Why networking is so important for music teachers

As music teachers who often operate either in a solo capacity, providing private music tuition, or as part of small groups of music teachers, often connected to music school or hubs. This article explores why it is important to make connections with other music teachers across the UK and beyond to support continued professional development.

Music teachers tend to be very sociable people, warmly welcoming music students to their lessons. Indeed, it is something that we as music teachers all love about our work - building fantastic teacher/student relationships with our pupils, so both of us look forward to lessons and seeing a student's musical development progress year after year. Yet, there is an unusual quirk of being a music teacher - despite connecting with so many music students, often as a teacher we are relatively limited with the network of other music teachers that we network or engage with.

This is partly due to the nature of our work. Firstly, for private music teachers, it is relatively normal to operate in isolation. After all, other music teachers in your city can be your direct competition, so contacting them can seem slightly strange if it is to seek advice, support or to share resources. Secondly, at music schools/hubs teachers while there is more of a chance to interact with other music teachers the opportunities to connect with other teachers of the same instrument sometimes is a challenge - especially if the school/music hub is small as it might be that there are only one or two teachers of that instrument. Getting great advice about a specific instrument's challenges when it comes to teaching it can be difficult to find.

I was talking with a good music teacher friend of mine, James Barnett, who runs Piano Lessons Sheffield about his experience and thoughts about why it is important for music teachers to network. He explained that reaching out to other music teachers was crucial for the continued career development of a music teacher, especially when it comes to the actual operational challenges that we all face as music teachers. For example, what to do to reduce last-minute lesson cancellations or how to approach a student who is late with making payment for lessons to ensure payment is made - these are issues that many private music educators face.

Interesting the internet itself has developed as the perfect medium for music teachers to network, sharing ideas of best practice and lesson resources to one another. It is now easier than ever to be able to network with other music teachers, with many platforms out their to enable you to connect and seek advice. The national Music Teachers Forum is a great example of this - something that James has used to find advice on a whole range of different subjects about being a music teacher, from dealing with student's questions about "What is your real job" to "How to keep neighbours happy" with the sound from music lessons.

With so many online resources and communities, continuing to network as a music teacher should be part of a music teachers activities when it comes career development. It is crucial to ensuring that a teacher feels part of a wider community of music teachers, giving them the confidence and support that we all need as teachers - as well as the platform to provide advice to other teachers who might benefit from our experience and knowledge.