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Episode Summary
Amy and her friend Joy Morin of the Color in My Piano blog share six ways they’ve used Notion (a productivity and note-taking app this week as independent piano teachers.
Joy Morin is a pianist, teacher, composer, and lifelong learner. She writes a blog at ColorInMyPiano.com, where she enjoys connecting with fellow piano teachers and sharing resources for piano lessons. Joy currently operates an independent piano studio near Ann Arbor, Michigan, where she resides with her husband, two daughters, and cats. Her books and music are available for purchase at keysatplay.com.
Items Mentioned
Episode 105 – Evernote vs. Notion
Workshop: Organize Your Life With Notion
View this post on Instagram
Transcript
Welcome to episode 109 of The Piano Pantry Podcast. I’m your host, Amy Chaplin.
In the early days of the Piano Pantry blog, I was known for demonstrating all the powerful ways that Evernote could enhance how we worked and saved information. We all know how technology evolves, as does our use of it, and this has been one of those for me. Here I am, more than five years later and there’s a new kid in town that’s left Evernote a bit in the dust.
If you’re around here much, you’ve already heard me talking up Notion – a productivity and note-taking app a lot. I cannot sing the praises of Notion loudly enough. Not only has it enhanced my daily workflow, but it has brought every area I manage in life together in a way that Evernote never could. Its minimalistic feel, seamless and intuitive functions, beautiful formatting options, and visual building features are above and beyond anything else I’ve seen out there.
As this community’s self-declared go-to organization gal, I’m determined to help pave the way for my teacher friends to embrace a more streamlined way of working using Notion. So, I’ve teamed up with my good friend, Joy Morin of the ColorinMyPiano blog to offer a special two-day workshop on March 8 and 9, 2024.
In order to help paint a clear picture of what it could look like for you, for today’s episode, Joy and I sat down a few days ago to share a few ways that each of us used Notion this week as independent teachers.
By the way, if you missed it, you might want to go back and listen to episode 105, where I lay out a very clear comparison between Evernote and Notion. If you’re a visual person, we’ve provided supporting pictures of all the pages we discussed today in the show notes.
Amy: Well, Joy, I am really excited to sit down with you now because you have inspired me in the past on different ways that you use Notion. And I love just hearing what you’re doing with it and what other people are doing with it. And yeah, let’s like share a little bit with each other.
Joy: Yeah, I’m excited about this. To hear how you’ve been using Notion in the last week and I’m going to share some of my own examples. So this will be great.
Amy: We like to geek out on Notion.
Joy: We do.
Amy: Okay, so I’ll start with one. I started using it as a place to house everything for my annual note naming challenge, which I’m now calling March Minute Madness.
And in the past, I used to just use like a big foam board that I would pull out every year, and I had like a cardboard chart, like you know, where kids track like their stickers, like a sticker chart basically, and I would just cut out however many lines of that I needed for all my students, and we would track their There are times for the note naming challenge on that.
And then I would record the annual winners in like a word document and I would save that in my file explorer, you know, but this year I decided to pull all that together in notion. So I just created like a landing page basically. And on this page I have a link to a spreadsheet that I made in Google sheets where it tracks all my students times from last year so that we can compare and see how they’ve made progress.
And then when this year is over, like I’m just going to pencil it in, I’ve got like a clipboard and then when we’re done, I’ll just go in and record those in a spreadsheet. So the link is there. I’ve also got some bullet points where I just track the students that have won each level because I have five different levels and so each year there’s five different winners basically.
And then I can just see from year to year who’s won. So it’s just a nice little easy place. I don’t have to go into Microsoft Word, you know, and then I don’t have to pull up my board anymore. Like it’s all just right here in this nice little place. What about you?
Joy: Oh, I love that example. That’s great. So one way that I’ve used Notion in the last week is working on my Tax filing preparations, which is a fun task for all of us piano teachers this time of year.
So basically in Notion what I’ve put together is a pretty simple page that’s just a bullet point kind of list. Making sure that I have included all the information that I need to in my spreadsheets and PDF documents that I need to give and turn over to our tax preparer. So this is a page that has a bunch of lists like bullet points, like I said, except in Notion there’s a feature that you can use where it’s an empty box that then you can click on and it’s very satisfying because that little square box will turn into a check mark.
So it’s a nice way for me to keep track of the tasks that I still need to do and what I’ve already completed when it comes to preparing everything for filing our taxes. So this is a page I’ve used for the past two, maybe three years now, and it’s a simple checklist, but I’m able to kind of tweak it each year and improve it a little bit.
And it’s really convenient to have the same list ready to go at the beginning of the year when I sit down to work on my taxes. In previous years, I think I had somewhat of a list in my, just kind of directly in my spreadsheet. And then I think I also would get like a checklist from our tax preparer that kind of suggested.
You know, what all we needed to pull together. So I, it was, it felt like it was like here and there, you know. So it’s just really great having this list all in one place in my Notion.
Amy: And you created also like a button that you can autofill a template, right?
Joy: Yes, that’s right. Yes. You can use a neat little feature in Notion. It’s a block that looks like a button. And then when you click the button, it will just kind of automatically Populate whatever information you’ve set it to populate. So in this case it’s my checklist and so each year I click on this and it gives me a, a fresh list from the last year except all of the check boxes are not yet filled in.
So that means last year’s list that I like went through and checklist every item on this list, you know, I can just kinda be done with and then in the next year I click the button, and I have a fresh list that I can use.
Amy: So much easier.
Joy: Yeah.
Amy: Less manual work. Awesome. Well, one thing I did this past week was create a page to help me plan things that I need to do when I attend a conference.
So, I also used that same button template feature that you just mentioned to help me auto-populate a couple of different checklists. I’ve got a checklist of different people I want to catch up with and a checklist for materials and resources I want to check out in the exhibit hall. And a checklist of just things to pack, right?
Things to not forget. And some of these are just important because, like, you know, you’re going to a conference, and you get all these people that you’re like, Hey, we need to grab dinner together. Or I want to meet you to go to the session together. And you’re gathering phone numbers, maybe. You might have people sending you messages on Messenger or Instagram.
And, you know, you get to the conference, and you’re like, Okay, shoot, what was that person’s phone number, you know? And this is where I can get it all in one place as I’m going over the weeks, and I don’t have to rush, you know, the day of the conference, trying to figure out who I’m communicating with.
I also have a page, actually, I have several pages that I created on this conference landing page for every conference I go to. So, I have a page just for this upcoming MTNA 2020 2024 conference in Atlanta. And that’s the place where I have specific details for that conference going on. And I already created one for MT& A 2025.
And the reason I did that is I was reading in a book or in a podcast or something somewhere, and I heard about ideas for restaurants to try in Minneapolis. And I was like, Oh, I have to save this for MT& A 2025. Perfect. And so, you know, otherwise, in the past, I would have just, you know, forgotten about it or jotted it down somewhere randomly and, you know, never come back to it again probably. So I can start building ideas for next year.
Joy: I love that example and I think I need to create a similar page for myself. That’s a great idea. Awesome. The next example I’ll share is that in the last week, I used one of my Notion pages that I set up for when I took an online course. So this is a page, so the course I’m currently taking is the Teaching Intermediate Piano course that the Royal Conservatory of Music offers online.
And so this is a ten-week online course, and there’s material to read online. I like to take notes when I’m learning, so my Notion page basically exists of notes that I’m taking as I work my way through the course material. I also use it to work on the assignments I have to submit for this particular course.
So I can just be typing up my assignments, you know, make my rough draft, do my editing for it, and then when I’m happy with it, I just copy and paste it over into the actual course page, and then submit my assignments when I’m ready. So I love this because it gives me a place where I can always come back to it and refer to my notes if I want to.
I’ve got my registration information and login information for this particular course. It’s just, like, all on this page, so I’m not gonna lose it or be trying to track down, you know, details from, like, an email from months ago or something like that. It’s just nice, all in one place, to put anything related to this particular course.
So, this Notion page is actually kind of a sub-page. So I have a page called Learning, that’s what I call it. And then anytime I take a course or if I take like a workshop or a webinar and, or attend a conference, anything like that, that I want to take notes for, I can create sub-pages underneath my Learning page.
Amy: Ah, that sounds similar to my conference page. And now I need a learning page like you, Joy. All right. So for my last item, many of you might know my Friday finds post series on the Piano Pantry blog. I’ve been doing it since 2016. It used to be weekly, and now it’s about every three weeks, but it’s just a place where I love to share random things that I have found all over the internet that I think my teacher friends would enjoy, whether it’s teaching resources or silly YouTube videos or recipes.
All kinds of different stuff, and I’ve always had a place like where I would just save a link, you know, Like I used to do it in Evernote But more recently, I’ve been trying to save stuff and categorize it for different times of the year that I might save it So I might have an idea for something that would be fun to share over the holidays, but I might think of it in April Right, so I don’t want to share it like in Friday finds in April So I’m gonna save it for Christmas, and I just created these simple little boxes on my Friday Finds page that just kind of highlight items for the month of December.
When I save it, I can just drag it under the box for December, and then when the time comes around, boom, it’s right there. I also have some different things for the Thanksgiving season and some regular places that I pull from. Like, every time I write my Friday Finds, I think about, okay, you know, what have I bought from Amazon recently?
What have I been listening to on Spotify? What’s the third thing? Oh, I now have a favorites page on my website where I just share different favorites like cooking gadgets or teaching resources, and sometimes I’ll include little things from that. So it’s just a little reminder to me to check those three different locations to see if there is different things that I could share.
Joy: I love that example. I mean, it’s just a simple, straightforward page where you’re just able to paste links to things that you want to share in the future. And it’s all organized. I’m looking at your page now; it just looks very beautiful. All right, the last example that I’ll share is related to my current position working for a local church.
So I’m the pianist at the church and I also lead the church choir. So I’ve created a page in my Notion account that is actually made public so that I can share it with the musicians at the church, the other musicians and the members of my church choir. So most of the pages, actually all the pages in Notion by default are private pages that just you can view in your own Notion account.
But Notion does offer some settings that are really convenient for you if you want to Collaborate with someone else to work on a page. There’s a way you can do that. There’s also a way to, a way to take a page and get a public link to that page and be able to share that page with anyone that you share the link with.
This is a setting where the page, in this case, is editable only by you. And anyone looking at your page from the link you’ve given them can see things but not edit the page. So, I call this the Music Hub page for my church, and this is a page that is linked to from the church’s website.
So that means anyone who’s in my church choir and wants to hear recordings of the pieces that we’re working on and preparing can click through from the church website and get to our music hub page in my Notion account, and listen to the YouTube video that I’ve put on there. Or click play and listen to the mp3 track that I’ve recorded on my piano so that they can practice, you know, the alto part or the tenor part or whatever it is.
So, I’ve also got the schedule for our rehearsals coming up and other important dates relating to what’s going on with the upcoming church services. So this has been a really helpful communication tool for this position that I work in and just really something convenient.
Amy: And I’m looking at your page right now, and it’s so pretty. And the cool thing with Notion is there are two different settings for the pages. So you can have a page that’s a little bit narrow format. For if you think about a webpage or a blog where you’re reading it and the page isn’t super wide, you can also make a full-size page where it’s like the full width of the screen.
So you have a little bit of options for how big the page is. And this is a great example that you have of this, the page that Joy created actually almost looks like a webpage, right? It’s beautiful. She’s got a little header. She’s got a picture, she’s got a quote, and there’s just so much that you can do with it.
And that’s the cool thing about Notion: it is very customizable, but it doesn’t have to be complicated. It could be very simple if you just like very, you know, basic note things. I know my husband’s that way. He’s like, I don’t need my Notion to look pretty. I just want a good place to take notes and a, a nice way to structure them and to be able to share things, but also keep portions of my Notion private.
But it can also be beautiful and very visual, like this page that Joy has created. And I think that’s why I love talking about this with you because you just get so many different ideas. There are just so many different possibilities, and that’s one thing that we really want to do for our teacher friends is to share different templates and uses for how you can use it as an independent teacher.
Joy actually introduced me to Notion several years ago. And just the sharing she did with me inspired my own Notion pages and got me going. And if it wasn’t for her, I feel like, eh, I may have eventually got there. You know, but it really made a difference getting to see things that she had done.
And that’s what we’re hoping to do for you guys – to help you, like, have a great starting place to get you kicked off. So that you’re really, you know, just hitting the ground running with these Notion pages.
Joy: We really can’t recommend it enough. It’s a great program. I’ve looked at a lot of different task management and productivity type apps, and I think Notion is very different, and I’m not the only one saying this.
I think there are a lot of people out there who have really discovered Notion and realized that there’s something different about it, just the flexibility that it has and how easy it is to use. And you can keep it very simple, however you want to incorporate it in your life. As you learn the tool more, you will find that there’s a lot that you can do with it.
So it’s also very powerful.
Amy: And that’s a keyword, but I think it is really easy. It really is. It’s just some basic building blocks. And it’s just a lot of fun. So I think you’re going to love it.
Thanks for listening to our chat today. If you’re interested in learning more about our upcoming workshop, Organize Your Life With Notion, here are a few details:
It’s being held Friday and Saturday, March 8 and 9, 2024, from 10:30 am-1:30 pm Eastern Time via Zoom. Replays will be available for 6 months.
You’ll get live instruction from both of us, 10 in-depth sessions, 2 guided projects, and an accompanying workbook and set of cheatsheets. Best of all, you’ll get access to a special starter pack of Notion page templates designed by Joy and me, especially with our independent piano teachers in mind, including a prospective student inquiries tracker, student curriculum notes, student attendance tracker, studio communication calendar, tax preparation, and more.
For more details and to register, visit PianoPantry.com/notion. The early bird discount for $40 off ends March 1 so don’t delay! Again that’s PianoPantry.com/notion. Get links to everything we talked about today in the show notes at PianoPantry.com/podcast/episode109.
