Teachers, do you want a voice which is healthy and powerful? Evidence shows that 90% of school teachers will have a problem with their voice as some point during their career. These voice problems can be faced by primary and high school teachers, as well as other who use their voices for teaching, including swimming teachers, dance teachers, yoga instructors or gym instructors. These voice problems occur when teachers need to use their voices loudly over a long period of time. This can cause the muscles to get sore and tired and can cause vocal damage.
How can education and voice training help? Helping teachers understand how their voices work can help to address these problems. Education can focus on ways to adjust the environment to better support the voice, for example rearranging the classroom or planning breaks in the day when the voice can be rested.
Why do teachers need help with their voices? Voice training can help teachers learn to use their voices in a healthy and sustainable way. Many teachers report that their voice gives out at the end of the week, and lacks the power it needs to carry over a classroom of boisterous students. Voice training can help teachers develop a voice which last longer and has the power needed to keep the attention of the students.
How does this voice training work? "Voice Health for Teachers" can be delivered as a one-off Professional Development workshop in your school or workplace. This involves a 2 hour presentation about vocal health and offers an introductory exploration of some voice skills to help teachers improve their vocal health.
Ongoing voice training is also available to groups of teachers, where a weekly session is held at your school or workplace to work on the voice skills needed to improve vocal health. These weekly sessions are recommended for teachers to truly master the vocal skills needed for ongoing vocal health. The benefit of these sessions is that teachers are given one on one attention and plenty of opportunities to practice and apply their vocal skills.
Voice coaching is also available online and in individual sessions.