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Writer's pictureRyan Reed

Living Beyond The Edge

Hey everyone, hope all is well. If you are doing marching band now I hope your rehearsals are enjoyable and educational. I just finished up week of 2020 (aka - modified) band camp. I talked with some staff members about the idea of students being beyond their edge this week, and just wanted to share my thoughts with the world. Before that, I want to share a definition of "the edge:"


noun - the outside of an object, area, or surface; a place or part farthest away from the center of something


Read that again, but replace "an object, area, or surface" and "something" with "your comfort zone." I would assume that most of us have heard a saying something along the lines of "learning happens outside your comfort zone." While not all learning happens there, the acquisition of new skills does. Something can't be comfortable (or familiar) if you have never experienced it before. When you have little to no experience with something every repetition of that thing is either brand new or trying to recall how you where successful with that task or skill.


I am in my second year at my current program and we are definitely living beyond the edge right now. Due the current pandemic, we lost a bunch of recruiting (as did everyone else) but we also experienced a lot of turn over due to students pursuing other interests, their families moving, the pandemic itself, or any other number of valid reasons. This has put us in a situation where in our 14 person percussion section, 13 of them are on different instruments than they were last year. While I would normally say this would be super stressful (and maybe in a "normal" year it would be), I think it is really exciting. With it being my second year at the school I had some things I wanted to hit the reset button on anyways, and this made that process much easier and quicker.


The other exciting part of that is that everything is fresh and new. Additionally, the overall attitude of the group is extremely positive as well. The students are making noticeable growth every single day, and we (myself included) are having fun every single day. Now, not every day is as fun as the last and not every day do we experience as much growth. However, because there is a more level ability in the group everyone is noticing the growth they are making. In the short term is the quality where I would usually expect it to be...No. However, the potential length of the road (progress) we can travel is MUCH farther that a lot of groups I have experienced.


I know you may be reading this saying, this all sounds amazing. And while it is pretty awesome. There are challenges in this situation. Almost every student is currently operating beyond their "edge." What exactly does that mean? It means that most of the students are experiencing playing at a level beyond what they have experienced, or thought possible for themselves. Earlier in the post I talked about learning beyond your comfort zone, and those learning experiences being either new or trying to recreate what lead you to be successful. That is the challenge when teaching students who are beyond their edge. They are SUPER inconsistent. Rep to rep you see variances. You can see them check out for a second, mostly to mental fatigue from having to think about almost everything. Day to day is even more different. You can spend an hour working on something, breaking it down and building it up correctly. This was Thursday for me. I did some work with the front ensemble on a phrase of music. I had a marimba out front playing along with the kids, switching between parts to demonstrate whatever needed to be demonstrated. We crushed it. On Friday, it showed up for about 3 reps...talk about frustrating.


Now, that front ensemble is all new on their instrument and only one of the 6 keyboard players played a mallet instrument last year. So yeah they are inconsistent, but those 3 reps it showed up were GOOD. So that tells me they can do it at a really high level. It also tells me that achieving at that level is still very foreign to them. I don't view that as a bad thing, it is just another thing we need to not only let teach them but let them discover. I used the term "monkey see, monkey do" a lot these last 2 weeks. I set up a pad, drum, keyboard and play along with the students almost the whole day. A lot of times the best teacher they have is seeing me doing it, try to replicate what they are seeing and then figuring out what that feels like to them. Again, they then have to replicate that feeling over and over again even though they just experienced it for the first time.


If your group is in this situation where they are super inconsistent, I would encourage you to look back at where they were before this. Maybe they are inconsistent because they are less mature, or maybe because they are beyond their own comprehension of what good is. Either way be patient. If you know me, you know that is not a virtue I readily have available. However, that is an area I am working to grow in. As a young teacher, these inconsistent ensembles drove me crazy. I knew how good they could be, but couldn't understand why they weren't there. Now I know they will get there as long as I put them on the right path.


Lastly, I will say that we as teachers can live beyond the edge as well. I started teaching World Class in 2012. All my experience before that was A class/small high school teaching. I remember being exhausted every day that summer trying to up my game to teach at a level I had never been at before. If you are in your first teaching gig, or first big one, and feel exhausted. Keep pushing. You will expand your comfort zone, and start to operate at a whole other level. Keep pushing, expand your "edge" and the "edge" of those around you, give yourself grace and patience, and keep moving. Great things are ahead for those who do.

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