Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum Piano lessons over skype, any teachers here?

If you want to point out snark best not indulge in it yourself.

If you want to convince us, just continue writing thorough posts, as you just did. I actually agree with many of your points. It doesn't have to be one way or the other.

Question: how do you deal with Skype problems such as the quality of video getting blurry or sound cutting out? I love Skype for many things but there are nights when is just won't cooperate no matter how good my own connection seems to be, or that of the person I am Skyping with...

I'm well aware of the potential for long-distance learning, as I have outline in my other post. I have a friend who is teaching on the other side of the world, and it would be fun to have an occasional Skype lesson with her students--if nothing else, to exchange ideas and check out what's going on with piano pedagogy elsewhere in the world.

Skype or whatever more advanced technology available will be excellent for exams, especially for those far-out places near the Arctic Circle. The evaluator/examiner doesn't have to fly 500 miles just to test 15 kids.

However, there are so many aspects of teaching piano that can only be done in person. What about the tactile aspects of teaching? There's only so much sight and sound can convey the feel of contacting the keys a certain way.

My biggest question: How do you teach advanced pedaling techniques over Skype?

There's also the business practicality of using Skype. If you live in an area with an abundance of piano students, and you have a healthy studio full of living and breathing students, do you really need that extra income??? I was only half-joking about teaching at 1 AM to some students in India, but I do know a colleagues who offers Skype lessons because she's struggling to fill her studio. And she's given me more practical reasons not to teach over Skype--those students come and go faster than a revolving door can spin. At least in this case, Skype lessons have yet to establish a model of economic stability.

Is it possible to extend this discussion beyond the medium of Skype, and on to the idea of distance learning? The way it is commonly envisioned is simply as a weaker version of in-studio lessons, and trying to work in exactly the same way. I thought of this after an earlier post, and while gathering my thoughts, Mark's post went in the direction I was thinking of. Re: "weaker version of, etc." - in the studio a student and teacher get together for 60 minutes, hear each other play etc., so a Skype lesson = student and teacher get together for 60 minutes but over that medium, and hear each other play. Obviously this will be a weak version of the former because of what is lost. But this is a "flawed way" of seeing distance learning.

In-studio ("traditional") teaching has its own limitations. Students must travel physically to a location, there will be numbers of students and so there must be time slots: thus you will have your 60 minutes of physical presence of one student, preceded by 60 minutes of physical presence of another student, and ditto for the one following. You must fill in that time slot with activities which can only be done within that time period, whether or not less or more time is needed.

In distance learning, other possibilities are open to you. The limitations of what Skype allows you to hear get changed if some of the work is done "off camera" and turned into a recording, by either party. That includes recordings or videos by a teacher that can be studied over and over by the student. In fact, I remember as an in-studio violin student telling that teacher "I wish that I could package what you just showed me, because by the time I'm home it has faded."

But more than this, there are things happening in distance learning which can also happen in traditional in-studio lessons. In regards to recordings of a lesson for later study: our John Brooke implemented this at least a decade ago by installing a camera in the studio that recorded the lessons, and students were handed a disk to study when they got home. For the IPIBAH, which is real, some teachers have their students bring in a recording of how they played at home. In regards to resources found on-line, AZNPiano, you have already stated that you do this in the studio. Back when I had in-studio lessons, there wasn't a computer anywhere near the studio. It was instrument, music stand, paper scores, done.

Why can't this discussion expand to such things?

I sort of expect my post to be ignored, and Mark's post to be ignored (addressing some of the same ideas), and would love to be proven wrong.

Your question about the shortcomings of Skype and how to overcome them: Are you teaching with Skype or learning through it? Or casually using it and wondering why or how anyone could learn or teach piano with it? Having some sense of your use of Skype and where you're trying to go with it would let me answer your question more precisely.

If you want to discuss further send a PM.

My opinion is Keystring has raised important issues. Let's that be said.

This is a good point and I think it could be expressed more forcefully.

The desired teacher is simply any quality teacher, and the local teachers all produce your "transfer wrecks."

As students become aware that there are real limitations to the amateur and unqualified teachers, and realize there are good ones out there available via Skype, there may be a movement towards Skype lessons.

That might even dry up the income from the neighborhood teachers, and that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Good connection speed is important though. I schedule my lessons for weekend mornings when the gamers and porn addicts are sleeping in and not grabbing band width. Obviously everybody can't do that.

No, Tim, that's not what I meant. Usually the desired teacher is a good quality teacher, and the student/parent is actively seeking a well-qualified teacher.


Wouldn't that be nice? But the truth remains that most parents get word-of-mouth referrals for lessons. I don't know how that'll work for Skype, either, maybe online referrals??

Actually Tim is correct. That is one major reason.

Hah! My word choice was ambiguous. Sorry about that.

I meant to say the desired teacher is simply any teacher who is of high quality. Sheer dumb luck may or may not drop a high quality teacher into your neighborhood. Apparently AZN's neighborhood did not have that luck or she wouldn't be getting all those transfer wrecks.

At any rate, Skype expands the pool a student can search in, and may improve the chances of finding that quality teacher. How to tell the difference is of course another problem.

I have committed to one year of Skype lessons myself and will see how it goes. The gig scene occasionally brings my teacher into my neighborhood so there will probably be a F2F mixed in there.

I'm classical pianist and piano professor in Budapest/Hungary. I have students from beginner to professional level, but I teach via Skype or with video exchange mainly from advanced level.

Moderator note: you may put your link in your signature, but you may not advertise your business in your posts.

All I have to add is that FaceTime is better than Skype. Less loading problems, way better sound. The only problem is that some people don't have mac/i devices.

Just want to chime in, in response to the OP.

I teach over the Internet, not over Skype, but via TakeLessons classroom platform. Whether or not that's different from Skype, I'm not too sure. There is a noticeable lag, for sure. I use a very good quality microphone, so my student has no trouble hearing me. As a teacher, I would say it's very important to have a good ear if you're going to teach over the Internet, because likely your student is not going to have a top quality microphone. Luckily, my student is a beginner, so it's not too difficult for me to hear when he is playing something wrong and which note it is. He's still learning to read notes so sometimes he steps up instead of down, for example.

It's hardly ideal. There are times I want to reach over, and I can't. But he lives in a remote place, and his piano teacher had moved away because it was too cold there! So I think his only option is online. I also charge less for online lessons, because I feel like I cannot give as good instruction. It's also more comfortable for me anyway, so I don't mind. I could be sitting in my PJs for all he knows :P

Since you've been doing this for a while, do you have anything to add in regards to the questions that have arisen in this forum?

It's advertising, not a useful comment.

So can others comment about Face Time sound quality better then Skype?

That's why I invited this new member, Sukipiano, to become a bona fide participating member, rather than making like a cuckoo.

If the new member Sukipiano actually is interested in being a bona finde participating member, that would be lovely - but he or she still can't advertise in their posts. Only a link in the signature is accepted in threads. Any other advertising should be paid for.

I just found out that you can have more than two participants in a Skype call. (maybe I'm a little technologically challenged)

This is a huge opportunity for a beginning teacher to watch and learn while an experienced teacher works with a student. Potentially you could compress some of the early learning curve into a much shorter time.

FaceTime would require Apple product to Apple product, so I don't see how practical that is since you wouldn't necessarily buy another laptop just for FaceTime, unless of course you and your teacher both happen to already have a Mac computer, then sure.

I think it's a little more complicated than a blanket answer.

Here's a couple of folks' take on the question
https://www.quora.com/Does-FaceTime-have-better-video-and-audio-quality-than-Skype

Most of my students don't have a Mac, so I just stick with Skype.

Lag can come from either person's internet being slow. Some internet providers only allow a certain speed in a community, and so if someone is home playing online video games, they will take up more of the available bandwidth. I believe this happens mostly with cable, but I could be wrong. So some times of the day, like after school, can be particularly laggy.

I try to quit all other programs when I'm doing a Skype lesson, or if I need my web browser open for my online calendar, I try to keep the # of tabs down. Less stuff going on in the background to use up bandwidth.

Also, some student's internet is really bad, but they cell reception is good. So some take lessons using their smartphone, either directly on that, or tethering to their computer (as long as they have enough data or an unlimited plan).