Survey Says…
Several weeks ago I started posting a weekly survey question on a white board outside my studio. At the end of each week I draw a paper from the jar with all the entries and the winner receives a prize. So far I’ve been letting the winner choose a piece of sheet music from my overflowing collection that’s accumulated as a result of receiving New Release packages from various publishers. The students have really enjoyed it and their answers to the questions have been rather enlightening! I’ll try to keep up with posting our studio questions and answers here each week. Here’s the question from the first week, “What is your favorite thing about piano lessons?”
Here’s my student Addi filling out her answer…
Here she is dropping it into the entry jar…
Here’s a list of the answers I received. (BTW, I’m tracking all these in a spreadsheet for easy reference in the future.)
* Playing at recitals. I also like how Natalie treats and helps me through difficulties and other things just the same as others even though I have a handicap.
* A nice teacher to teach me.
* Playing the games.
* Time with Natalie and making up songs.
* New songs.
* You don’t let me get lazy! I love the accountability.
* Piano games.
* Miss Natalie.
* Adding up points at the end.
* Points.
* I like everything.
* Playing songs.
* Pentascales.
* The interesting songs I get to learn.
* Reading music.
* I like learning new techniques to make the motion of a piece better (like wrist motion, etc.).
* The end. 
Practicing the songs.
* The help I get.
* Getting points.
* Learning to play fun and difficult pieces.
* Playing.
March 9th, 2008 at 7:12 am
Great idea, Natalie! Could you explain your points sytem?
March 10th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
This is wonderful. I should start too, but most of my students are so young(6 years olds) and new to piano lessons. Should I wait 6 months before asking these questions?
Thanks,
Lydia
March 10th, 2008 at 7:39 pm
Thanks, Chris! Each year I develop a different theme. This year’s is Go For the Gold. Each student is placed on a team with 5 other students and they are working to accumulate the most points for their team. The criteria for earning points is listed in each student’s assignment book. Every 6 weeks or so we hold an Olympic Event where the students play for each other and do various things to earn additional points. The winning team at the end of the event wins gold.
I’m planning to compile the incentive program and add it to the others I have available under the practice incentives category. I’ll include more specifics when I do that.
Lydia~
I think you could do it with young students as well. You’d just have to tailor the questions to their comprehension and experience level. You could also do non-piano lesson questions just for variety (e.g. What’s your favorite kind of candy? How many people in your family play a musical instrument? What do you want to be when you grow up? etc.)