Editor’s Note: Meet Katheryn Naler, an MIE student/Violin major in her 3rd year and doing her first MIE Guided Internship! Katheryn’s internship this semester is tied in with the String Pedagogy course taught through the NEC Strings Dept.

When I was a young girl, I wanted to be a violin teacher and performer. Even during the years when performing was at the top of my gratification list (even if it meant playing on a balcony, pretending it to be the Carnegie Hall stage), when I got home to the privacy of my room, I would teach imaginary students how to learn the concepts I myself practiced. At the age of 11, I began teaching three brothers, but soon my “studio”, as I excitedly called it, doubled as my first students spread the word. As I turned 12, I began teaching an 11 year old who then stayed with me until I moved away, right before he began preparing for college auditions. He now is playing repertoire that I haven’t even approached, an experience I hope to always cherish.

As I enter this internship, I have much to learn! I wonder how to approach a four year old and impart the desire for learning that I had when I was young – to truly engage them in the excitement of learning music. I want to learn how to not play information down so much that a small child doesn’t see the wonderful value of music and the joy it can bring. I want to learn how to convey not only musical knowledge, but intertwine insight that has been important to my growth, developing a deeper connection with the student in the long term. I want to learn different methods of which to teach and how to avoid pain and injury. To accomplish these goals for my internship, I would like to teach one four-year-old student, focusing on his learning style. Each lesson plan, as well as new ideas I have, will be documented before the lesson. After each lesson, I will journal the strengths and weaknesses of the lesson as well as new information/insights I’ve gathered in response. I will also be observing at least four other teacher’s lessons with their students during the semester, taking notes throughout the lesson, as well as writing a response journal entry afterward, regarding what I learned. During the semester, I will write at least three times on the MIE blog, mirroring what I’m acquiring as well as thoughts I’ve had in response to my new ideas. At the completion of the semester, I will turn in a portfolio of all the lesson plans, response/journal entries, MIE blog entries, as well as a video of one of the first lessons and the last lesson before the internship has come to a close. The video will demonstrate my progression as a teacher as well as the progression my student has had throughout our months together.

To cultivate the experience for the student and myself, I have registered for the String Pedagogy class. Although this class directly connects with my desire to teach pre-college students in a studio atmosphere, I have also taken Performing Artists in Schools and Performing Artists in Community. These classes will aid my experience greatly as I learned better how to grasp young children’s attention as an artist in schools (emulating Bernstein in his Young People’s concerts), and how each person is important, a small part of a community, and how music can create community. I have also taken Music, Brain, and Child Development with Lyle Davidson. This class relates to my internship in that we studied the brain’s development in relation to music and how children mature even from conception. We learned how music, whether a nursery rhyme or the widely recognized Mozart, is so very intertwined in a child’s developing brain. Having this knowledge will help me understand how to more creatively engage the four-year-old student.

This internship will help me prepare for my career as a violin teacher, but more importantly prepare me to be a teacher forever learning. It will increase the opportunity for me to focus on the aspects of a successful teacher as well as hone my own. I will hopefully broaden my perspectives while I inevitably learn new techniques entirely. I will begin to learn what is essential for me to begin understanding before I leave NEC: What does it mean to be a successful teacher? How do I engage a student while effectively communicating? How do I set up a beginner’s technique in a clear, concise way in order for it to stick in their minds and be understandable for their own practice?

Hey MIE Blog readers! Got some great news for you. We have finally given a name to the music program we started last year in Chinatown. We’re calling it MusicLaunch, and it’s going to be an amazing opportunity for both our MIE interns and for community youth.

NEC’s MusicLaunch was founded in 2010 in partnership with the Wang YMCA of Chinatown (Boston). MusicLaunch is an innovative community-minded music education lab, where programs and curricula are driven by the dynamic, multi-faceted, and versatile faculty of NEC’s Continuing Ed Music-in-Education Certificate Program. It follows the YMCA’s commitment to “developing the potential of every child” with its open enrollment (no audition) policy and classes that encourage music literacy from the ground up, starting with parent/child music circles (ages 2-5). Small-group lessons in guitar, band instruments, and recorder are also offered.

Like the YMCA, MusicLaunch is committed to promoting social responsibility, critical thinking, and socio-emotional development. While many arts organizations focus on free performances as their way of giving back, MusicLaunch instead puts experiential, hands-on learning and multi-level (sometimes, multi-generational) instruction at its core. Youth are guided, mentored, and instructed by experienced teaching artists from NEC’s Continuing Ed faculty, as well as by adult intern volunteers from the MIE Certificate Program.

Here are some posts from Devin U, who started out the MusicLaunch guitar program last year.