Thread: Private lessons --?

I was wondering: If a teacher offers you private lessons, who sets the lesson plan? Do you tell her what you want to work on, or does the teacher make the plan ?

It depends on the style of the teacher and the objective of the student. If the teacher is an expert in a specialized area, it may make sense to let her/him guide the lessons. If you are going for general technique improvement, then I would set a tentative agenda that's open to the possibility of covering something else if the teacher recognizes a different problem needing more urgent attention.

Hi DonnaAnne- It really depends on where you are and what you need- If you are a beginner I would be giving you the basics and set the agenda for the classes. Of course in private classes the instructor can focus directly on you correcting posture, arm and hand placement etc. With more advanced students and budding performers I like to have them give me an idea of what they want to work on or brainstorm with them what aspect of the dance they want to focus on in the private lessons. Then I can tailor the instruction and make it worth their while. Every dancer has specific strengths and weaknesses that they can address systematically in private lessons.Some want to learn about a specific part of the dance such as a prop skill or floor work or drum solo.....or ethnic dance or assistance interpreting a particular piece of music.

What does this teacher have to offer you? and what do you want to learn or improve- that would be a good place to start...

it makes a difference whether or not you have a long term relationship with the teacher too. if the person giving private lessons is a regular instructor you see every week, there is more room for both of you to negotiate- they already know your strengths & weaknesses and know there is time to address each issue in depth.
for one off private lessons, I prefer to let the instructor set the course- i am usually looking for general improvement, so I send a video ahead so they know how i dance & can pick out things they want to work on with me. Usually we end up working on some aspect I wasn't aware of even needing previously, so I feel like if I had directed too much in advance, I would have missed out on that. I can request specific topics if there is an area of specialty I want to learn, but the whole reason I'm going to an instructor is to learn *their* take on what I need to be working on. I do let them know my expectations- because I am remote, it may be 3-6 months before I get another private lesson, so I'd like a little hot-list of things I need to work on between lessons.

What interests you about private lessons with this person? It's important that your goals and the teacher's ability/goals line up well with yours. Also, how familiar are you with this person as dancer/teacher/mentor? If you only met him/her once, you should make sure this person is someone whose style you like, who teaches in a way that works for you, and someone you like; the latter point might seem silly, but you are working in close capacity with him/her.

I'd start off with figuring out what you want to learn/improve and go from there.

You are best to give her some guidence eg I need to work on my xyz or how do I interprete abc? That said once there, generally the teacher leads "No, you cannot work on xyz until you master this" etc

This is the way I've been working things out. The first lesson I went in and did a little improvisation and she told me things that she thought I needed to work on overall. We worked on those for the first lesson. Now we've been working on things that I've asked for and incorporating the things I need to work on into those things.

I also came up with a very specific list of goals for my dancing and sent it before our first lesson.

In one off lessons where I might never get to see the instructor again or will only see them very rarely I usually ask to do a short little improvisational bit and ask them to give me some things to work on.