Why Kids Need Freedom to Learn Piano
Piano is inherently difficult for everyone.
Yes, it's especially difficult for a six or eight year old to figure out physically how to please the teacher: where do my fingers go, which one, when, which hand, what note, how long? The older the child, the easier the list of tasks is, but it's always rather difficult to get the hang of it at first.
The list of interlocking tasks and skills necessary to learn the piano is endless if you stop and think about it.
The strategy of a children's piano method should ideally be to reduce the beginner's list of tasks to the bare minimum, and repeat a minimal skill in creative ways until the child has firmly mastered the physical act of playing the keys.
The concept of freedom in this discussion comes in at this point.
Children learn piano in different ways, and the teacher can go with the flow or against it.
Some kids are ready for certain concepts, like fingering, and some aren't yet, for example.
A perfect example was a child today that was just beginning to learn fingering and was having a slow time with it.
But he suddenly said, "Hey, I wrote this song!" and proceeded to play a perfectly logically-patterned ditty in the key of C.
What was remarkable was that this little melody was comprised of almost all stepwise motion, perfect for showing the ideas of fingering.
So we played a game with his song, trying it with different finger combinations, in which he delighted because it was his song we were using.
He readily understood what I was trying to say about putting the fingers in a row, and adopted the idea immediately into his song, playing it in perfect C position (right thumb on Middle C.
) We went on to other things, and then I slyly came back to his song, played it twice, and then sprang a book of sheet music on him, a simple Bastien exercise piece.
He had been having trouble with the idea of fingering with it the last time he had seen the book.
But now, with his own "fingered song" under his belt, he had no trouble putting his hand in the correct C position when sight-reading.
The reason this happened was I waited and saw an opening in his interest.
Any child who feels comfortable enough to offer up a song he has written is a student to be followed.
Listen to that: I follow the student.
What music teacher does that? It takes tremendous creativity and patience to teach this way.
Often it is the repeated impatience of the teacher, not the incompetence of the student that spells the end of the student's enthusiasm for piano.
Relax, and watch the student.
They will show you an opening where you can gently get in and teach.
If a student seems interested in a certain concept, say, rhythm, then follow that enthusiasm at that very moment, and show them that more good things lie underneath that.
Follow your student's spark of enthusiasm wherever it goes.
By John Aschenbrenner Copyright 2008 Walden Pond Press All Rights Reserved
Yes, it's especially difficult for a six or eight year old to figure out physically how to please the teacher: where do my fingers go, which one, when, which hand, what note, how long? The older the child, the easier the list of tasks is, but it's always rather difficult to get the hang of it at first.
The list of interlocking tasks and skills necessary to learn the piano is endless if you stop and think about it.
The strategy of a children's piano method should ideally be to reduce the beginner's list of tasks to the bare minimum, and repeat a minimal skill in creative ways until the child has firmly mastered the physical act of playing the keys.
The concept of freedom in this discussion comes in at this point.
Children learn piano in different ways, and the teacher can go with the flow or against it.
Some kids are ready for certain concepts, like fingering, and some aren't yet, for example.
A perfect example was a child today that was just beginning to learn fingering and was having a slow time with it.
But he suddenly said, "Hey, I wrote this song!" and proceeded to play a perfectly logically-patterned ditty in the key of C.
What was remarkable was that this little melody was comprised of almost all stepwise motion, perfect for showing the ideas of fingering.
So we played a game with his song, trying it with different finger combinations, in which he delighted because it was his song we were using.
He readily understood what I was trying to say about putting the fingers in a row, and adopted the idea immediately into his song, playing it in perfect C position (right thumb on Middle C.
) We went on to other things, and then I slyly came back to his song, played it twice, and then sprang a book of sheet music on him, a simple Bastien exercise piece.
He had been having trouble with the idea of fingering with it the last time he had seen the book.
But now, with his own "fingered song" under his belt, he had no trouble putting his hand in the correct C position when sight-reading.
The reason this happened was I waited and saw an opening in his interest.
Any child who feels comfortable enough to offer up a song he has written is a student to be followed.
Listen to that: I follow the student.
What music teacher does that? It takes tremendous creativity and patience to teach this way.
Often it is the repeated impatience of the teacher, not the incompetence of the student that spells the end of the student's enthusiasm for piano.
Relax, and watch the student.
They will show you an opening where you can gently get in and teach.
If a student seems interested in a certain concept, say, rhythm, then follow that enthusiasm at that very moment, and show them that more good things lie underneath that.
Follow your student's spark of enthusiasm wherever it goes.
By John Aschenbrenner Copyright 2008 Walden Pond Press All Rights Reserved
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