Learning strategies are important for piano students. Having developed great learning strategies over years of teaching experience is what makes good teachers. Young piano students, however, need a bit of guidance to practice their music at home using effective strategies to develop good playing habits. Without this they may not acquire the basic knowledge and skills necessary to move forward. Plus, there is no point in having your child spend 30 minutes practicing incorrectly without learning their pieces when the material can be mastered in 10 minutes with good practice habits.
Imagine little Susie or Johnny at the piano delighted to be learning to play, but having so much trouble mastering their first lessons at home. They're not getting the guidance they need because their parents who may not play the piano assume they can't help and that the weekly piano lesson is all the guidance their young student needs. These assumptions are not true. It's easy to help your young student at home even if you don't play the piano. Here are 5 tips for parents to help their young children use effective learning strategies at home and develop good paying habits.
Remind your child practicing piano at home to:
1. Sing the note names as they are played. Pre-reading music has the names of the notes written on the note heads. Students need to say the names of then notes as they are played so they learn to visualize what keys are under their fingers in beginning hand positions C and Middle C. Without this simple knowledge, students will not b able to go on to learning to read notes on the staff.
2. Keep eyes on the music, not the hands. Once students have their hand position, they need to keep their eyes on the music and not look down at their hands. This way they are developing a keyboard in their imaginations. This is also necessary for reading notes on the staff, which is just a map of the piano keyboard.
3. Sit back on the piano bench and reach out to the piano. Students will not be able to use their small muscles in the fingers unless they are reaching out to the piano with their arms extended and elbows slightly bent with elbows pointing to the walls and not the floor.
4. Round the hands over the keyboard. The fingers need to stretch down to the piano keys from the top knuckle and then retract back to a rounded hand position. This allows for finger flexibility and control.
5. Play each song 5 to 7 times a day. It doesn't take long for a young student to practice their beginning lessons. But each song needs to be played about 7 times using good playing strategies. For the average student whose teacher has assigned them two songs, this will take about 5 minutes a song. That's a ten minute practice session. And that's really all beginning students need to do to learn their lessons. But without these strategies they could sit at the piano for hours and never learn what they need to know.
Guide your young piano student at home with these 5 practice easy to use practice tips and no one will ever know that their parents don't play the piano!
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