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Kindergarten is 5-6. Preschool is 4-5.

The breakfast program is continuing, to the dismay of many parents and teachers. I used to work in a district that has the free breakfast program, too. It's a joke. They served quite a bit of junk (coffee cake for breakfast, anyone?), and a lot of spills took place. We had ours in the cafeteria, but apparently some schools serve food inside the classroom on a daily basis. What a nightmare.

Sorry to digress...

Interesting. We have "junior kindergarten" and "senior-kindergarten". With some birthdays, that means some of the kids are starting school when they are still 3 years old.

I'm sure it is politically incorrect as all get out, but this makes me giggle and think of a fun place for elderly people to go for a few hours each day.

Here's the story from the Los Angeles Times. The huge Los Angeles Unified School District (from which I graduated in 1973) is fighting with its board about budget cuts. A couple of days ago the district threatened to "...eliminate a classroom breakfast program serving nearly 200,000 children...."

I was in high school there when the first big round of cuts went into effect following the property-tax rollback imposed by Proposition 13. I felt them personally as I had to attend summer school to get enough academic credits to qualify for university admission. In those days, every California school kid was required to take one period of physical education every day of their thirteen years in public school. As a result I was only allowed to take three academic classes in my senior year. California has gradually declined from leading the country in public education to a dismal near-bottom performance. Factors other than finance certainly contribute, but you can't maintain a school system with continually declining budgets.

Andy

Let's not forget equal voting rights for blacks and other races, more or less equal pay (we still need to do some-read a lot of work on that), and so on. There's still the issues of marriage equality (please for the love of God do not open this can, nay cargo ship, of worms and derail this thread any more), immigration reform, and other busy-sounding buzzwords for serious issues, but given that each side always says "no" to what the other side wants and vice versa (like kids at recess), these issues'll be up in the air 'til doomsday :P

Anyways, stand up for yourself. Confront the parent. Don't take crap from whiny kids. Another thing you could do is try teaching them pieces they're interested in, which is mostly not Piano Adventures 2A. Try looking up arrangements for songs from famous movies or video games. Show them that piano is more than just stuffy dead white people music. If you give them something that they're more likely to be interested in, it shows not only that you can understand them at least a little bit, but they'll have more incentive to learn to play the instrument. Case in point-the guitar teacher at my school not only teaches basic/advanced guitar method and the pre-requisite standard teaching songs, but also teaches them both classic and modern rock and metal, which is what the students want to learn in the first place, and as such all of his students respect him.

You know what they say-"you can teach an old dog new tricks, but only if he/she wants to".

It's not "telling stories to motivate"-- it's threatening. Threatening people shouldn't be part of anyone's teaching. It's not healthy and it's inappropriate. And it violates someone's human rights.

I'm not about to argue whether the USA has gotten crude over the years because I haven't been there long enough to know.

But I have been to the USA and I've noticed differences in behaviour (even though Target says we're neighbours), and it never feels the same as Canada.

It's still progress from the 1960s though. Which brings me back: human rights have progressed since the 1960s.

Anyways, if those things aren't progress in human rights (plus SBP's post) and more, then you must be pretty immersed in your fantasy world. :P

However, I'm not about to start an argument, and I'm not a political person anyways (I'm more of a dabbler in the field of law). I guess we can each exist in our own worlds.

It seems self evident to you that eating in the classroom is a bad idea.

I see the other side of it: that kids who are desparately hungry aren't all that interesting in learning.

One thought about the first kid - this from my own childhood. I was once thoroughly chastised by my mother for "mocking" an old lady of our acquaintance after we left her house. The thing is, as far as I know I'd done no such thing and was totally bewildered. So bewildered that it was a seminal experience that has stayed with me for more than fifty years. All I can figure out is that I must've been subconsciously imitating one of the old lady's mannerisms. (I'm one of those people who tend to pick up the accent of whomever I'm talking to.) Your student number one may not realize he's doing anything offensive. He may not realize he's doing anything at all. It may be a form of flattery. I sincerely liked that old lady and never thought there was anything odd about her.

I’ve never had trouble with child rudeness ...
but then I have a heavy set of eyebrows with a tortured rebel crease.

However, if I were in the shoes of the OP,
my solution would conjure the following scenario ...
when the rude student arrives (preferably with parent) ...
I would beg 5 minutes to conclude an earlier lesson in the main studio ... and with use of a trick recording which can be heard in the waiting room ... let waft upon the air the dire sound of knuckles being rapped and yowls of pain ... all heard above the daemonic roars of the angry PT ... with a closing shout “get out you useless waste of time “ ... ”use the back door and don’t come back”

If that doesn’t work ... resort to the blood-stained riding crop.

I have always wondered if a variation of that actually happened to me.

Many years ago I was audited by a state IRS office.

As I waited in the examiner's outer office, I heard him on the phone. His end of the conversation went like this, "yes, I understand that your father is dying of cancer in the nursing home. But what kind of payment schedule can he set up?"

That did not set a good tone for my turn.

(as it turned out, I had overpaid and they owed me money instead of the other way around. But being the IRS, they just calculated some kind of penalty that exactly balanced it out.)

As a person whose knuckles were rapped by someone who pretended to teach piano, I am not amused ....

I was waiting to hear if you told them what kind of payment scheme they would have to accept.

I dont blame you, I would only want them rapped by someone who could actually teach piano as well.

Hah!

That hurts more than having one's knuckles rapped by someone who is a master piano teacher.

I think I was too young to notice the difference!

This thread is getting a little strange...

When I was a kid, I used to go along with my friends to their piano lessons at the Catholic school. Sister Andriella kept a ruler next to the piano to whack their hands if they made a mistake. True story. Ah, the good old days.

Would the mother be willing to sit in on the lessons? If not could you video tape them? I would get the mother's permission (in writing) to video and then email her the video. There may be underlying factors (such as trouble at home etc.) but you are not the child's therapist and if it continues it will only get worse.

What I recieve from your post is that the children are confused and frustrated because they are tired or frustrated in some way. Are you setting goals for them? And moreover, are they working on goals? Or just doing piano.

Although not an expert, I think we need to believe in students and show them our positive expectations. Set some targets and give positive affirmation. By. focusing on the annoying habits of the kids you make them bigger.

Of course a dialog with parent is important to find out motivations. Also kids are rounded individuals who have a lot of stuff going on in their lives. Boys particularly have all kinds of hormonal changes influencing moods. And when you can emphathise with some of these issues you will be able to create a better relationship with these students. But yes, be firm and work with them on 'their' goals - if it is to look cool in front of peers or whatever..