Check out Karen’s latest post on how she helped a group of students learn the basics of composition in 11 easy-to-understand steps. This can be such a challenging area for some students, so Karen’s list will be a wonderful tool to help them get started!
Teaching
Composer Trading Game
For our Mid-Winter Ball, the theme was “an evening of serious music – experience the masterpieces of yesteryear composed by world famous musicians.” Each student played a classical piece and shared a biographical sketch of their composer. The games centered around the composers represented in the performances. Here’s a game that was a favorite! Composer […]
A Great Music Dictionary for Students!
Throughout the year this year I’m holding six musical balls for my students. It’s part of our studio incentive program for the year, Let’s Have A Ball! (After the year is over, I’m hoping to package it up like I did the Climbing the Ladder to Success incentive program.) At each of the balls, I […]
Make Your Own Piano
Check out this fun Make Your Own Piano page provided by the Piano Technicians Guild. Just print the page onto a piece of cardstock and follow the instructions – sounds like a fun group activity project for students!
Melodic Dictation Game
At the beginning of each lesson, I’ve started having my students draw a popsicle stick from a container on the piano. Each popsicle stick has one of the following written on it: 1. Chords 2. Rhythmic Dictation 3. Rhythm and Pulse 4. Vocabulary 5. Melodic Dictation 6. Sight-read 7. Play A Game 8. Written Theory […]
Black Key Songs
Here’s a helpful list of songs that can be played using only the black keys on the piano. From almost the very first lesson, I like to have students working on picking out songs by ear. This will be a great list to keep on hand!
