Tag: Saturday satisfaction

When Your Teacher Doesn’t Believe in You

#SaturdaySatisfaction
Since my family is my best companion and environment, I decided to dedicate a separate topic and hashtag on my blog to family matters.

SupportToday’s is a bitter post.
I heard the worst possible thing a teacher can say about a student. Our daughter’s singing teacher doesn’t believe in her. What’s the deal? Our daughter, says the teacher, is very musical, and sings very well, being able to sing without getting influenced by others. In other words, she is very “stable”. Nice!

At the same time, the teacher decided to tell me and the other parents honestly what she thinks of our children’s chances of singing solo songs. She said things about how some children have the “charisma” and the “skill to overcome stage fright”. Then she told us who had those. The youngest ones and the beginners didn’t have them. The rest were OK. Our daughter was put in the beginners’ group. She doesn’t have what it takes. She gets nervous when she needs to sing on the stage. This is what the teacher said.

She saw I wasn’t too happy to hear that, so she went on to give us examples of two of her students with magnificent voices. One of them never won anything at contests, not because she wasn’t any good, but because, you know “some people just don’t have it, they are too slow, and things don’t happen well for them”. The other one never sang solo because she didn’t want to. The only time she did was at her graduation, and she did it just to please her mom. I didn’t feel these examples mattered really. I didn’t see how I can relate to them, especially the second one.

What I heard was that the teacher didn’t believe in our girl.

On the way from there, I started thinking about advice to give my daughter for the coming classes. Believe me, I don’t care for the singing group if my child is miserable. And last year, she showed on many occasions that she was miserable because she didn’t get enough stage time, because she didn’t get a mike and because others had solo songs. The truth is that this child burns for the stage.

Getting back to the advice, I thought, maybe she needs to put some extra efforts and show the teacher that she can sing solo, that she isn’t nervous etc. But then I thought again… I didn’t hear the teacher say that we can overcome the problem with more effort. She didn’t give any assurance like: “We’ll find a way out of this.” or “She will get there with time.” No. Her verdict was final. She doesn’t believe this child has it.

Before I ramble away, let me say one thing. Teachers who didn’t believe in me were just people who worked for the school where I went. I don’t remember them. Maybe they were good, maybe changed the life for some of my classmates. I don’t know. I remember the teachers who believed in me.

I think we’ll cancel singing there.

Saturday Satisfaction

The way this week goes, I need to think up something clever in connection with Saturday, as well. Well, satisfaction to my mind is a pretty accurate attribute of the day.

Sleeping in late, or maybe lingering in bed, even if you have woken up early due to working habits; having a nice and relaxed breakfast and the lack of necessity to do anything in particular… (if that is the case, of course) can be mighty satisfying. Well, it is often the case that we use our weekends to get some “work” done, for lack of time during the week. I guess that is a normal human urge – to get busy with something, to take part, even if we do complain a lot about it.

I’ll admit what I hate about Saturdays. I hate it when people (too general, I know) insist that we go to visit, or that they come to visit. In short, I hate visits, no matter in which direction. It feels like I am wasting my time for relaxation. I hate interaction with people who come by for a coffee and stay for 3 or 4 hours, talking small talk. Oh, yes – I definitely dislike small talk. Not that I have anything particularly “big” to talk about. I hate it if we go over to their place, although we may leave any time we want. Ha! – in fact, with this type of people, it is not so easy to leave. They say: “Oh, why so early? Stay and let’s talk.” Beyond all my powers of patience (which are very scarce) is behaviour of the sort – “Why do you want to go home? What are you going to do there?” If you make the mistake of suggesting anything, say – “we need to do some cleaning”, they go like, “Oh, you’ll do it, no need to hurry. What are you going to clean? Your house is so small, you’ll be ready in no time. What else?” Well – maybe now it’s hahaha, but I’m sure a lot of us have been there, right. 😉

So, the Saturdays I get the most satisfaction are those that I spend with three living beings only (one is a cat). No arrangements, no appointments and thus – no arguments. My husband will confirm on the last one.

So far, this has been such a Saturday. Enjoy it, have the satisfaction you are looking for and don’t forget to kiss your most beloved living beings today, as well!