EE Band Talk Episode 11: Teacher Fatigue, SEL, and Nick Averwater of Amro

The new buzzword is fatigue

[00:02:34] Charlie: As I continue to chat with directors around the nation, I’m hearing this word fatigue more and more. Tim, you never get fatigued, do you? Tim: No, but you have physical fatigue, mental fatigue, emotional fatigue. They said when we push against something that can’t move, it’s a waste of energy and we get fatigued. A lot of us are pushing against something we can’t control. But the water goes around the rocks, not into the rocks. Paul: I go to bed at 5:30 now. We get together once a week, but we talk to plenty of teachers. That seems to be the new word — fatigue.

[00:04:39] Charlie: After every class and before the next, teachers have to get out the sanitizer spray, clean off all the chairs and stands and doorknobs. Paul: A huge additional responsibility on top of being under such stress — we’re talking about kids’ safety here with a lot of unknowns. And the other fatigue: isolation. Music teachers don’t get to interact even with other teachers like before. We’re all social-connecting humans — this is counter to that.

Music teachers as islands

[00:05:46] Charlie: In so many cases music teachers are the island. There may be classroom teachers, counselors, administrators they’ve developed a relationship with, but those people aren’t there to connect anymore. Tim: The band room, the choir room, the orchestra — that’s the place you hang out, meet in the morning, eat lunch when you’re not supposed to. Without that physical environment we have to look for alternatives. I have a friend that calls me almost every week. If you don’t call him, what’s going on?

[00:07:11] Paul: In many schools the music, art, and phys-ed teachers are the special teachers — they meet hundreds of kids each week and tend to bond together. Our music teachers don’t even have that opportunity to connect with their art and phys-ed pals like they normally do. So that’s part of the isolation — they miss the entire staff, the teachers.

Social-emotional learning and the trunk of the tree

[00:08:00] Paul: We’ve been hearing about SEL — social-emotional learning. There’s also what I’d call SET, social-emotional teaching. How teachers are going to have to teach to the social-emotional situation kids and parents are in. Tim: Scott Edgar’s book a year ago started addressing it — I did the foreword. Now it’s louder than ever. SEL is setting the stage for ultimate learning. The trick in our arts situation is to create a culture that’s safe, challenging, and encouraging. Then the music can be taught.

[00:10:00] Charlie: We can go back to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs — kids need to feel safe and a part of something before they’re ready to learn. Tim: When the teacher is ready, the students will appear. You have to find a common detente zone where we trust each other enough to unleash emotion into the music. You can play Hot Cross Buns with emotion. Paul: This will become a big part of our new elementary program. Distance learning for a kindergartener is almost impossible.

[00:13:00] Paul: In music there are certain things we do that are social-emotional push-buttons — like learning every student’s name at the beginning of the year. That’s a comfort-zone thing. Great teachers make it a point to learn every kid’s name, a little bit of background. So when that kid walks in their class, they feel special.

Edutainment and the YouTube fifth-grader

[00:14:12] Charlie: Tim, does that mean those days of sit down, shut up, put the horn to your face and enjoy this are over? Tim: The era of “my way or the highway” — stricter, meaner, the better — is over. We don’t teach as we’re taught to teach, we teach as we’re taught. Charlie Mangini was a victim of my first-year dictatorship. People confuse boundary-setting with weakness. It’s not entertainment — it’s creating an environment that’s safe.

[00:16:18] Charlie: Let’s hope education stays at the forefront and doesn’t become edutainment — entertaining kids at the expense of discipline. Paul: Today’s fifth graders live on YouTube. General music teachers tell us it’s very difficult to keep them focused without eye rolls. Project-based work is one creative response.

[00:19:31] Charlie: I read the other day that on television for kids shows there’s a reaction point every 14 seconds. Paul: You’ve got to be good at that as a teacher. Charlie: We’re in that river swimming with everybody.

Steve Smith — make videos, keep it simple

[00:20:36] Steve: Things used to happen in a vacuum. You couldn’t see other marching bands or drum corps as easily as nowadays. That’s helped teachers understand what’s possible. In EEI land we have this technology tool, and teachers nowadays think “that’s going to be one of my eight things my district is having us use.” We’ve been talking a lot about how to use EEi not as a for-now type of thing but as a hybrid — how can you continue to use this when things get back to normal?

[00:22:38] Steve: One thing I’ve seen teachers do is make a weekly video where they just kind of talk — connect with their kids on a personal level. Have a video about their life at their house, their dog on screen saying hi. Kids love getting inside the teacher’s mind. It’s not easy to connect over Zoom. Today is National Body Language Day, by the way — we should have practiced. So the content really does have to be, and sometimes it doesn’t have to just be the music. Get a little more personal.

[00:27:15] Steve: Quick tips for video — keep it simple, do what you can do. I was at Vandercook doing a tech session for ten people; I asked how many cameras do we have in this room. Phone, iPad, laptop — amongst ten people we had 27 video cameras. Make a video with your phone. Put it on Google Drive. The beauty of sharing things in EEi is you can get that link, put it in there, and send it to just your clarinets or just your flutes — it’s already pre-sorted by section.

[00:29:00] Steve: Be the source of positivity. If every time you put a video up or talk to them on Zoom you’re providing positivity — that may be the most important thing you’re doing right now as a teacher. They’re hearing things that aren’t going well left and right at home; if you can be the person that’s like “this is positive,” they’ll want to come to you.

Reaching parents through EEi

[00:30:55] Paul: A great idea — do a video to parents through EEi. My wife being a teacher, I always maintain no parent doesn’t pay attention when you’re paying their kid a compliment. “I had your son send in his first video and we’re so excited about it” — that goes a long way with a parent. Probably the best way we can communicate with parents in the situation we’re in.

[00:31:56] Steve: We do have a parent part of EEi. I don’t think we talk about it enough. Parents can log into EEi and see what’s going on with their kid. They’re going to need some help on this — even my own kid who’s pretty with-it technology-wise, and me, we’ve had struggles. Don’t feel like you’re burdening the parents by contacting them, especially from a positive standpoint. We always had a goal when I taught — our first interaction with a parent should be positive, no matter what.

[00:34:00] Charlie: When we compliment parents or students, we have to be really specific about something they did well. Not the judge’s comments for all occasions — “I never believed I’d ever hear a band sound like that” — which could go either way. It’s got to be sincere. Good teachers know how to do that.

Nick Averwater — 100 years of Amro Music

[00:35:24] Charlie: I’ve got one of America’s premier school music dealers joining us. He’s the vice president and band department manager at Amro Music, Memphis’ number-one music store — Nick Averwater. Nick: Honored to be here with such a star-studded roster.

[00:36:49] Nick: Next April marks 100 years — 1921. The company was founded by my great-grandfather Mill, who was on his way from Cincinnati to L.A. seeking his fame and fortune, ran out of money, stopped in Memphis, opened a piano studio, and just ended up staying. He wrote one of the first jazz method books. Amro survived the Great Depression — we have recordings of him talking about trading milk and eggs to make it through, and what it’s like being a business owner during World War II. Even a couple of times he had to relocate the address of Amro Music, which we now refer to as being evicted.

[00:38:00] Nick: Today we employ 80 families. We have eight ed reps who drive 7,000 miles a week to service the needs of school programs across five states. A lot of them are small farming communities dotting the Mississippi Delta. We’re a fourth-generation, family-owned, locally operated company. I go to work every day with my dad — he refers to himself as the custodian but he’s our chairman. My cousin CJ is company president; I’m vice president.

[00:40:01] Nick: It took me about two weeks of spring 2020 to mentally wrap my head around what was happening. We threw the playbook out and transitioned to a new business model for serving school band and orchestra programs. “Consistently inconsistent” is the terminology I landed on — right here in Memphis, Shelby County Schools is completely online while surrounding municipalities have returned in person. School districts streets apart with completely different approaches.

[00:42:35] Paul: Within that, one of the toughest challenges is beginners. Where do most of your schools start? Nick: Sixth grade is the most common in our area — mostly middle school or junior high. The challenges are unique per district: building-level guidelines that may differ from the high school, space, scheduling. Arkansas has the strictest set of guidelines — outside, limited time, bell covers, masks, sanitizing. If you ever questioned whether educators were masters of improv, this semester has shown that to be true.

Partnership, decompression, and the why

[01:00:42] Nick: Partnerships between education and the music industry are vital. At Amro Music our goal is to help educators spend more time on the podium and less time dealing with distractions — a low-quality instrument, the student who didn’t get what they needed, a repair taking too long. These are all distractions that cause a director to step off the podium. Amro Music ceases to exist if we don’t have vibrant music programs in our communities. That’s what educators want too. We can have a really incredible partnership.

[01:03:30] Tim: What do you do to stay positive and decompress? Nick: I do exercise pretty regularly — half marathons, working out, that’s my me time. My wife is generous; she lets me step away — although she says it needs to be between six and seven o’clock in the morning. And I feed off the energy of others. We’ve got a great team at Amro Music. Charlie: Rumor has it Amro does the best barbecue in Memphis. Nick: Stiff competition here, but a few of us know our way around the smoker.

[01:04:39] Nick: Stay focused on your why. Why did we get in? Why are we doing this? It’s so easy to lose sight of that right now because there’s so much noise. If we stay focused on the why, we’ll come out of this better people — more understanding, caring, and loving.

Signing off

[01:05:16] Charlie: Nick Averwater, keep up the great work. Thank you for all you do to help band directors through this time. Nick: Until next time, gentlemen, y’all have a wonderful day.

[01:06:30] Charlie: Another great show. Thanks for taking time to join us for Essential Elements Band Talk. Tell your friends about the podcast, about the EEi blog at eeiblog.com, and the Essential Elements Teachers group on Facebook. Dr. Tim, Paul, Steve — you guys make this special. Until next week, this is your host, Dr. Charlie Mangini, saying thanks for listening.