Lisa Toner

Lisa Toner teaches violin, viola, chamber music, and the Alexander Technique. She has a Bachelors of Violin Performance from Western Washington University, where she performed in the scholarship string quartet. Her curiosity about teaching and learning led her to start taking Suzuki teacher training in 2008, and to the University of Washington, where she completed a Masters of Educational Psychology in 2011. For her masters thesis, she synthesized educational research, music pedagogy, and learning theory and did an in-depth, three-year study about her own teaching, a process which was immensely rewarding and set a strong foundation for her career. She has studied Suzuki pedagogy with Cathy Lee, Teri Einfeldt, Mark Bjork, and Edmund Sprunger.

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The Problem with “Relax”: Using the Alexander Technique to Develop a More Clear Teaching Vocabulary

by Lisa Toner

You have tension. Just relax! Shoulders down. Relax your arm. Play from your back. Stand up straight. Get out of your head! Get into your body. Perhaps you have heard messages like this on your journey to becoming a better… Read more ▶

Teaching, Technique, Tension
ASJ 52.4, page 15