The Big Launch

Hello Friends!  Today is Launch Day! Today is the day I open up my website http://www.lessonspark.com/ to the world.  Many of my friends already know about it, and some of you have tried it (thanks!).  So what is this all about?

One of the things I’ve noticed in the years I’ve been teaching is how much more technologically savvy kids are these days.  Kids play virtual guitars instead of real ones, they talk to friends online that they may or may not have ever met in person.  And yet, they come to their lessons with notebooks (unless they forgot, again!), and they report to us what they did since the last time we saw them.  I thought there must be a better way!  I tried several existing online resources, and found they were overpriced and generally didn’t do much to improve over a lesson notebook. 

I had a vision of what I wanted, so it hit me - I should create it myself. The idea was to create an online tool that was easy to use and help students and teachers stay better engaged. I started with an effective if poorly executed database I created myself.  I built lists, queries, and forms, trying to figure out exactly what I wanted.  If I couldn’t program a function myself, I drew schematics for it. 

Once I had the basic ideas down, I engaged a great group of developers to help me build it, and http://www.lessonspark.com/ is the result.  It accomplishes all of the basic things I set out to do.  It provides teachers with recruiting and studio management.  With it, I can provide my students with more thorough and up to the minute feedback, and they have ownership of tracking their practice. It has a repertoire tracker with archiving capability so they can easily find and refer to prior accomplishments.  The best thing it does is improve communication between the student and the teacher.  Some of my students’ parents said that their children seemed more engaged, and they felt like they were getting more from their lessons.  I don’t have to spend a lot of time monitoring, but it does a great deal for my students’ confidence to get a note from me helping with a problem or congratulating them on good practice.

So to celebrate the launch, and because of my confidence in the site, I am running a promotion from now until March 31, 2011.  In addition to the free 30 day trial, anyone that signs up during this period will lock in the current subscription rate for life!  As long as you remain a member, your subscription rates will never increase.  Right now, the monthly rates are less than the cost of a sandwich at a fast food restaurant and you get a discount for annual membership, so what do you have to lose?  This goes for students or teachers, and there is no limit on the number of people that can sign up so tell your friends too!  Go to the site, take the tour and sign up for a free 30 day membership to try it out.   I’m available for questions or comments, so I hope you like it!