By Edmund Sprunger
It was a bright and crisp winter afternoon in Matsumoto in the early 1980s when Suzuki rounded up those of us who were practicing in the kaikan to go with him to a nearby café for cheesecake and coffee. His treat. Suzuki, luxuriating in coffee, cheesecake, and tobacco, took long drags on his Camel-loaded pipe and talked about what really mattered to him: ending wars. There were other occasions—at conferences, and such—in which I heard him talk about his mission being to eliminate weapons from the planet, but that afternoon was the one I will never forget.
Nurturing by love.
Eliminating wars.
It’s a monumental agenda. Although he was dead serious about it, he didn’t talk about it very often. I don’t ever remember him telling a student, “Practice this so that wars end,” or “I’m going to give you chocolate so no one will use a nuclear weapon again.” Instead, he delivered the message indirectly. His emphasis was on nurturing and the environment.
It was a wise move, as slogans don’t get the job done. I think that adults sometimes resort to telling children how they should feel because they don’t know what else to do. But merely telling children how to feel pushes the problem down to the people who have the fewest resources and skills to do anything about it. It’s as if we forget that they’re children.
We don’t create loving human beings by telling them to be loving human beings, we do it by creating a nurturing environment around them. A crucial part of that environment is the fortifying relationships that children have with adults.
The focus of this article is on how teachers nurture children by love. The environment has the biggest impact on how a child grows, and its essential feature is the child’s relationships with important adults.
A key element of the relational environment is the teacher’s mind, because it’s the teacher’s mind that will generate how the teacher nurtures the student in a lesson. I will elaborate on how the teacher’s mind perceives the child’s mind, how it breaks the task of learning music into manageable chunks, and how the teacher’s mind helps the child process frustrations until the child is gradually able to digest them alone.
The Child’s Mind
“Nurturing by love” can be easily misunderstood. It does not mean smiling a lot. Nor does it mean measuring our success by whether or not children are always smiling. It also doesn’t mean giving children exactly what they want at all times. Sometimes what they need is different from what they want (an idea that doesn’t only apply to children.)
What “nurturing by love” does mean is remembering that the child in front of us has a mind that is different from ours. There are other ways to state the same thing, such as the child has a “unique heart,” an “individual soul,” or a “special life force.” In this article, I will be talking about the child’s “mind.”
What is it that we’re nurturing by love?
We’re nurturing the child’s mind.
More specifically, we’re nurturing the child’s developing mind, a mind that will be shaped by experiences, primarily experiences with important people in their lives. The goal is not to make a child have the teacher’s mind, the parent’s mind, or even Suzuki’s mind. The goal is to give the child opportunities to construct his own mind.
The idea that every child has a unique mind feels like an important point to make because, over the years, I have been increasingly troubled by what I think of as an overuse of “I” statements. What began with good intentions—communicating what the speaker is feeling instead of telling the listener what they are or should be feeling—has evolved into critiques like the following: “Jimmy, I really liked how you took time to place the bow quietly on the string before you played, and I’m very impressed that you learned all the notes this week! Oh! And I almost forgot to mention that I was absolutely delighted that you remembered to let your bow float in the air at the end of the piece!”
In many ways, it’s a wonderful bit of feedback. I can imagine a child (and accompanying parent) basking in the glow of those words from a teacher. Nevertheless, such comments run the risk of communicating that what’s important about practicing and playing is satisfying the teacher. There are many positive alternatives to this kind of feedback, and, indeed, an entire article—or even book—could be written about them.
When it comes to nurturing a child by love, I want to give the kind of feedback that recognizes that the child has his own mind. I want to take myself out of it. Instead, I aim to speak about the child’s accomplishment, how the instrument works, or the process the child was engaged in. I might ask how it felt for him to let his bow float in the air at the end, or I might ask him how he remembered to place his bow on the string before starting. I might say “Hey! You didn’t know these notes last week, and now you do!” I like to give feedback that takes into account that a child has his own thoughts and feelings about things, and that his thoughts and feelings are worth acknowledging.
Certainly there’s a place for the teacher’s mind, but I want to make sure that I make room for the child’s. It’s part of the reason I begin every lesson by asking the child some form of the question, “What would you like to learn today?” In no way am I abdicating my teacher role, nor am I disposing of my mind. I’m communicating that there is space for both of our minds in the lesson. If I don’t check in with the child, there’s the danger that the child will end up feeling like a car that’s taken into the shop for repairs: turn the playing on, check out the weird sound, fix it, then turn it back on again to see if it’s fixed. It’s a sequence that’s all too familiar in music lessons.
I recently saw an interview with someone who won a major, world-class competition decades ago. As the winner and the interviewer watched a video of a round of the competition, the performer said something like “My teacher and I worked and worked until I could play this section exactly the way my teacher wanted it.”
Did those lessons help the student win the competition? It sounds to me like they might have, but I immediately thought of how the teacher was imposing their mind on the student. I also wondered how those kinds of moves on the part of teachers and parents can get in the way of a student getting in touch with their own musical mind; what we might also call their “voice.” And it also occurred to me that this kind of teaching may have had an impact on why someone can win such a huge competition and then disappear into the shadows.
A Mind Under Construction
We’re not only nurturing by love when we acknowledge the child’s mind, we’re also nurturing musical creativity, expression, and artistry. The three go together as our students are in the process of constructing their lives.
It can be useful to think of childhood as a construction zone in which one of the major projects for children is constructing their minds. Parents and teachers certainly provide the conditions under which that construction can happen.
What are the components of the minds that children are constructing? I have shelves of books in my study that answer that question, but, in brief, children are generating templates that they will use in order to function in the world.
They construct these templates by grappling with questions that include—but are not limited to—the following: What’s that over there? What’s this here? What’s happening to me? What can I have? What can I not have? How do I get what I don’t have? What do I do about what I can’t ever have? Who loves me? Who do I love? What even is love? What are limits? How do I deal with limits?
You get the idea. It’s not shallow stuff, even though it’s basic.
While it may seem obvious that each child has a mind that is under construction, I’m afraid it’s not as obvious as one might wish. In fact, a few years back, a highly accomplished Suzuki teacher who did extensive training over many years and with several trainers told me, “You were the only trainer where the focus of observations and the discussions were on what the student was doing and thinking rather than what the teacher was doing or thinking.” This teacher went on to say, “I think that the norm is that we are focused on the delivery and communication of what the teacher is doing rather than how the student is exploring and developing their own understanding.”
Nurturing by love means having an appreciation of the child’s mind and an interest in the way that child is “exploring and developing their own understanding.” Nurturing this way requires us to think about what is going on with the child emotionally and psychologically, rather than only focusing on the specific and concrete behaviors we want the child to be able to execute. In other words, if a child is struggling, a teacher who is nurturing by love is going to realize that the child has a mind—an inner world—and that appreciating that inner world could prove helpful for lessons.
It also means that rather than jumping to generalizations such as “Well, you know seven-year-old boys” or “They’re just tired,” or “That’s a twelve-year-old girl for you,” we think a little bit deeper about what might be going on in the inner world of this particular child.
If you were to say to me “But I’m not a therapist,” I would say, “You are correct.”
I would also be quick to add that if you combine your own mind with your heart and empathy, you will likely get a sense of what might help that child. Besides, even if you are a therapist, in such scenarios, it’s typical not to know which path to take right away. However, if we ask ourselves questions and if we can sit with not knowing, solutions can emerge over time.
A major way to find a solution is to observe the child. We can listen—or, perhaps, “listen”—for very specific things by asking ourselves questions such as “Who is this child?” “What is she telling me about herself?” “What is difficult for her? What does she find gratifying about playing? What does she want to be able to do but finds she can’t do right now?” “What kinds of solutions are presenting themselves today?”
I phrased those questions not as questions to ask the child but as questions to ask ourselves. It’s certainly an option to ask those kinds of questions of the child, and if I think a child can answer them, I’ll definitely take the direct route.
Oftentimes, however, the child can’t tell us with words. The answers come out in actions, and we’re most likely to find answers to those questions if we’re looking for them.
We’re unlikely to find them if the most prominent questions in our minds are along the lines of “What is she doing wrong?” “How do I think this should go?” and “What skills are missing?” I want to quickly add that those kinds of questions have an important place in a teacher’s mind, but they don’t really contribute to the focus at hand, which is nurturing the child’s mind.
We can ask students directly, but we’re likely to get answers to our questions through observing a student’s actions.
Monitoring and Observing
I’ve always enjoyed noticing when a student has trouble with something he’s playing and then remaining silent as that student works it out. A common scenario is when a passage doesn’t go the way he wanted it to, and he then goes back and plays it again and gets stuck. If I’m silent, the student typically keeps working at it until he gets it.
There are a couple of challenges with these moments. The student may feel that we are abandoning him by being silent as he struggles. Another danger is that by telling him the answer, he gets irritated because we interrupt his thinking process. When I’m not sure what the student wants and needs from me, I will sometimes say “Do you want time to figure that out, or do you want help from me?” Even just asking the question, though, can interrupt the student’s train of thought, so I’m most likely to remain silent and then comment after he has worked out whatever he was struggling with by saying “You worked that out by yourself, but did you want me to help?” The answer is almost always a resounding “No!” We teachers often worry that the child will get too frustrated, so we tell him. But the children, I often find, take pleasure in solving the puzzle at hand.
Too often, teachers think they’re only teaching if they’re talking or demonstrating. A larger part of the teacher’s job is monitoring and observing how the child is learning. We’re also teaching when we create an environment in which the child can work without comment and come up with her own solutions. Part of Suzuki’s genius was noticing how children learned best, which is how he decided to model his teaching on how children learn their first languages. When we observe a child working and we stay out of the child’s way, we’re working in the same spirit.
When someone who is important in a child’s life sees the child as capable of solving problems, that experience lives on in the child’s mind. The idea of “growth mindset” is an important one, but these moments in a lesson in which the teacher admires the child’s work and then commends it help a child to develop such a mindset much more profoundly than merely telling a child “You need to have a growth mindset,” or explaining the research, although I find it compelling.
Attunement
Much of what I have included in this article could be summed up in the word “attunement,” meaning that we tune in to the child’s experience and work in a way that is congruent with that experience.
The way Suzuki developed the Book One repertoire is a brilliant example of attunement in action. Through his constant observation of children and their reaction to his teaching, he developed a plan for introducing violinistic skills step by step; and he found pieces that taught those skills. If the students didn’t like the pieces, he got rid of them until he found a similar piece that the students did like. When he couldn’t find such a piece, he wrote one—his Perpetual Motion, for example.
Nowadays, it’s pretty much standard practice for Suzuki teachers to teach the repertoire in a systematic, step by step way. We preview the most challenging spots of new pieces to make sure that the child will be able to play the entire piece, not just the easy parts.
We work this way because we understand that it can be frustrating for a child to have to take too big of a step. To the extent that it’s possible, nurturing by love means that we want to help the child avoid needless frustrations.
In spite of our efforts, frustrations appear anyway. In the course of a lesson, a child might blurt out something such as “I’m never gonna get this song!” At those moments, I think it’s important to respond to the child’s emotion with something such as “tell me more about that.” It’s not the time to say “It’s actually a ‘piece,’ not a ‘song.’” The difference between “piece” and “song” is an important point, but it can be saved for later. When a child is telling me her feelings, it’s more important for me not to step on them by correcting her word choice.
I don’t try to jolly up students who are feeling badly, because it dismisses the child’s feelings and it’s often unnecessary work. Children usually start to feel better through talking about feeling bad, because they know that someone is interested and listening. They have our company instead of being left with something that feels bad to be alone with. Trying to cheer up a child can give the child the impression that they are only valued when they are happy, and that they have to hide their unhappy moments and bear them alone, which tends to make things worse. I’m quite concerned about the amount of pressure that’s put on children to “be happy” these days. What I call “performing happiness,” takes tremendous effort, and at some point, the effort becomes too great and there’s a collapse, even if that collapse is postponed for decades.
Several things can exist all at once when a teacher is nurturing a child by love. I don’t want to inflict unhappiness on my students, but I’m also OK with them sharing their unhappiness and frustration with me.
It’s also useful to find moments of spontaneous pleasure in a lesson. We’re nurturing by love when we find moments in a lesson to listen to a child’s playing and to leave it unedited, something I aim for in every lesson. Two weeks ago, a ten-year-old student’s answer to my question “What do you want to get to this week” was “Play ‘Jupiter.’” So that’s where we started her lesson. She just played it. I asked her if she had any questions about it or wanted help with anything. “Nope,” was her happy response. She went on to tell me how her mom’s friend taught it to her. Then, we moved to working on Suzuki repertoire. The next week’s lesson started the same way, with the addition of a comment from her: “I think I’m getting a better sound with it. Maybe because I’m using more bow.” My response: “So, you’re liking how it’s sounding.” And then we moved on.
As we continue to listen for what’s on a student’s mind, we will be able to offer her not just accurate information, but relevant information. Teachers are nurturing by love when they’re then able to say things to students that begin with “I think this will be easier for you if you…” or “You said you wanted to…And here’s why I think this will help.” Of course, we need to make sure that students are also cultivating skills that they will need in the future, but we also need to speak to issues that are pertinent to them in the present.
Transforming Frustration
As every teacher knows, at some point many students will face significant frustrations. Sometimes a frustration will come because the child can’t do today what he could do yesterday. Often, the frustration comes because the child wants to play by magic, not by working. For a child at these points, even a game is too much work.
Our work would be much easier if children communicated their wish for magic with words, but children can’t always find the words. The younger the child, the truer that is. Think about the difference in language skills between a three-year-old and a six-year-old. But until children are able to use words to communicate their feelings, they usually communicate their feelings with actions. They may melt down and cry. They might whine. They might pretend to listen to what we say, but actually ignore it. They might disengage, or they might refuse to do anything.
At these points, our job is to treat the child’s undigested frustration as a raw source of energy that needs to be transformed so that it can power genuine work. Our job at these times is to help the child metabolize his frustration.
If we’re going to engage in this kind of work with the child, the first feelings we have to manage are our own. A monumentally important part of the environment is the teacher’s mind, which is why this series of articles began with nurturing teachers. It can be a tremendous challenge for us to keep open the possibility that we may be the source of the frustration while also knowing that we’re probably not the source. Perhaps we gave the information in a confusing way, were asking the child to do too much too soon, or in some other way needlessly frustrated the child. Usually, however, the child is upset because he wanted to be able to do something without having to work at it, and the disappointment is overwhelming.
We will be well-served to appreciate how big this frustration is for the child. When a teacher says, “He doesn’t do what I say because he doesn’t believe me” or “She doesn’t respect my knowledge,” the teacher is usually misreading the child’s communications. It’s tricky, because the teacher feels ignored—and the child may, in fact, be ignoring the teacher—but if we’re going to nurture by love, we’re going to need to get past this impasse and see that the child is too overpowered by frustration to think about the teacher’s knowledge or to be able to think about respect.
There’s a big difference between the two. What the child knows is that he is frustrated and the teacher is there. He hasn’t gotten to the place of realizing that you are not there to frustrate him, but that you are there to help with the frustrations.
As the adults in these scenarios, teachers have to be the ones to realize that the child is being held hostage by feelings of frustration and that our job is to help the child transform those feelings so that they can get the work done.
I get nervous when I hear teachers talk about “not letting kids get away with these feelings.” It’s not a question of how strict or punitive the teacher is. As the British child psychoanalyst Adam Phillips says, “People punish other people when they don’t know what else to do with them.”
To be certain, there is a sharp difference between safety and danger. If a child is throwing a bow or violin, hitting, or in some other way being physically destructive, I’m going to talk about the importance of keeping everything safe and will likely end the lesson. But if the child just sits down and refuses to do anything, I’ll do what I can to understand what that sitting down is attempting to communicate. Non-compliance isn’t in and of itself a reason to end a lesson. But my mind can’t be available to decode what that non-compliance is communicating if I am stuck on perceiving the child as disrespecting me.
Another way of thinking about this is that it’s not that the child won’t behave with civility, it’s that he can’t. Punishing him won’t help. Another thing that won’t help is for the teacher to accept the blame that’s in the air and to pretend that they really can provide magic, they’re just not doing so. To respond this way would be to avoid reality.
What does help is doing the best we can to figure out a useful next step. That next step will typically involve our remembering that behaviors have meanings, and breaking the big feelings down into smaller, more digestible bits, much like chopping up food for a child who has just started eating solids. Of course, that’s what we intend to do preemptively, like with beginners, when we play all of those games; and it’s what we’re doing with previews to pieces. But none of that is foolproof.
If we are going to nurture by love when a child is in a major snit, we’ll have to tailor the next step(s) to the child in front of us, but here is a rough outline of several possibilities:

Saying we wish we had magical powers at the same time that we acknowledge that we don’t: “I wish I had a magic wand or that there was some other way that I could make this easier for you right now.”
Asking “Do you want to work on this now, or come back to it later?” [and if they want to move on, I would go to something super easy and/or pleasant for them.]
Speaking to what you imagine are the child’s feelings: “This is really hard for you, and if you’re like a lot of students I know, it makes you mad that you can’t do it by magic.” [If the child tells me I am totally wrong, I would not argue the point. I don’t have to be right. My goal isn’t to win, it’s to assist.]
Offering a choice: “You got it to work once. Do you want to see if you can get it to work again, or should we come back to it later?” or “Do you want to do it three more times now, or would you like to come back to it next week?”
The child’s wish to get out of work isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s actually a very human tendency, which is why we invented things like wheels, dishwashers, and computers.
Ultimately, though, as my students develop more and more skills, there are fewer major frustrations that they have to deal with. Or at least they’re not so difficult to be with at a lesson. It’s a phenomenon that’s similar to what happens outside of music lessons. One of the main reasons young children throw temper tantrums is because they are cognitively aware that there are things that people are able to do–and they want to do them–but they don’t yet actually have the skills to get the job done. As their skill sets grow, the tantrums dissipate, because they can actually do stuff. Something similar happens in music lessons, I think.
It can also be helpful to keep in mind that children who are roughly four to seven years old are developing an inner critic, the one that we all have; the voice that can say helpful things like “you probably shouldn’t do that.” When this inner critic is first emerging in a young child, however, it is typically harsh and prone to either/or thinking. This harsh and uncompromising part is behind a child saying things to himself like “You are BAD if you can’t do this right away.” Because that feels so horrible to the child, it is common for a child to attribute his own feeling to the teacher or parent, not something that’s coming from his own mind.
We’re nurturing by love when we help children to tame that inner critic as best we can. Part of that is keeping grounded and knowing that we weren’t being harsh and critical.
The most helpful way I know to think about helping children manage frustration is to think of them as not being born with the muscles that are necessary to control frustration in civilized ways. Our job is not to penalize children for not having these muscles, but to serve as personal trainers who help them develop those internal controls over time. It’s another way of describing “nurturing,” and I hope to do it in a caring and thoughtful—loving—way.
Our Mission
“Nurturing by love” in the ways I have outlined in this article can be an enormous challenge. Not every teacher is up to it. I’ve realized that one of my missions in life has been to help them get there.
The students who need the most nurturing by love from us may not necessarily be the ones who are the most gratifying in terms of being the best players, making the fastest progress, etc. The neediest children often communicate their needs in a volume and with affects that are difficult to be around.
But if we’re really going to go for Suzuki’s ultimate goal of ending wars, we may as well be taking steps in that direction during lessons.

Editor’s Note: This article is the third in a three-part series. Part one, “Revisiting Nutruting,” appeared in ASJ volume 53 number 2 (February 2025), and part two, “Nurturing Parents by Love,” appeared in ASJ volume 53 number 3 (May 2025).