My apologies...

To the teachers that I have had whom I've really enjoyed without showing it. It's really easy, when sitting and listening to an interesting lecture or point of debate, to nevertheless maintain a blank face - that's simply its resting state. It's really easy, when listening to an interesting lecture or point of debate, to nevertheless put my head down in a piece of paper and doodle to my heart's content (I just like to be using my hands!). But you should know that I was engaged and interested, even when I was doing those things.

I started teaching the brass section of the orchestra in Plan 3000 at the end of last week. Thursday was my first time doing it - sectional rehearsal was from 5:00 pm to 7:30. I wasn't really sure where to start, so after hearing them play through a piece once, I just went back to where I started - intonation and technique. This involved a lot of down time for the kids - sometimes we would do exercises without even playing the instruments, or exercises focusing on the trombones and not the french horns, or the other way around. When I was talking to them, or when they were sitting with their hands idle, all I could see was blank faces looking back at me. I could see they were all paying attention - they were very respectful. Yet I didn't think they were enjoying it, or even finding what I was saying engaging (or grammatically correct, for that matter). I know that teaching technique and intonation isn't the most fun thing in the world, but it's really important as a basis for playing something, especially something as difficult as the 1812 Overture (one of their current pieces). All I could think about as I was introducing these concepts was, "I am so boring. I gotta find a way to make this more interesting."

They surprised me though - at the end of the sectional, when they were all packing up, they all gave me big grins. As I said thank you to them, they all responded very gratefully. As we all walked out together, they kept coming up to me and asking me about myself, expressing their discontent that I was only staying for 2.5 weeks. You confuse me. Are you just being polite, or did I actually do better than the level of "hmm... I would compare you to Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, but I think that would be offensive to him"?

Then I remembered being a student in that type of situation. No matter how engaged I felt inside, I would often look up at my teacher with the same blank stare - even if I was happy to be where I was, it still took a lot of energy to smile, and I was lazy (still am). So for that, I apologize.

To sum up, teaching's been pretty good so far I love the kids and am learning a lot from them and the various interviews I've started doing!