In this episode, John Kozicki (Michigan Rock School and RockSchoolProprietor.com) and Mandy York (Music Time of Milford) discuss the importance of educating parents in music lessons. They explore various strategies for setting expectations, providing feedback, and reinforcing learning. The conversation emphasizes the need for effective communication with parents, the role of repetition in learning, and the balance between reading music and playing by ear. They also highlight the evolving nature of parent education and the significance of building confidence through group learning.
Areas of focus:
- Educating parents is crucial for successful music lessons.
- Setting clear expectations helps align student and parent goals.
- Repetition aids in the retention of information for both kids and parents.
- Feedback and anecdotes can enhance parent engagement.
- Building confidence in students often comes from group learning experiences.
- Effective communication strategies are essential for parent education.
- Understanding progress in music can be challenging for parents.
- Balancing reading music and playing by ear is important for student development.
- Parent education strategies should evolve over time.
- Encouraging parents to let go of expectations can foster a better learning environment.
Building a great music school and studio business happens when we focus our education on students and their parents.
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Episode Transcript:
John Kozicki (00:01.478)
Welcome to Rock School Proprietor podcast. My name is John Kozicki and joining me is Mandy York. I screwed up the intro. It’s you, it’s Mandy. We’ve been having so many guests on as of late, or I’ve been doing so many guest interviews. I’m so used to that routine of like, hey, let me introduce my guest, but yeah, but you are our co-host. Yeah. So how are you doing?
Mandy York (00:05.836)
And I, that’s me. It is.
Mandy York (00:24.266)
And this is… It’s me. Yeah.
Hi, John. Good. It has been a while. It’s been a couple of weeks since we’ve done this, actually. Yeah.
John Kozicki (00:35.738)
Yeah, yeah. So, well, getting back into the swing of it with a John and Mandy episode, we’re gonna go kind of back to some of the the early concepts that we talked about in like way way back when we first started the podcast, which were really inspired by the conversations that you and I would have on a regular basis. And
Mandy York (00:40.376)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (01:02.318)
I still remember this, we were having coffee one time and this again, this goes back like at this point a year and a half, maybe more. And you had said, our parents, the real students in music lessons. And we did a whole episode on that. But we’re gonna kind of revisit the concept of like educating parents and why is important to educate parents when it comes to music lessons, when we should educate parents.
when it comes to music lessons, how we educate them in our studios and beforehand. thoughts on that.
Mandy York (01:39.246)
Yeah. Oh, this is, I’m all about this. My situation is a little bit different than yours because I do sit down with the parents in all of my classes. So yes, I’m regularly, you know, commuting, communicating to parents in all of my classes. yeah, this is, this is great to dig into. And I think it’s super important.
John Kozicki (01:49.816)
in your classes. Yeah.
John Kozicki (02:02.056)
And I was thinking about this this morning about when we educate and for me, and I told you a few minutes ago before we started recording, I do a lot of parent education before parents even get into the studio. So on those initial phone calls, when we’re talking about what is the right fit and what program. So
That’s all like before registration stuff. you have ways to communicate what you do in your studio to parents before registration?
Mandy York (02:43.351)
Yeah, I’ve always thought that you do such a good job with this. Yeah, it’s really good with your, you know, the way that you communicate, phone calls, tours, all of those things. And it’s important for you to make sure that you’re connecting with the right people and the right students. I’m not as good at it as you are. I think my tactic is more a little bit getting them in the door.
John Kozicki (02:48.957)
Thank you.
Mandy York (03:13.351)
I’m, it’s really important to me that like my website, my socials really help prospective clients like visualize what my classes are because kind of just telling them, you know, is, know, what do you mean you make music with babies? What do you mean? You know, so showing them photos of, look, here’s what we sit on the floor and we play, you know, shakers and things.
John Kozicki (03:26.44)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (03:34.918)
Yeah.
Mandy York (03:40.459)
getting them in the door, and then once I have them in front of me in those initial classes is when I really dig in. So a little bit different.
John Kozicki (03:47.46)
Mm hmm. Well, and I think we’ll get into where you really shine, which is educating when the parents are in the classes with you and the students are in the classes. The things that I do in the front end before I guess we would call this before registration to educate the parents. This for me is all about setting expectations. Because when
Mandy York (03:56.93)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (04:16.599)
students come to my studio, we serve, I mean, we start at age four and all the way through adults. And I think as, as kids get older and their maybe prior experience varies and their interests and their tastes change, there’s a ton of different ways to approach learning music. And
We can’t serve everyone, I think. know, like I’m good at what I do and I know what we’re good at at my studio and there are other people in our community that I think are really great at teaching in different ways. And so I think it’s about setting expectations, finding the right match, right? So number one, I want parents and prospective students to understand
Mandy York (04:49.559)
Ryan.
John Kozicki (05:15.333)
what it is that we offer. And yeah, you can put that on the website, but I feel that so often when parents are searching for music lessons, they just think about, well, there’s this place down the street, I guess I’ll call them and then see what times they have available. And so there’s so much more involved in that process, I think, than just convenience.
you know, location and times. So I think it’s important that we have that discussion about what it is that I offer at my studio and figuring out what’s going to be the best fit for their child. And so that way they understand what to expect and we figure out if it’s good fit.
Mandy York (06:11.041)
Yeah, definitely. It saves you time, right?
John Kozicki (06:14.927)
Yeah, and in your situation.
that, you know, toddlers have not developed a specific instrument that they want to play, right? So like right out of the gate, there’s like, all right, well, we’re talking general music classes. They haven’t necessarily at least haven’t expressed different interests in musical genres or styles or things like that, you know? So I think the way that
Mandy York (06:24.493)
Right. Yes.
John Kozicki (06:45.059)
you’re serving the community and the classes that you’re offering, to get them in the door, we don’t have to necessarily deal with those things.
Mandy York (06:53.847)
Yep, it is different.
John Kozicki (06:56.647)
Now on that, I think they added bonus there on what that does. When we spend the time educating our prospective students and parents before registration, we’re going through that process, figuring out, letting them know what the expectations are. This is what we do. This is what we’re very good at. This may be what we don’t do, what we’re not very good at. That’s also going to help us.
attract the right kind of clients to our studio. And the hope is that we’re going to weed out those clients that might be looking for something different, not in a negative way, but as a for instance, if we offer guitar lessons at my studio, it’s very popular, but
I don’t have anyone on staff right now that teaches guitar, teaches classical guitar. It’s a very specific style, right? And it involves finger picking and reading music and there’s a whole different skill set.
Now if someone called and they’re like, I really want to get into classical guitar. And they put two and two together. Michigan Rock School offers guitar lessons. I’ll call them so I can start playing classical guitar. I’m going to tell them right out of the gate, this is not where you need to be. I don’t have anyone that does that. yeah, setting those expectations, figuring out who are going to be the right clients for us.
and then weed out the clients that aren’t right for us.
Mandy York (08:46.081)
Yes. And I mean, I want to point out that the classical guitar student that you’re telling them you don’t have anyone that can do that. Like you, you answered honestly, you didn’t think like, gosh, I wonder, I wonder if so-and-so might be able to do this. Like trying to fit that person into your studio. You weren’t trying to make it work. You know who you are and
John Kozicki (09:08.487)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (09:12.551)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (09:13.558)
you know, you do what you do really well. You’re not trying to be all things for everyone. That’s important. That’s part of, that’s what we’re talking about here, finding the right foot and not trying to be everything for everyone.
John Kozicki (09:18.959)
Right. Yeah.
John Kozicki (09:25.861)
because I certainly don’t want that prospective classical guitar student to be disappointed. Now,
I maybe in the past, like my early days of running my first studio, I may have.
in that situation said, well, we could kind of get you started. I wouldn’t do that today. I don’t think I would. I think if I had done that, that would have been more.
Mandy York (09:53.43)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (10:03.056)
coming from a place of, want to book this student and I want to book as many students as I can and whatever it takes, I will try and book those students. I don’t think I would do that. Well, I’m certain I wouldn’t do that today because let’s say this prospective classical guitar student is a beginner. Could we teach that beginner the basics? Yes. But would they probably be better served just starting with a class alcohol, classical guitar instructor?
100%. Yeah.
Mandy York (10:34.093)
Yeah. Yep. It’s good to know who you are and what you do well.
John Kozicki (10:41.348)
Now, speaking of what you do well, now I think you do a lot more parent education once the parents and students are in your studio than I do. And this is an area that I was thinking like, wow, what else, what could we do to do a better job of like as they progress through our program, continuing to offer them
little bits of information so that they feel like, yes, this is the place that is right for me. I’m glad we were here. We’re always getting great information and we’re learning not just our student, but as a family and understanding what music and learning music is all about. So.
What are some things that you do once those families are in your studio to continue to educate them?
Mandy York (11:39.308)
Yeah, I mean, it’s something that I do every class every week. We are, I’m big into repetition. So I think when I first started, I did a lot of parent ed up front, kind of like you, right? Setting expectations. This is who we are, this is what we do, this is how we do it, this is why we do it. And then it would kind of fizzle.
John Kozicki (11:57.158)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (12:08.262)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (12:09.109)
I felt like I was, I didn’t want to be too redundant or boring or saying the same thing over and over again. But I’ve kind of learned over the years that repetition is good. Repetition is good. Repetition is good. Repetition is good. Like the kids need it. Little kids need it. Right. And when we’re in a classroom, this is for my situation, but when we’re in a classroom where it can be fast paced at times.
John Kozicki (12:21.242)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (12:27.846)
Sure, yeah.
Mandy York (12:37.719)
caregivers trying to wrangle a student, there’s distractions. Maybe they didn’t hear you the first time, right? We shouldn’t assume, and in your situation too, we shouldn’t assume that the information is being received and absorbed the first go around. So I’ve allowed myself to be repetitive. And I think that it serves me really well.
John Kozicki (12:46.096)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (12:55.28)
Sure.
Mandy York (13:04.897)
I tell, you know, I have two tweens and they know that their coat and shoes need to go in the closet every day, but they don’t do it. I have to tell them every day. Right? Okay. Right. We have to keep telling them. And you know, sometimes I feel that way with some of the parents in class. I’ve told you before. I’ll say it again. This is what we need to do. Repetition is good. Keep it up. And then I’ve
John Kozicki (13:11.61)
Yeah. Yeah.
John Kozicki (13:28.772)
Okay.
Mandy York (13:34.816)
I’ve learned to, as I become a better teacher too, I get better at observing my students and analyzing their progress. And I think individual observation can be really effective. Hey mom, hey dad, I’ve noticed that so and so has been tapping a steady beat lately. Have you noticed that? They weren’t doing that 10 weeks ago.
watch for this at home or try this at home, right? Kind of giving homework, giving homework or asking, what are you seeing at home?
John Kozicki (14:04.955)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (14:10.982)
Yeah, right. observation and feedback. Okay.
Mandy York (14:18.061)
Mm hmm. Yeah. And the parents love that, right? And it is genuine. This isn’t, this isn’t me saying, look how happy they are shaking the egg shaker. Aren’t you so glad you joined or I don’t know, like something really just not genuine, but this is like, wow, I’ve noticed this behavior coming out. Have you noticed it? Keep an eye on that. Try these things. that’s really effective. And
John Kozicki (14:22.278)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (14:31.596)
Right.
Mandy York (14:46.165)
Kind of along the same line are anecdotes. I really love sharing anecdotes with my families. I think this is something that probably you could use as well.
John Kozicki (14:54.736)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (15:03.307)
I’m dealing with really young kids and young parents. sometimes parents, you know, they’re really hypersensitive about, my child doing, are they doing okay? Is this the right thing? What should I, how should I be supporting them at home? I suppose in your studio, it would look something like, shouldn’t they have learned this whole song by now or?
John Kozicki (15:25.52)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (15:33.025)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (15:33.24)
How much should they be practicing, right? And so part of my education to parents too can be like putting their mind at ease. Like, hey, here’s an anecdote. You’re right, Joey is not doing a lot in the classroom space. But you’re telling me he’s participating fully at home. He loves to dance. He loves to sing. He loves his instruments.
John Kozicki (16:00.08)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (16:02.721)
Well, let me tell you about, know, Zoe was a student of mine and for a whole year she didn’t participate in class. And I should put that in quotes. Watching is participating. I try to tell my parents that watching is participating. But Zoe didn’t do a whole lot of moving in class for a whole year. And then you know what? Like she started sitting on my lab. She started like engaging fully and music learning takes time.
John Kozicki (16:12.025)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (16:15.641)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (16:32.309)
and each child is different. Giving them anecdotes that kind of show them like.
how music learning can look like for their student and how it’s different for everybody.
John Kozicki (16:44.739)
Yeah, and when you’re doing this, when you’re giving the feedback and when you’re sharing these anecdotes, are these all framed by your big picture goals for your students and your families?
Mandy York (16:58.541)
Yeah, I try to have, I try to have like a big picture goal for my semester, right? These are the big, these are the points I want to cover. And I’ll even get into like week three, I want to talk about babbling on the resting tone or something like that, you know, how kids
John Kozicki (17:09.826)
Mm Okay.
Mandy York (17:27.859)
It’s one of the first notes that the kids will sing, right, is the resting note of a song, resting tone. if I’ll demonstrate in class, just naturally, at the end of a song, I won’t sing the last note, and I’ll wait. And sure enough, someone’s going to finish that note for me. And then I’ll present like that kind of education piece and tell the parents to try it at home. So I kind of, have like goals for the whole semester.
John Kozicki (17:32.143)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (17:41.593)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (17:55.33)
But like those anecdotes and individual observations are a little bit off the cuff, right? And based on what I’m seeing in class. And I think those can be so really effective because they are, they’re really genuine and they’re in the moment.
John Kozicki (18:04.004)
Okay.
John Kozicki (18:14.179)
Yeah, and that positive feedback at that time reinforces like, yep, this is what you need to be doing. This is why it’s good. This is why it’s working. most of the education you’re doing, would you say it’s verbal or do you have other other tactics? mean, do you?
Mandy York (18:34.825)
Yeah, that’s a good question. Yeah. be the nature of the classes, you know, I’m always saying I try to talk as little as possible, really. So it is, you know, I’m demonstrating for parents and hopefully they’re picking these things up and supporting the kids at home and in the same way. So I just will throw out a couple of these small.
John Kozicki (18:46.682)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (19:02.881)
brief parent ed pieces during class verbally. But I do, I do more and more. I, I like to just point sometimes, you know, like we’re, we’re singing and again, maybe, one of the younger kids is doing something we haven’t seen before, right? Maybe they’re clapping their hands with us or maybe someone’s starting to tap a beat. I will just point, you know, and it, it’s nonverbal and
John Kozicki (19:12.303)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (19:29.251)
Yeah.
Mandy York (19:32.045)
you know, the caregiver’s heads will turn and everyone will kind of nod along. So it’s like, see guys, this is, it’s working. Like just proof of what’s going on. So things like that I do.
John Kozicki (19:36.579)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (19:48.102)
Because I’m also thinking about, I’m thinking about what are things that I can do in my studio? What are things that other people could do in their lesson studios when parents are not present? Right? Because this is, the idea is, yes, we’re seeing students every week. Yes, we’re educating the students. We’re showing them how to play. We’re showing them how to improve.
Mandy York (19:49.015)
Yeah.
Mandy York (19:55.981)
Hmm?
Mandy York (20:05.589)
in the room.
John Kozicki (20:17.925)
We’re giving them ideas on what they can do at home. We’re giving the same type of positive reinforcement and feedback, but then they leave the lesson room and just like you said with your daughters, they could forget, right? So, and I don’t necessarily think,
Mandy York (20:37.419)
Yes.
John Kozicki (20:45.817)
This is about reiterating everything we tell the kids in lessons to the parents, right? This isn’t like, well, we write it down in a practice notebook so that the parents can look at it. Or, we send the practice and lesson notes in the student portal and the parents can look at it. I guess where I’m going with it is I wrote down three areas that I think
One, I think I want to focus on in my studio a little bit more because I think these are beneficial for parents to see and to sort of understand a little bit more about. And maybe other studios would also kind of get something from this. But number one would be, how do we continue to educate parents about progress and practice?
Because just like you were saying when you do it in in class you’re pointing it out. Okay, this is good This is or you’re giving that positive feedback
in that… sorry, go ahead.
Mandy York (21:56.322)
And it’s not practical to have an instructor parent conference after every lesson. Right. Yes. Sure. So how do you do that?
John Kozicki (22:03.98)
Right, yeah, yeah. And you’re also, when you’re dealing with the age group that you deal with, they just learn so fast. So you literally could see progress from one week to the next. You know, you can see that progress happen because these kids are so little and they’re like sponges and they’re developing so quickly. You take like a 12 year old kid,
and you’re not going to see the progress necessarily from week to week. and the concepts of, mean, we’ve talked about practice. I know I’ve got really strong opinions about practice and what it means, but for me,
educating parents on on practice and if it’s important and when it’s important and how it’s important, right? So I think that’s one area. Another area that I would like to focus on is what does it really mean when we say music lessons build confidence in kids? Because we hear it lot, right?
And I think it’s true. But how do we express that? And how do we explain that to parents? That’s not just, hey, it’s good thing you’re taking your kids taking music lessons, because it’s going to help them build confidence. You know what I mean? Like, what are the ways that we can show parents that music lessons are building confidence?
Mandy York (23:44.813)
Sure. Yeah.
Mandy York (23:56.406)
outside of the classroom. Okay.
John Kozicki (23:56.551)
Yeah, thoughts? I mean, I’ve got a couple.
Mandy York (24:02.325)
Yeah, I mean, I do. This kind of goes back to my comment about repetition. Not only am I repeating myself verbally within the classroom, I feel like sometimes I have to come at parents like five different ways. know, like they need an email, they need a poster in the classroom, and they need to hear it from me, you know, in the classroom at the same, like all these different ways until it finally sinks in.
John Kozicki (24:09.476)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (24:18.222)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (24:31.385)
Yeah.
Mandy York (24:31.829)
So I do things like in newsletters, I’ll put out some parent ed pieces within that newsletter. I keep a rack in the studio of pieces that I’ve created and that Music Together has created, the program that I license, so that they can take those at any time if they want to read further. And I remind them that those are there.
John Kozicki (24:39.876)
Okay, okay.
John Kozicki (24:52.238)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (25:02.061)
I throw out education in my social media channels, that kind of thing, right? And then, you know what I used to? I have a TV in the studio that I update. Yeah, I don’t know if you realize that. I update it with a slideshow every once in a while with…
John Kozicki (25:07.554)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (25:18.198)
Mandy York (25:28.279)
kind of, you know, sometimes just posters and pictures, but also like a, you know piece, things like that. And it’s interesting, like sometimes a caregiver will come in and they’ll say, I thought that was really interesting in that email you sent. And you’re like, wow, at least one people, one person read it, you know, you never know. Or they’ll come back, someone will mention the, the parent ed snippet that was on the TV.
John Kozicki (25:34.094)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (25:47.392)
Yeah, yeah.
Mandy York (25:57.378)
They’ll mention it to me in the next class. Someone will say, have you always had that TV? Is that new? Do you know what I mean? Like they never knew the TV was there. This person’s reading it. I, I think that there’s a lot of different ways to do it. And that, in my opinion, I don’t know, it’s just me. I, I put them in all those different channels because depending on the person, someone’s going to read the email. Someone’s going to pick up the flyer.
John Kozicki (25:57.657)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (26:04.182)
Okay, yeah.
John Kozicki (26:21.431)
Okay.
Mandy York (26:27.645)
someone’s going to notice what you wrote on the tape, you know, posted on the screen.
John Kozicki (26:31.116)
Okay, you’ve got, those are all, man, those are all great. Those are all very good practical tactics where, because you mentioned email, you mentioned the TV, and I’m assuming those are like infographics. Okay, and then you mentioned handouts and posters on the wall. So those are,
three really good tactics for parent education where the email is something that maybe they’ll read, maybe they won’t, but it’s at their convenience. The TV screen is something that visually they will see maybe in class at the beginning or after and pick up that.
important information and then the brochures and the posters similar but the brochures or little flyers something that they can they can take home. So I think that gives me ideas on what I could do in my studio because again going back to the areas where I feel like I would like to do a better job with my current families.
in in educating them would be on concepts like progress and practice. Building confidence because one so this is a conversation that I have with parents a lot when it comes to building confidence because again, going back to that, that concept music taking music lessons builds confidence. I agree, but I think like,
If I was a parent and I didn’t know, and I just asked like how, how does music lessons build confidence or like why? I would expect as a parent who’s asking the provider, I would expect a really good answer. And one of the things that I’ve seen in my studio is this belief that, and this is related to our band program and our private lessons.
John Kozicki (29:00.385)
I’ve dedicated a lot of time and focus on making sure that learning a musical instrument and playing in a group setting with other people of your skill level and ability level and developmental level and age level is accessible across the board. And still I have a lot of parents in my studio that believe,
My kid needs to take private lessons to be confident first before they start playing with other people.
John Kozicki (29:39.712)
And I am of the belief that that confidence is actually going, it’s reversed. That confidence is going to come from when they do play music with other people of their skill level. That’s how they’re going to build confidence, not in a, in an isolated lesson room, but when they’re with other kids and they’re seeing other kids making the same mistakes and, know, we’re making different mistakes and they’re
they’re having those interactions. So that’s the building confidence one that I would like to do something with.
Then the last one that I would like to do something with is the concept of reading music and playing by ear.
And how to educate parents that there’s value in both. And there’s value in one or the other at different times in, in a student’s journey as a student, right? And it’s okay if at a certain point a student feels more confident learning by ear than they do reading music.
Because again, we still have a lot of parents who just assume, well, if my kid’s taking music lessons, then they should be learning how to read music. And that’s like the path. So those are the three areas, like the progress and practice thing, the building confidence and the reading music and playing by ear. Any pushback from you on the reading music thing?
John Kozicki (31:22.499)
Hahaha!
Mandy York (31:23.517)
You know what? No, not…
Not in your case, not at the rock school. I do think it’s okay. I I’m coming to terms with this idea, Because ultimately they’re playing an instrument. And honestly, ear training, being able to play by ear is pretty incredible.
John Kozicki (31:40.685)
Hahaha
John Kozicki (31:58.03)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Mandy York (31:58.814)
I’m you know, so if they’re learning that, that’s great. I mean, everyone probably knows my daughter’s in your program and she’s not learning to read music, you know, playing guitar. But she’s she also plays in the school band and she’s learning to read music there, you know, and if so, if it’s a if it’s a goal, if it’s something you want to do, great. But but it doesn’t have to be it doesn’t have to be.
John Kozicki (32:11.192)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (32:24.311)
Right.
And that’s, what you just said is exactly why I feel like I want to educate people because the reading doesn’t have to be the goal, but it can be the goal. If that’s the goal, then yeah, let’s do it. You know, it’s not like we don’t want to, but along with that is whose goal is it? Is it the student’s goal?
Mandy York (32:55.373)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (32:56.811)
Or is it the parents goal? And what is the motivation behind that goal? Right? Because in a situation where a kid is really good at reading music, it makes that path easy. Like, yeah, they’re going to feel good about reading music. And so yes, let’s lean into that. I don’t think anyone would argue with that. Right? Flip that coin in a situation where a kid
is really good at playing by ear.
Should we force them to read music just because? Or should we lean into them learning by ear because they’re gonna feel great about it? And then like over time we can teach them to read.
Mandy York (33:36.045)
Right.
Mandy York (33:42.306)
Yes.
Right. What are the consequences of really forcing that music reading on that student that is having a positive experience and learning to play by ear? I think that’s important to think about, the consequences. I like these points, the areas that you want to educate parents on. And as you were telling me, it made me realize you’ve thought about conversations that you’ve had with your
John Kozicki (34:14.69)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (34:15.469)
parents. Like, you just didn’t decide that, forgive me, I don’t know, like, dexterity, finger dexterity, or whatever is really important. And you want to educate parents and students on like finger exercises or whatever, right? No, you thought about what’s what’s being discussed, what’s coming to you, what’s important to your families, and, and you’re thinking about how to approach that. Right? I like that.
John Kozicki (34:28.928)
Right?
John Kozicki (34:33.462)
Yeah, right.
John Kozicki (34:39.372)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (34:46.207)
I do the same thing, you know. I hear things about, this just, I don’t think my child is ready or I think that they need something more active, you know. And I think about how to approach that and like the language and vocabulary to use. Something I’ve been using a lot lately is I want everyone to let go of their expectations.
about what you think your child should be doing in here. So and so my point in that is like that’s kind of new language for me. I’ve been saying that but in different ways. So for me this parent ed thing is always evolving. I haven’t been giving the same spiel or whatever for 10 years. I’m I’m kind of constantly revising it thinking about the best way to say it. I think that’s a good thing to think about when you are.
John Kozicki (35:16.554)
Right, yes.
John Kozicki (35:26.144)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (35:35.04)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (35:43.661)
kind of planning out how you want to educate your parents. It’s not like, here’s what I want to say and I’m going to put it on a poster and that’s where it’s going to sit for five years. Keep evolving. Keep like thinking about the topic, the problem and how to communicate. I think.
John Kozicki (35:47.775)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (35:55.178)
Right, yeah.
John Kozicki (36:05.186)
Cool, think so this is as we’re recording this, we’re in December. I think what I’m gonna do then for myself is this is gonna be one of my in the new year things. I’m gonna focus a little bit more on because I already do a lot of that parent education before these kids become students. I’m gonna focus a little bit more on parent education with our current students.
Mandy York (36:05.997)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (36:33.847)
Very cool. I love it.
John Kozicki (36:36.332)
Cool, well, thanks for helping me work through that. We’re gonna wrap this episode up, so we’ll see you next time.
Mandy York (36:44.248)
Sounds great. Thanks, John.
