Teaching!

What an honor to be asked by one of the music faculty to take his class while he needed to be away on a family emergency. Normally I would have asked to change the date of the library instruction because Thursday evening is choir rehearsal for me, a major commitment. But he needed to deal with the death of one parent and the subsequent placing of the other parent in skilled care, and out of state to boot.

Besides, we are winding down the church season. There are only a handful of Sundays left before the choir will disband for the summer. I asked the accompanist to hold down the fort until I could get there - two of the last three pieces they have sung every year and are favorites, so they basically know them from memory.

Then I sketched out what the faculty person wanted. One hour of introducing various resources that will help them find 5 or 6 sources addressing the three topics of the paper (biography, era history, analysis). Then two hours of individual hands-on instruction with the goal of leaving with all the needed resources.

The instruction part went well, and about half the class had taken the master's of music education instruction I had given earlier. All of them are music teachers, so they already know some ways to find resources. I was very encouraged that they asked me excellent and specific questions that led to removing roadblocks and gaining articles and books. We sleuthed our way through bibliographies, encyclopedias, and electronic databases for about 90 minutes.

When everyone felt they either had what they needed or knew where to find it, they slowly began filing out until there were just three students, and we were able to intensely pursue their topics until they found what was required. I enjoyed working more closely with them than I would have normally had a chance to do.

Before I knew it, I was headed for church and choir, arriving just in time for the final run through for Sunday's piece. Nice.