Learning to catch your own mistakes

Today I’d like to talk about a common struggle that I’ve noticed in piano lessons, in the hopes that it helps others on their piano journey. I’ve noticed that the students who have the hardest time in piano lessons are the ones who wait for me to tell them if they’ve played their song correctly, rather than actively listening to themselves and trying to catch their own mistakes. Why does this happen? And what can we do about it?

I don’t really think it’s the learner’s fault that this happens. I think they’re actually trying to be a good student! In traditional educational settings, including piano lessons, the teacher is positioned as the authority and the student is positioned as the learner. As such, it’s common for teachers to take this more authoritative approach where it’s expected that the teacher provides feedback and the student simply listens.

While this is a common approach to piano lessons, I don’t think it helps a student build any confidence as a musician or independence as a learner.

This is why I make a point very early in our lessons of building a practice or habit of talking with my student about how they feel they played a piece after their performance. This can be a little uncomfortable for the student at first, as few are experienced in listening to themselves play—or even realize that they should be! But if I maintain a habit of asking these kinds of questions in our lessons, my students learn to expect them and listen to themselves more closely so they can be prepared to have a conversation about it afterwards.

This is when I get to witness some really amazing changes in their playing!

As a student becomes more comfortable listening to themselves play, they actually gain more confidence in catching their own mistakes. This starts a wonderful feedback loop, because being able to catch and fix your own mistakes builds significant confidence at the piano, and that confidence propels students to experiment with more complex pieces. This is why I believe that learning to catch and fix your own mistakes is one of the first signs of growing musicianship, and one of the first skills I try to encourage.

If you rely on your teacher a lot for feedback, I wonder if it impacts your enjoyment of piano lessons? If so, I hope this reflection encourages you to listen to your own playing a little more closely. Consider asking your teacher for more opportunities to comment on your own work. If this skill is initially difficult for you, try not to feel discouraged — you’ve just been taught one way of learning and it gets easier with time.

You have an exciting opportunity to grow here! Good luck!