Learning is Social

Image by Flora Lim

As social animals, we have brains that are wired for connection. Whether you’re an introvert or an extrovert, social interactions are essential for your psychological and emotional well-being.

Our Social Brains

Everything that we learn to do or understand is because of someone or something else. There’s even a part of our brain that is activated to look for and study social cues, probably because we depend on others for safety, well-being and learning.

Going Against the Forces of Nature

And yet when it comes to music, the majority of it happens one-on-one. This goes against every other kind of learning. So what makes music so special that the standard seems to be one-on-one private lessons? The truth is that it isn’t. In fact, I would even argue that the traditional model of one-on-one learning is exactly why so many young music students drop out in their first year.

Our Recipe for Engaged Music-Learning

At Thrive, we’ve discovered that the recipe for classes full of happy, engaged young musicians and their grown-ups is knowing that they belong to a studio community that supports and accepts them as they are on their good days as well as on their bad ones too. And you as a parent are involved in every class. So whether it’s in one of our EXPLORE Kindermusik classes or our EXCITE Inspiration collaborative piano classes, you get to deeply connect with how your child is learning in ways that strengthen your relationship.