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James Divine – Music Educator and Motivational Speaker

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Message frequency:  0.41 / week

Message History

There’s an old Newhart Episode where Dr. Switzer is seeing a counseling client. He offers her profound words of wisdom for her problems. “Stop It,” he says. That’s my advice to you. Earlier in my career, I often found myself comparing myself to other teachers. Look at their facilities… I wish I had their students… …

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I’m now closer to 100 than I am to 1. I can remember the days when teachers were respected almost 100% of the time. Parents always had a teacher’s back. Admin always supported the teacher. It was a trinity of leadership to support making the young person a better human being. Although we no longer …

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Air Will Get You There In 90% of cases, brass players are either not using enough volume of air or are not using a fast enough air speed. Check those two things first. Sirens Demonstrate a siren sound on a trumpet mouthpiece (you can obtain these for cheap here). Have brass students perform these in …

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Why do I call it classroom structure and management and not discipline? The word discipline implies that some things are going wrong. I once interviewed for a job where one of the questions was, “It’s the day of the spring concert. Students are running around acting the fool. Nobody is listening and there is complete …

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These tips were developed at a Title 1 school where my classes were very large and the students did not have a good culture of behavior in their other classes. They behaved in mine, but I had to work at it. #1 Pray I’m not kidding! I pray for wisdom on an almost daily basis. …

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