1.5. Teacher Psychological Preparation. Empathy and non-verbal communication

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1 E For students at first experience it is sufficient to provide an instrument of little value, without providing too much attention to the features of the various components. F It is possible to rent, from makers of confidence, instruments of small sizes already full of the various accessories; it should be good practice the teacher advises families about this opportunity. QUESTION No. 3 Tick one or more correct sentences A It is necessary a violin teacher decides to take a certain kind of shoulder pad for each student. B The choice of a type of shoulder pad suitable for a student may not be effective for another student. C Parents learn over the years of study of their child how to take care of the instrument. It is quite premature to provide early information on the maintenance of the violin. D You do not need to show parents how to tune the violin: the child will soon learn to do alone. E The teacher must devote time to show parents the structure of the violin, to speak about its maintenance and its tuning, so that they can check the good functioning and facilitate the training of the child at home. STIMULATION FOR REFLECTION Consider the importance or not of being updated teachers on the opportunities and teaching materials available to teach the violin to children Teacher Psychological Preparation. Empathy and non-verbal communication... they should not worry about how we have to do to educate (teach), but just about how we have to be to educate (teach) Don Milani Teaching violin, like any musical and extra-musical discipline, can not be conceived as a mere transmission of concepts and skills. Teaching violin is part of a broader educational contest related, for many aspects, to child s inside. It must always be clear, both for the teacher and for the student, that music should not be identified with a single instrument, and that you can make music in different ways. For this concept requires conceptual maturity and a cultural mediation, till when it will not be possibile to make it comprehensible to the students, to fail in violinist experience will be for him a defeat that does not concern - as for the adult - a single instrument, but the musical expression tout court. Teaching violin, therefore, is part of an education to expression, but 18

2 also it contains much more. Child learns, through violin, education to self-discipline, to resist to failures, to judge the necessity to express himself stronger than any fear, to assess the beauty in every detail, to be with others and to play with them in mutual feeling compliance and intrinsic diversity. Instrumental didactics appear, increasingly, in recent years, because of the numerous scientific discoveries, concerning the lateralization skills of the brain, as global education of the human being. To carry out a so complex operation for the teacher, it will not be sufficient to know the technique of his instrument and to be a virtuose. A concept, as perfect it could be, to be accepted by the student, must be: o comprehensible according to the level of student s language; o to arrive at the right time; o to be conveniently reinforced; o to contain strong elements of artistic and human motivation. For the discoveries on the role of mirror neurons confirm that imitation is a very powerful engine that pushes students to imitate their teacher, it is clear that the teacher can not ask students to behave differently from him. At the same time, if the teacher does not feel his student s mood, it will be impossible to see in him the moment and the appropriate way to advance his own comments, suggestions and encouragements. It is clear that empathy and ability in communication are the most important conditions for those who would like to teach. To konw himself is teacher s first step in the long journey towards this goal Empathy, i.e. the intuition of the others inner world Empathy is focusing on the inner world of our interlocutor and the ability to feel what charges him up, how he feels in a situation and what he really proves beyond what he expresses orally. Empathy is the ability to read between the lines, to capture the emotional spies, to grasp even non-verbal signal indicators of a state of mind and guess which is the value of an event for the interlocutor, without being guided by own schemes of meaning attribution. The intellectual understanding focuses on the facts, investigates how things really are and reconstructs the exact dynamics of the events. Empathic understanding is more subtle and complex than intellectual, and requires a very fine and rare sensitivity. The components of empathy are: 19

3 Transparency It is the agreement between the feelings expressed and those really felt. If the interlocutor perceives transparency, opens with confidence, otherwise closes to defend himself. Transparency does not mean to reveal all the feelings impulsively, but implies not to simulate a feeling when, actually, you feel another, because the interlocutor would capture the dissonance. Emphatetic understanding and unconditional acceptance. Empathic understanding consists in identiying yourself in the interlocutor to understand his point of view, without assuming it as yours, but maintaining selfcontrol: a nurse who lowered in the clothes of the sick, suffering the grief for his sufferings, would make the sick more emotionally felled instead of offering him support. The unconditional acceptance consists of the abstention from valuations, approvals or disapprovals, from corrections. Empathetic understanding implies the suspension of moral judgement on feelings reported by the interlocutor: the listener neither measures the compliance with the rules nor indicates the right way to behave. Empathetic Listening does not impose a directive, but put the other in the condition to explore himself, to find his truth Empathy Test The following test can check your level of empathy, that is the ability to understand what another person is feeling at emotional level. The empathy draws an attitude towards the others, characterized by an intellectual understanding of the other, leaving out personal inclinations, like sympathy, antipathy or moral judgements. 1. Do you participate the joys and sorrows of people near you? Rarely Usually yes Often 2. Has it ever happened to you to feel restless or troubled and not to know why? 3. Can you express your state of mind? Rarely Usually yes Often 4. Can you perceive the others mood quickly? 5. Has it ever happened to you that someone told you that you can not understand his emotions or feelings? 20

4 6. Has it ever happened to you to be confused about the emotions you feel? 7. When a friend of yours is suffering you feel Sadness Concern Indifference 8. When a friend of yours is very happy for something you feel Indifferente Happiness for her/him Happiness in general 9. A baby who cries causes you Annoyance/Indifferente Concern Pain 10. Has it ever happened to you to prove a strange uneasiness that you can not define? 11. When someone in your family is sad, are you the first to feel it? 12. Do you feel surprised when a friend or a family member reveals you to be particularly sad? 13. When you tell about your own experience do you merely talk about the facts without describing the emotions you felt? 14. Do you move easily facing people s suffering? 15. Has it ever happened to you to cry watching a very sad or romantic movie? 16. Do you feel uncomfortable speaking of your state of mind with others? 21

5 17. What do you feel when you see a person in difficulty? Nothing Concern Sadness 18. Are you able to get "in shoes" of others? 19. Has it ever happened to you to be surprised for your inability to prove strong emotions in intense and involving situations? 20. Has it ever happened to you to prove a boost to do something when you meet a person in difficulty? Non verbal communication1 The individual, to grow, to live, to be an adult, to become aware of his existential experience, must relate to the others, to communicate, that is taking and providing information, to express ways of thinking and being, using different verbal and nonverbal languages. Communication is an essential condition of life, of social order and mental health. The human development proceeds always as an organization and structure of different ways of communication, according to a gradual adaptation to the world around. If the communication process is blocked or made problematic, the individual faces difficulties that often, wrongly, rather than be reported to the system of communication, are designated according to specific psycho-pathological frameworks, out of context and free from the social conditions which determined them. Every action, educational or therapeutic, must therefore bring back to the analysis of communicative modalities between its players. In therapeutic field, the changement of the patient is determined by the change of patient-therapist relationship, through the development of transfer and backtransfer dynamics, as well as in educational field, the development of the child is guaranteed by a good educative alliance between adult - child, where form and content of communication have the same importance. Music is, par excellence, the land of both types of communication. The text above stresses that there can not be a real change in the capacity of the student, if there is not a good educational alliance with his teacher. (...) "The relationship that must be built is like that existing between the athlete and his coach, not at all devoid of strength and hardness, but never destructive." 1 Franco Nanetti, La comunicazione non verbale, in Psicopedagogia del Movimento Umano, Armando Editore, Roma, 1996, p.55 22

6 Child matures his character through a large number of interchanges. In the great love that binds the adult and the child, he is the former who has to express his feelings intentionally. "This exchange begins with the enthusiastic attention of the adult, that the child returns passionately ( ). The values and attitudes are bornig here, prior to any symbolic representation. Child s emotions, now combined with models of response, provide a constant and continuous comment to his behavior. Desires, expectations and intentions are converted into patterns of meaning, with emotion which acts as a guide among the increasingly complex difficulties of life "3. This dynamic is not only a moment of life in relationship with the others. It is necessary, at this point, to define human communication and, within this, the role of non-verbal languages: The human communication is an intersubjective event, which includes the exchange of messages both explicit and implicit and therefore it achieves also when there is a pre-formed purpose, i.e. there is no awareness in the intent to communicate. Behaviour (...) is a communicative act. The communicative process - for behavior is communication and it is impossible not to communicate can not be meant unidirectional, from the speaker to who listens, but as an interactive process, where the saying and doing of each individual influences and is always influenced by the saying and doing of the other person you are in relation with. In a relational system, therefore, any way of conduct, conscious or inconscious, determines effects both direct and feedback on the other members of the system (often, in a situation of disagreement, the attempt of a member of the relational system to punctuate repeatedly a message sending a sequence of constant communication, responds to the need to blame the other). The relational message, although usually - being analogic - is unpredictable and indeterminate, influences the behaviour of the others more than the message content. In other words, non-verbal communication, while having logic syntax and metalinguistic comment, has, in human communication, a high semantic potential (in the codification through the verbal) and pragmatic (the pragmatics of human communication has, as object of studying, the analysis of the communication s effects on the behaviour). 2 There are certain assumptions that may facilitate a successful relationship with the student, especially with the smallest: the action of the child is, for him, a source of meaning and therefore expression of his desires (...). 2 Franco Nanetti, La comunicazione non verbale, in Psicopedagogia del Movimento Umano, Armando Editore, Roma, 1996 pp

7 to give children the widest area of freedom to express themselves at a symbolic register level. (...) The teacher should privilege an atmosphere of participant understanding, stating, in advance, that there are not given judgments of value neither technical nor, indeed, aesthetic and ethical to the spontaneous acting of each one. 3 To act and to make act for fear of anger means limiting one s own emotional world irreparably. Questionnaire 1.5 Teacher Psychological Preparation. Empathy and non-verbal communication QUESTION No. 1 Tick one or more correct sentences A Violin teaching goes beyond the technical knowledge for the student. The teacher is also responsible for the human development of his learner. B You have to use technical language with the student and do not matter if he does not understand. C A violin teacher must be very careful about the way and the words he uses to explain the concepts to his student. D The state of mind of the student has nothing to do with the teaching of the instrument. E The violin teacher is an educator in the global growth of the learner. QUESTION No. 2 Tick one or more correct sentences A For a teacher of violin, it is not required particular sensibility towards his students. B The empathy allows you to read beyond the surface, to understand the emotions arising in another human being. C The communication between teacher and student is the key for the development of a relationship of confidence between the two. D The proposed test on empathy (see 1.5.2) allows you to evaluate the characteristics of your students. E The verbal communication is the first and most important factor of teacher-pupil ralation. 3 Franco Nanetti, La comunicazione non verbale, in Psicopedagogia del Movimento Umano, Armando Editore, Roma, 1996 pp

8 STIMULATION FOR REFLECTION How is your relationship with your students? Do you agree with what was said in the chapter on empathy? 25