Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum difficult siblings (non-students) and parents

So my business partner has a voice student who is very sweet and talented. Her mother, however, insists in bringing in the girls two younger siblings, a boy and a girl around both age 7. The mother is there but she does not discipline the kids at all. They sit in the waiting area and make a mess of things, I'm pretty sure they've drawn on the table cloth on the side table, and they are NOISY.

My partner told them last week that they need to be quiet, otherwise I will get upset with them (I don't know why I'm the one who has to be threatening). Anyways, yesterday they were so noisy I couldn't concentrate on my Skype lesson which is hard enough to hear details as it is. They were talking loudly with the front door (which is right outside my door) wide open. I went out there and told them that I can hear every word and they need to shut the door and be quiet while they are here. In the midst of my saying this, the boy turns his back and walks away. I said I am talking to you, don't walk away from me and he talks back saying "I know you said to be quiet". I told him he needed to look at me when I was talking to him and not disrespect me.

After going back in to my studio, it is no less than 5 minutes and they're at it again, except the mother is outside the door on her phone on speakerphone adding to the noise. I went out and told the children that I told them to be quiet. The mother says "she's just wishing them a happy birthday" pointing to her phone. I said do it somewhere else! I can't teach with all this noise! I let my partner know what happened and that she has to tell them they are not allowed to stay during this student's lesson.

My next student came in and those kids left. My student said "Those kids are really annoying. One of them came up to me and pointed to your door and said, "That girl is crazy." I was livid!

My partner is aware of this now and she will tell the mother that under no circumstances are the children allowed in the studio. I'm just venting, and hopefully this will solve the problem. Anyone else have some wonderful stories about undisciplined kids?

Haha don't you just love kids and the things they say.
At my last piano teacher's student recital, some parents thought it was smart to bring in their toddlers, so basically the whole recital was a barrage of classical music interspersed with screaming children.

Wow! This parent is the problem IMO, as she doesn't discipline her kids, and I have had similar instances in my studio.

Mom brought her 2 kids in for an interview lesson. She sat outside the studio with Kid #2 while Kid #1 was working with me. Kid #2 (who was 6 years old at the time) walked into the studio, pulled a chair up to a window, stood on the chair, and began taking the shade off the window. No kidding. Kids are not studying with me....Mom thought this whole shade-off-the-window issue was "no big deal, you should see what they do at home!"

Hey, I have similar stories to fill five tubs...years of teaching in public schools.

That's why I love working for myself. I get to fire all the really, really undisciplined students!

Ha! This cracked me up.

haha, me too. When I was school teaching I had a mother say gleefully (about her impossible 7-year-old son) "You think he's bad, just wait till his little brother starts school!" I didn't, as it turned out - I'd moved on by that time!

We moved to a new school when I was in 4th grade and my next younger brother was in 2cnd grade.

Five years later, the 2cnd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th grade teachers had retired or quit.

Not saying my brother was difficult, but................

LOL! Thanks for the laughs, guys. I really feel sorry for these kids, though. The parents are ruining them because no one wants to be around them. Undisciplined children are a curse to all who encounter them, and instead of people finding them cute and giving them good attention, all they will get is in trouble or excluded from things (like my studio).

I once taught in a classroom on the second floor of a building, and the back windows open out to a small platform behind the room. So I have these 7th-grade chipmunks who enjoy squeezing out of the window and scurrying around the platform. There were no guardrails to prevent them from taking a 12-foot plunge to the concrete below!

I called security and wrote every single one of these kids a referral to the office. But the office didn't do anything to discipline the kids. Instead, it wrote back: "Control your kids."

And forget about calling their parents. They don't speak English.

HAHA!
Reminds me of an antic my brother pulled years ago when he was 12 years old:
He and his friend picked up a desk in the music classroom (one of those old, HEAVY wooden and metal desks), during class time, and hurled it out the window, from 2 stories up! Desk hit the blacktop in back of the school. Thank goodness no one was below to get hit! Kids ended up with detention. My parents were never told of the incident

That actually sounds like fun. LOL

Your partner needs to be the one to stop her lesson and tell the family in the hall that they need to be quiet right away. It might take 6 interruptions and her asking them to wait outside for it to make a difference. Your lesson should not be the one suffering.

The parent is oblivious. Your partner needs to make them aware they are not the only clients in the building.

You can't teach a parent to parent once they have hit the oblivious stage. They are the folks who expect the school to handle it.

Actually, she is going to tell them they are not allowed to stay during her sister's lesson. The mom will have to take them elsewhere. She couldn't hear from her room what was going on, and I told her after the fact. So hopefully, that's the end of that.

I feel so blessed, that in my teaching world, I cannot relate to any of the above

So turns out my partner is not too keen on talking to the mother. Apparently she's afraid the lady will get offended and have her daughter discontinue lessons. I'm not too happy about the fact that she's backing down on speaking to her, which can be done in a respectful manner but still effectively.

Here are my thoughts on how to resolve the issue myself:
-Teach in the large room that she has been using for her student during this time. It seems she's not bothered by the noise as this room is farther away, so why should my students be affected?
-Bribe the kids. I have some cool stickers and I could show them to the kids and say, "If I don't have to come out of my room to tell you to be quiet for 30 minutes, then you each can get a sticker. But if one of you is noisy and I come out, then neither of you get a sticker, so help each other to stay quiet."

Any other suggestions on how I can solve this? I see them today.

Have your partner teach somewhere else. This is her responsibility. She doesn't want to deal with it? That opens up more issues than you might want to see.

I think the first option is the best. If it's her clients that are being disruptive, it should interfere with her lessons, not yours. Perhaps that will be enough for her to speak up.

Perhaps the two of you could talk to the mother in question together.

Morodiene, do you have any activities available for children who wait?

I think it is unrealistic to expect energetic (and perhaps undisicipled) children to sit quietly for a full lesson of their siblings.

Where I teach there is an area for kids stocked with crayons, coloring books, and reading material for youngsters, and with reading material for adults.

Doctor's offices have similar areas, even with a small TV programmed for children's shows, with the volume and channel changeable only from a remote (that is kept away from the tv).

Just a thought, but it might solve the problem.

That would be nice, but ultimately, the behavior of the children is the responsibility of the mother. I imagine that, even if there were things to do, they would still be loud and unruly doing them. Call me a pessimist, but I'm seeing crayon drawings on the walls . . .

I agree it's unrealistic. The weather down here, of course, is perfect for the kids to be outside at a nearby park. The mother doesn't want to bring them there, however, she'd rather force them to stay inside. The brings things for them to do, but it's the loudness of their doing things that is the problem. The mother usually just leaves the kids and goes outside to talk on her phone.

The only indoor space we have is our waiting area, which is right outside my door.