What I Wish
I'd Known

Most lists like this are written as if the author has it all figured out.

I want to be honest with you: I've made every one of these mistakes — some of them many times — and I still catch myself slipping into them after thirty years in front of elementary music classes.

These aren't really mistakes in the way that word usually lands. They're the things nobody tells you in your training, the lessons that take a decade of trial and error to learn, the small adjustments that turn a frustrating class into a class the kids beg to come back to.

I'm sharing them because I wish someone had handed me this list on my first day.

• If you don't love it, the kids won't either
• Their reaction isn't always about the song
• The lesson starts before they sit down
• Familiar material is a feature, not filler
• The right level of challenge takes time to find
• Transitions are where you lose them
• The hardest thing to see is yourself teaching
• You can't do this job alone

Each lesson comes with the practical detail and classroom context I wish I'd had access to in year one.