This is challah-henge: 

I love how the early morning sun cast long shadows from such short pieces of dough.

During my free time, I bake often for my family and friends. I made this dough the night before and rested it overnight in the fridge. Now, after dividing it into three sections, the challah is resting again before the shaping step. 

Learning any skill involves cycles of work and rest, just like the challah loaf.

My students and I work hard during the school year. To develop musicianship skills, personal skills such as perseverance or collaboration, and technical skills on the flute and piano, I see my students attending lessons and classes consistently, practicing at home, preparing for recitals and community concerts, completing practice challenges, and creating their own music. I am also developing my skills: my teaching skills and intuition, musicianship skills to keep growing musically, flute and improvisation skills for upcoming concerts. Just like all the ingredients in a loaf of challah work together to create something beautiful, all the different elements of our studies and activities come together to help us grow in multi-faceted ways during the periods of work. 

This month, I am in a time of rest and so are my students! It’s been a busy summer for me, filled with interesting work opportunities at summer camps and festivals, an international conference, and visits with friends in 3 different countries. In this last month before the school year begins again, I am enjoying days which feel full but not busy, and a schedule which I am free to improvise each day. It is like a sigh of relief to gather in my energy and spend time recharging. I am truly looking forward to seeing my students again in September. This to me is the sign of good rest – that we feel renewed and eager to continue our work. 

This challah has rested and baked, and is ready to be enjoyed:

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This month my flute and piano students worked together on duets and trios , and my group class students in the Rhythmic-Solfège program prepared for their end-of-year exit evaluations. I introduced the idea of giving each other feedback – students giving and receiving comments as colleagues, peer-to-peer. I know I have amazing students, but they still managed to surprise me with how supportive, thoughtful, analytical, and open they were! The younger ones, even as young as 6 years old, were much more articulate than I was expecting them to be. The teens and pre-teens went out of their way to be both honest and very empathetic when speaking to their peers about something tricky or difficult in the music that still needed a lot of practice.

After I gave examples of feedback they might give to each other, students understood the idea and offered their own insightful comments to their friends. I reminded them that it is important to point out specific things that are good, as well as specific things their colleagues can work on. A “good job” without specificity is not as meaningful as “good job on your rhythm at the beginning of the piece.” The students were honest with each other without being mean or destructive. As a teacher, I got to assess my students’ ability to analyze each other’s performance, and by extension, their ability to analyze their own playing when they practice at home. In a group setting, working with each other regularly, we all come to know each other’s strengths and weaknesses. It’s not a secret that a particular student always has trouble singing while stepping rhythms (in our movement class), or another student has a beautiful tone in the high register of the flute. What was truly lovely to see was the united sense of celebration when all the students noticed improvement in our one friend who finally was able to step and sing at the same time, or that the high register of one student inspired and reminded her duet partner to play with his best sound.

I had a lovely meeting today with fellow music teachers who are teaching the same group music class curriculum as I am, the Rhythmic-Solfège program. I am in the Boston area, two teachers are in Colorado, and the fourth is in Utah. The most effective professional development I have ever attended is a meeting with other teachers, in the thick of the semester, while we are all teaching. As teachers we spend so much time thinking about our students, wondering how to engage them, how to challenge them and give them space to grow, how to respond to the unique things they are doing and help them develop new skills. And yet sometimes we get stuck. To get another teacher’s perspective and 2 new ideas that I haven’t thought of yet – that is gold!! I love learning from my colleagues.