I have very few personal fears about posting onto YouTube. Probably because I have so much confidence in my one point, my mission.

However a do want to address those few fears that I do have. It’s possible you have them as well.

1) Posting Footage of Children Online

My first concern is the privacy of my students. Not only do I not want to post something that they might consider embarrassing later, I don’t want to personally gain from their likeness on YouTube.

I’m getting around this issue in several ways. First, I am very explicit in my studio policies that I record our lesson videos and post them publicly on YouTube and Instagram. They need to let me know within the first two weeks of the semester if they have any stipulations (like not posting names or shielding faces) or simply would prefer I don’t. I also make it clear in the policies why I do this– to share my teaching discoveries with other teachers. Because the videos are for teachers, the audience is teachers.

You might be surprised to hear that of my 25 students only 1 of them asked not to be published online.

At the moment, my entire studio is under the age of 12. As my students grow older I will start discussing the posting directly with them and making sure they are comfortable.

I don’t have plans to post “challenging” lessons online or any video where the student might be percieved as being ‘bad’ or ‘wrong.’ I think lessons like these are important to review and watch, but I think a better place for those videos might be a presentation or a patreon video.

Finally, my channel is not monetized right now. I haven’t made these decisions yet, but it is possible for me to toggle in the future whether I want one of my videos to be monetized or not. I could end up monetizing the videos that just feature me and my thoughts but not monetizing the videos that feature student performances.

2) Teacher Training Before a Teacher Trainer

Another concern I have is the perception that I’m putting the cart before the horse. That I’m posting about teacher training before I have even collected the experience or become a teacher trainer.

This is where my confidence (link) comes in.

In the SAA you aren’t even able to apply to be a teacher trainer until you have tuaght for 10 years or have moved several students through all of the books. I recieved my first unit of training in the Summer of 2014. So in 2.5 years time I will be able to apply to be a teacher trainer. When I do, I will already have needed to collect recitals and lessons from the whole span of repertoire. I’m not going to wait until 2024 to start collecting and really reviewing my footage. That process of refinement needs to start now.

Furthermore, I believe that your mind should always be one dimension ahead of your challenge. When you are a violinist you must think like a teacher in order to get better. And therefore teachers should think like teacher trainers. Putting my archive out on YouTube forces me to think like a teacher trainer.

Finally, just going through the motions of publishing my work helps me to make changes that I otherwise might just sweep under the rug. I clean up the studio, put on my teaching uniform, and prepare the space so that I can invite the student in as well as the camera. They get a better version of me because when I’m documenting I don’t let anythign slide.

3) Fear of failure.

Related to above. I’m afraid that if I operate in public I will lower my credibility. If expert teachers see my teaching on YouTube they might find reasons not to hire me for institutes or workshops.

This is just a fear that will always crop up. It is simply a fear of vulnerability.

And I know from Brene Brown that if I lean into vulnerability, that, in and of itself, will be noble to people. I know that I’m a good teacher. Not the best, but good, decent. I’m going to be vulnerable and share my work because I want the Suzuki community to bring that ethic of sharing over to YouTube. I don’t need to be the best in order for that to happen.

Furthermore, if a trainer or institute director uses YouTube to decide they don’t want to hire me then that is okay. I have more work to do. They saw reality and it didn’t align with their expectations. I’d much rather be hired later for the real skill of my teaching than be given a cosign that I don’t deserve because my teaching was a mystery. It will also be that much sweeter when my skills grow through the roof by doing this exact process.

4) Students won’t experience me as giving them my full attention.

My biggest concern of all… I worry that they think I’ll use them as a means to an end. That the only reason I teach is because I want to be a teacher trainer. That they are only a stepping stone.

I’m afraid that they’ll think the most important relationship is me to YouTube, not me to them.

I worry about this one a lot.

This is the rub in my Enneagram Type 3 personality (ambitious, success oriented) integrating to 6 (loyal, thourough, planning ahead). I’ve talked about this elsewhere (link) but as a 3 it is my life’s work to forsake my own interest and dedicate myself to the safety of a handful of individuals around me. I think of my studio– the literal 25 children I work with every week– to be the most important relationship in my professional life. They are the people who I will spend my decades with. They are the individuals who will shape me into a teacher trainer. They are the individuals who trusted me and believed in me from the beginning. They are everything. I’m constantly asking myself how I could give more back to the studio.

I am scared that they will think I care more about our YouTube videos than our lessons.

I have a few strategies I’m trying, though.

• I don’t do anything with the camera in the lesson. It’s locked on a tripod and I focus exclusively on them
• I send them the lesson footage to use as a reference in their home practice (immediate benefit for them, too)
• I talk up the student and write about what went well when the lesson video is published
• I encourage parents to follow me on social media and share what I share with their own friends and family (celebrate what we have, it’s worth sharing)
• Make sure I’m a better teacher for them every week
• Re-invest in our studio and don’t post about it. Only they know the really, really special parts about being in the studio. The YouTube footage isn’t the highlights, it’s actually the lowlights, the B-sides.

I’m never to take fear completely out of the picture. Fear is inherent in vulnerability. But I’ve named my fears, I’ve named my workarounds, and now it is time to put out the work.

Do any of these fears resonate with you?