Developing patience in children through piano lessons.
Patience is one of the faculties developed by studying an instrument. This is particularly so for children. Lessons and practice present an opportunity for the student to gain experience in inhibiting their immediate impulses, the act which, if made habitual, is identical to patience itself. They must listen both to the music and the teacher; they must try and fail and try again to play a passage well as they refine their technique; and they must learn to have a quiet mind while they are playing. All of these challenges, if taken on vigorously, contribute to the development of patience.
In the first and final analyses, a child first and foremost must learn how to practice, and for that they must be guided by an adult—a parent or other caregiver—who calmly demonstrates the necessity of failure, repetition, and emotional detachment for improvement. Crucially, parents and teachers must themselves exhibit patience, for the mere example of it is worth a thousand pedagogical tools or tricks.
The younger the student, the more fertile the mind for the seed of discipline and focus. Anyone can develop patience, but as a student grows older, entering their teens, the ability is unlikely to be helped along by direct intervention; an adolescent or an adult chooses for themself, based of course on their environment. Of course, that is not to say a three year old is effortlessly molded to be patient. This is where the patience of teacher and parent is indispensable, since it may be years before the good effects of practice are observable.
In this culture, patience is typically conceived as an inherent virtue—its lack being nothing other than moral deficiency—but in reality it is just a manifestation of what one may call mental fitness, just as endurance or strength point to physical fitness. And like physical fitness, mental fitness can be developed through exercise. The ability to say “no” to the urge to act—whether an act of greed, boredom, frustration, joy, or any other emotional stimulus—is a conscious act a person can strengthen and make habitual through practice. Anyone can strengthen this faculty, just as anyone can strengthen their legs by walking; and once they have done so, they will be remarked upon as patient. Developing patience in children through piano lessons is such a way to strengthen this muscle.
All virtues are linked. Humility breeds patience; patience breeds awareness; and awareness is the key to all activity. Cultivating these qualities should be the chief goal of music lessons. If one has learned to play quite beautifully yet still is not developed in perseverance and patience, a golden opportunity presented by the study of music has been lost. Conversely, the ability to say “no,” to remain quiet and determined and to carry on—in other words, to be patient—invariably opens the door for the student to develop musically to the limit of their potential.