It will be another quiet week here on Music Matters Blog because the studio is closed while I’m in Colorado enjoying the snowy slopes! In the meantime you might be interested in checking out a series of posts I wrote last year on Teaching Tips from Snowboard School:
Part 1 – Be a Pro
Part 2 – Give Students a Vision of Success
Part 3 – Plan a Systematic Approach
Part 4 – Build Confidence By Teaching Mastery of Fundamental Skills
After our fabulous weekend in Kansas City, my students and I thoroughly enjoyed our first experience participating in the Multi-Piano Concert! We got back late Sunday evening, so I’ve been scrambling to get everything done this week and thus the blog has been a bit quiet. However, I thought I would share with you a picture from the weekend and a couple of quotes I came across in a TED video I watched last night.
Aren’t they a great-looking bunch of students?!
One of the organizations that I follow is Character First.They send out a monthly e-newsletter that always has great articles and insights into how to address character in your own life and in your work with others. One of their leaders, Dr. Nathan Mellor, recently spoke at TEDxOU in a presentation called, Listen Up, Corporate America: Less Rules, More Character.
One of my aims as a piano teacher is to provide an environment where good character is promoted and praised. I’ve mentioned this before, particularly in the post, “Teaching Students to Play Beautifully,” but it’s a constant challenge to determine the best way to teach students with this in mind. Videos like the following one provide lots of thought-provoking insights and illustrations:
Here are a couple of the quotes that I really like:
“Your job should not define you, but the way you do your job reveals who you are.”
“Actions reveal beliefs. If you desire to change actions, you must challenge beliefs.”
In particular, a realization of the first quote was the impetus behind the character evaluation that students are required to complete at the beginning of each lesson as part of our Project 28 studio practice incentive theme this year. This has been a very helpful tool, but I still want to do a better job of encouraging students to view their piano practicing and lessons as an opportunity to develop good character that will transfer into every area of their lives!
Reading about the great pedagogues of years gone by is one of my favorite aspects of the music education magazines I receive. In the February/March 2013 issue of the American Music Teacher magazine, there is an interesting article by Arjola Miruku about Tobias Matthay. Here are just a few of the insights that inspired me about his teaching:
“His teaching approach can be described as one of analysis with the idea that playing the piano does not have to be a struggle.”
“According to Matthay, good teaching makes students think, not just imitate the musical interpretation of the instructor.”
“Many accounts by his students have agreed to state that he never let the student work it out on his own in practice. He was an immediate problem solver, and with endless patience, made sure the student could demonstrate a passage the correct way in the lesson and show an understanding of the problem, so that he could then correctly practice.”
“Good teaching will help all students attain musical goals that they thought they never could reach.”
I have a technical question – my boy wants to rest his wrist a lot while plays. I sit by him and sort of poke underneath to remind him. Now he’s getting into harder stuff and has runs with 8th notes. He tends to play with his fingers straight. What can I do to get his “finger posture” correct?
Well, I’ve heard of teachers putting nail strips at the edge of the piano, or smacking kids’ hands with rulers…but aside from the fact that these approaches are highly abusive, they do absolutely nothing to help a student understand why it’s important for them to maintain a good hand position. I am a firm believer in teaching students to understand the reasoning behind what they are being instructed to do so that they will develop a personal sense of responsibility and motivation for applying the instruction to their practicing and playing. Here are some resources toward that end:
Remember, if you have a question you’d like to contribute to next week’s Monday Mailbag, leave it in the comments below or send me an e-mail sometime this week with Monday Mailbag in the subject line!
I have been thinking a little more about curriculum. My younger students typically work through a method book with additional repertoire and activities added. My older students choose several pieces to work on through the semester/year, discuss theory/musical concepts in their pieces, work through a theory book, and typically do scales or other technical exercises. Do you have any set “curriculum” you follow as far as what you expect students to learn/cover over the course of a year?
Last week we dealt with one aspect of this question – 5 Essential Resources for Selecting Repertoire for Intermediate Piano Students. This week we’ll look at additional resources for planning a comprehensive curriculum. It’s important, first of all, to understand that “comprehensive” does not mean “exhaustive.” You will never be able to teach any student everything there is to know or learn about being an excellent pianist. (Not that that keeps some of us from trying, but I digress… 
)
Music Progressions – I have mentioned our state piano curriculum before, but this is easily the most helpful resource to me in knowing what skills students should be working on at different levels. Music Progressions outlines a systematic approach for teaching keyboard facility (scales, arpeggios, etc.), applied theory (intervals, chords, etc.), rhythm, sight-reading, listening, and written theory.
The Brown Scale Book – I don’t use scale books with my students, but as I was referring to this wonderful reference book for some inverted arpeggio fingering for a student a couple weeks ago and trying to figure out how to help my more advanced students remember the correct fingerings, it occurred to me that I should just have them each purchase this book for their own reference. Duh. So I ordered four of them that afternoon from my local music store. This is way easier than writing down fingerings in their assignment books!
Practice Incentive Themes – Many of you are familiar with the yearly practice incentive themes that I develop for my students. These are particularly helpful for older students because they provide a framework for us throughout the year to ensure that they are receiving a comprehensive music education. It’s easy to revert to a repertoire-based approach to teaching/learning piano, so developing and using the structure built into the practice incentive themes helps make sure we include other important skills like playing by ear, improvising, composing, memorizing, etc. Plus it keeps the whole process more fun!
Theory Books – I’ve mentioned several times that I rarely use theory books with my students. For written theory work, I often have the students use their Music Manuscript book, develop a program like Kick it up a Notch!, or use the Just the Facts II theory series from Music Bag Press.
If you have resources or tips for developing a comprehensive curriculum for intermediate students, please share!
Remember, if you have a question you’d like to contribute to next week’s Monday Mailbag, leave it in the comments below or send me an e-mail sometime this week with Monday Mailbag in the subject line!
One of my studio moms posted a link to this video on Facebook:
I thought it was really cool and started checking more into this amazing pianist/improviser, Richard Grayson. After digging a while, I unearthed a link to his Improvising at the Keyboard handbook, a work in progress that is already an incredibly helpful resource for anyone interested in learning to improvise. His explanations and examples are easy to understand and put into practice. I’m looking forward to using it myself and with my students!
A Guest Post by Michael Lerner of Sight Reader App
We’re really excited to announce the latest version of our innovative iPad app that helps musicians of all levels read music! It’s called Sight Reader and n honor of the New Year and to commence our resolution to become better sight readers, we’re giving away a $25 iTunes gift card to one lucky (sight) reader.
While there are a number of mobile and tablet apps that teach and allow you to practice your reading, the end result is that you become very good at touching a screen. That’s because touching a screen is how you interact with these apps and not by playing your instrument.
What makes Sight Reader different is that you practice reading music by reading on your instrument and Sight Reader has many ways in which you interact with your music. For the very beginner there are animated lessons introducing the basic notes on one of 12 supported instruments. There are then simple exercises to read and play followed by challenges that offer newly generated music with each use to prevent memorization. In addition, students can use flashcards to test how quickly they can identify then play a random note shown on screen.
For the more serious reader, there are Rhythm Only exercises that are a single pitch with infinite rhythm combinations, Note Only exercises which are steady streams of notes at particular rhythms to increase speed and dexterity, Intervals which allow you to practice recognizing intervals more quickly, and Scales so you can practice your scales in all 12 keys.
What’s also important is that everything you play is graded objectively and students can monitor their results. This makes it great for practicing without a teacher present.
Tell us what’s most important in your sight reading practice routine in the comments below. The $25 iTunes gift card winner will be drawn using a random number generator at noon (CST) on Thursday, January 31, 2013. Happy reading!
I have been thinking a little more about curriculum. My younger students typically work through a method book with additional repertoire and activities added. My older students choose several pieces to work on through the semester/year, discuss theory/musical concepts in their pieces, work through a theory book, and typically do scales or other technical exercises. Do you have any set “curriculum” you follow as far as what you expect students to learn/cover over the course of a year?
This question has been sitting in my inbox for about six months now (sadly it’s not the only one…), but I’ve been intentionally delaying answering it because this is an area I’ve been really wanting to improve in my teaching. Sequencing and repertoire selection seems so much simpler for elementary students than it does for those at an intermediate level. There are so many musical possibilities, so many skills to be learned, so many pieces of repertoire to be discovered…and only so much time to work with each student. What to focus on? And how do you know if you’re covering the most important things?
Well, I finally decided to post this question, not because I have a brilliant answer, but to share some resources and ideas that have been helpful to me in my quest to learn to teach higher level students more effectively. And in hopes that some other more brilliant teachers will pass on their knowledge in this area! In this response, I’ll be dealing specifically with repertoire selection for intermediate level piano students. Next week I’ll address other aspects of the “curriculum” for teaching intermediate level students.
For starters, here’s what you’ll need:
1. The Pianist’s Guide to Standard Teaching and Performance Literature by Jane Magrath – this is a must-have for every piano teacher! I cannot even imagine what an enormous task it was to compile a reference book of this magnitude, but I love having a handy place to look up specific composers and their works, read a brief overview of the piece, and see an approximation of what level of difficulty it is.
2. Spotify – Ever since I first posted about Spotify last fall, I have fallen more and more in love with it. (You have to have a Facebook account to set it up, but it is well worth it!) You can do quick searches to find nearly any piece of music, listen to several recordings, click through to discover new albums and artists and repertoire, subscribe to playlists that others have created, and create your own customized playlists. For example, as I did lesson planning and worked on selecting repertoire for several late intermediate students this spring, I put together a Student Repertoire Spring 2013 playlist so that I could quickly access pieces I selected for individual students for my own reference and to play recordings for them at their lessons. For students who are also on Spotify, you can easily share links to tracks, albums, or playlists. I would definitely consider this another must-have for music teachers today!
3. Excellent compilations of intermediate literature. Here are some of my favorites:
4. IMSLP Petrucci Music Library – It’s great for students to be able to play familiar, tried and true piano classics, but I love to find lesser known and played pieces for the students to learn. Especially when they will be performing for recitals, adjudicated events, or auditions, it’s fun to find new pieces that will capture the student’s (and audience’s!) imagination and inspire them to develop their skills and musicality to new heights! IMSLP is the perfect place to find just about any musical score (that’s in the public domain) and download a temporary copy to see if it’s what you’re looking for and whether it will work for a particular student.
5. A cup of hot tea. Definitely a necessity for long hours of poring over musical scores and listening to recordings, trying to find the perfect pieces for each student!
Now it’s time for others to share their brilliance. What resources or tips do you have for selecting repertoire for intermediate students?
Remember, if you have a question you’d like to contribute to next week’s Monday Mailbag, leave it in the comments below or send me an e-mail sometime this week with Monday Mailbag in the subject line!
As a music teacher, you’re always looking for ways to brighten up the music room and bring something new to your lessons.
We think we’ve found the perfect instrument.
African drums much like the djembe are the perfect way to spice up your music lessons, and really engage with your students. Not only are they highly unusual and alternative, but they can teach pupils more than just the basic notes.
Here, we take a look at just how you can bring the sounds of Africa to your music lessons:
The benefits of African drums
African instruments can bring a whole host of benefits to education.
Djembe drums are unique instruments that are sure to brighten up your lessons. The goblet-shaped drum – constructed from Mahogany with a goatskin head – is available in a variety of shapes for players of all ages.
The handheld drum is played in a seated position, so is perfect for all children. You don’t need any additional sticks as the drum is played by hand. This all adds to the ease of playing, and increases their appeal to distraction-prone children.
As well as learning a brand new instrument, you can help educate kids in areas other than music.
The djembe is steeped in cultural history; it has been played in religious ceremonies for years. As you teach the instrument, you can also spark pupils’ interest in history, geography, and culture by discussing the origin of the drum, the culturally representative carvings on the body, and the times it would be played.
How to teach them
Before you can teach this drum, you need to be able to play it yourself.
The djembe has five basic notes:
Each of these notes is played by striking the head of the drum in a different way, but each is easy to grasp. To see exactly how to play these notes, check out this great YouTube tutorial.
To teach your students the djembe, start by teaching them these basic tones. As they grasp the notes, encourage them to play more notes in quicker succession. You should then continue to encourage pupils to start playing their own rhythms as well as teaching well known ones.
The beauty of the djembe is that it is playing in a drumming circle. The leader starts off playing one beat, with everyone else joining in and playing their own tunes. If you have a number of students, this is a great way to teach the drum the way it should be played.
Top ways to include the djembe in your lessons
With such an exciting instrument to play with, there are a whole host of ways you can include djembe’s in your music lessons.
As previously mentioned, getting a group of students together to play in a drum circle is a great idea for getting a real feel of the drum. Using djembes, as well as additional hand-held percussion instruments, get pupils to sit in a circle.
Nominate one person to start by tapping out their own rhythm on the djembe. Then, when students feel ready, they can join in. The idea is not to play the same rhythm. Pupils play a complimentary polyrhythm that really enhances the drum circle.
You can also include African drums as part of a generic drum or percussion lesson.
If you’re teaching about different kinds of percussion or drums, including the djembe drum is a great way to spice things up. Include them by teaching children about the different kinds of drums and percussion instrument available. Bring in this new and exciting drum, and encourage students to try out as many as possible.
Bringing the sounds of Africa to your music lessons is one of the best ways to really engage with students. Not only do they learn to love music, they can get a real insight into exactly what makes the djembe so magical.
Djembe Drum Shop is an online retailer that sells a great range of musical instruments for children, including djembe drums, percussion instruments, and school percussion packs. Visit their website to find out more.
I have several students working on more complex rhythms this year, including a variety of cross rhythms. This requires such an incredible amount of hand independence, and is often very difficult for students to grasp, so I was doing some research to find more resources on the topic. I came across a fabulous blog post with a downloadable PDF called “Cross Rhythms Without Tears” by Christine Brown. The 3-page overview gives some very helpful (and mathematical) explanations, plus a number of excerpts from repertoire where cross-rhythms are encountered, along with suggestions for practicing them. What a great tool that I can pass on to my students!