Attitude and Confidence

Author: Amanda Goodwin

When I first started serving at Paisley Middle School, I noticed one kid I was teaching to play the violin (in a small group of 4 to 5 kids) would always leave the room lamenting how poorly he did. I always tried to tell him that it was okay because we're all here to learn. Violin may have felt especially hard for him, because he seemed to struggle with fine motor skills. I would try to adjust his bow hold, and in his attempt to do what I was asking, his fingers would move wildly around. If I had managed to get one or two fingers properly placed, those fingers would lose control once I tried to fix the rest of his fingers.

The last time I served at Paisley, however, I noticed a difference in his attitude. As I was addressing the group of kids as a whole, he was experimenting with all sorts of techniques on the violin. One thing that really surprised me was that he was trying to use different fingers to play first position notes. He would put his first finger where his third finger would go in first position, and interestingly enough, he was unintentionally exploring playing in third position. This is impressive because he is in the beginner class. A beginner class would only talk about notes in first position. Most beginners would have their mind blown if you told them they could eventually learn how to play higher up in the fingerboard, yet he was attempting it all on his own.

Aside from experimenting on the violin, I found out he was also exploring classical music outside of class on his own time. In his method book, there is a melody that was taken from the second movement of Dvorak's New World Symphony. He had mentioned that he actually listened to the piece on YouTube.

As he left the classroom that day, I noticed he did not leave in frustration, but rather with more confidence. He has been producing really healthy sounds on his violin and should be proud that his experimentation and work ethic are paying off.