5 Best Tips to Improve Your Child's Online Lesson Experience
Published: Jul 12, 2020 | Category: Uncategorized
At a time when every parent is concerned for the health of their children and families, online music lessons are a great option. Most of us don't know whether or not school will be online, in person or a combination of both but, until there is a vaccine or better treatment for Coronavirus, there are constant risks in our lives. Music Lessons can be conducted online fairly easily and pose one less health worry for parents.
That said, there are some tips that can make it a much better experience for both student and instructor. Here are my top 5 tips to enhance online lessons:
1. Both student and teacher need to set up filming and audio equipment IN ADVANCE of the lesson. Too many times, my students are wasting precious lesson time still trying to get set up after the lesson time has begun. After the 1st few lessons, you will know how to set up and it will go more quickly but you still need to allow 5 - 10 minutes to set up (depending on how much equipment is involved).
2. Make sure all devices you use for filming are charged enough for lessons. I set a timer to go off 1 hour prior to teaching online si I can check and make sure the equipment I use is fully charged. This allows enough time to still charge them if I need to. Having an external or back-up charger is also a great idea for those times when equipment is not charged enough. (of course, you have to make sure the back up is charged too :))
3. If you were only going to invest in 1 thing, I would highly recommend a tripod for whatever device you will use for filming. This is especially true for keyboard students. Without a tripod, you can't lean the camera over enough to get a good shot of the keyboard. If the teacher can't see the keyboard well, then it is extremely difficult to check hand position and fingerings which are a very important part of keyboard technique.
4. If you are able, consider investing in some basic equipment like a decent speaker for sound, a webcam, a mic and a tripod as mentioned above. As a teacher, I have invested in quite a bit of equipment to improve my student's online lesson experience but ideally, both ends of the lesson should have decent equipment in order to have the best possible equipment. I can have the best mic to record sound but if the student does not have good speakers it doesn't matter that much.
Here's a link for equipment I recommend to my students: (Please note that these are affiliate links. I receive a small commission on the sale of these products at no additional costs to you.)
