"Behind the Scenes" of Being a Music Teacher

Chapter 8 is about the administrative aspects of teaching music. This is an aspect of the teaching profession that is often over looked, especially by new teachers. Because so much emphasis is placed on delivering instruction, it is easy to forget about keeping records, calling parents, and continuing with professional growth and development. For me, keeping my records, lessons, and students organized is one of my greatest strengths. All of my grades and attendance records are put into an excel spread sheet, as well as entered daily into SchoolMax, which is the district wide grade book that all teachers are required to use.  I also keep folders on my laptop for each school I teach at that include parent information, phone numbers, email addresses, and copies of letters I sent home specific to each school. Since I am teaching and grading students at 4 different schools, it is essential that I keep all my records organized or it would be easy for things to get mixed up or lost. Aside from grades and contact information, keeping accurate records of any monetary transactions between students and teachers is critically important. Whenever a student brings money to school for a field trip, equipment, attire, or anything else it is crucial that this be documented incase of any discrepancies that may arise later. Keeping this information in a spreadsheet or a Google Doc will allow all dates, times, and amounts to be documented and visible to staff and parents. Also, personally, I keep all important dates such as concerts, field trips, etc.. on my Google calendar, which gets sent directly to my phone. This way I can get reminders on the computer as well as on my phone whenever there is an important event.

Communication and public relations/advocacy, in my opinion, go hand in hand. Whenever there is a concert or other musical event at school it is important to not only inform parents of the event, but also advertise the event throughout the school and if possible in the community as well. Just like it is important to know your student’s families, it is important to know about the community, and within the community I teach in, I know that spreading the word about upcoming school musical events is something members of the community will enjoy as much as the families of the students I teach. Not only will this increase the number of people who are present at the events, but also increases awareness of the music program at the school, thus promoting greater enrollment in music classes. 

Professional development is an area that I wish my school district focused more on. We have several built in professional development days throughout the year, however, these are usually school based which means “specialists” (music, media, P.E. etc…) end up sitting in a meeting all day geared toward reading, math, and science. What usually happens at my school on PD days is the principal asks all specialists to just join another group of our choice to see where we could “assist” with this subject. It is very frustrating because I don’t find that this is a huge waste of my time and certainly does not help me to develop as a professional in my field. When I taught in Philadelphia for my first two years of teaching, the professional development days we had were outstanding! Not only did we get a chance to meet with the other music teachers, but we were given choices between 5 or 6 break out sessions that we could pick and choose from to attend. Many times I attended instrument repair workshops where I was able to fix broken instruments hands on, thus learning the essential skills to do this on my own. I also attended wind ensemble, jazz band, and beginning band workshops where we were actually allowed to play our instruments on music that could be used for our students. This not only helped us to grow in our profession, but also helped us to keep our personal instrumental skills up to speed. I really wish that they followed this model of professional development in my current school district. It is very frustrating not being able learn new skills about the subject I actually teach. I am glad for the opportunity to take this online master’s of music education program since it helps to supplement the lack of professional development I receive from work. Online learning is (relatively) new to the world, but I believe one of the greatest ways to receive an education. I am still able to work full time, teach private lessons, continue on with my personal life, and yet fulfill the requirements to receive my master’s degree at the same time. I know some people I have spoken with say they could not do an entirely online program because their learning style is more hands on with face-to-face interaction. For me, the online format works perfectly because I can complete assignments on my own schedule, as long as I make the final deadline. Now that I have taken this technology course, I realize by keeping up with my PLN and actively seeking out new information, I can continue my professional development on my own without having to rely on the school district to provide this for me.