the cross one is now her school music teacher, dd likes her.

It might be interesting to know typically how long children stay with the teacher and what levels they achieve - if they're mostly sticking with it for years and getting to advanced levels then it's probably a good teacher but if they all give up after 6 months it would be a bad sign. The trouble is mostly you'd be somewhere between those two extremes but I've no idea what would be normal. A waiting list might be a good sign. You could ask about attitude to exams (not everyone likes to do these, but some teachers very much base their teaching around them sometimes teaching little else than exam pieces). You could ask if they provide or encourage other performance opportunities like entering music festivals. Some teachers organise informal recitals for all their students every now and then which seems like a nice idea. You might ask if they just teach classical or if jazz piano is an option.

Do they teach through the holidays or term-time only? Do you still have to pay if you miss a lesson for holiday/sickness/whatever. Is it ever possible to 'catch up' such lessons at another time if so?

If you can find a teacher that's recommended by others that's probably the most reliable indicator - even then though different children suit different teaching styles.