Suzuki transfer student

[keyofc]

This may have been addressed before - but if so, I don't know where.

I just had an interview with some parents with their child who want to switch their little boy from the Suzuki method to my rather eclectic method.

Here's the deal:  The little boy can play Bach minuets very well by ear.  He can't play Mary had a little lamb from notation.  They want him to learn to read and I was honest about the gap in repertoire that we would have to explore.

Has anyone had this experience before in taking this kind of student on?
I have thought about teaching him with lead sheets to help minimize the gap and work on chords if they are open to that.

Any suggestions?

[lenkaolenka]

It is a dilema. Here is why
Full article is here:
https://www.boopadoo.net/page-Why+Jenny+Can't+Play+the+Piano%3F.htm

The Rule of the Stationary Bicycle
or
How We Have to Develop Complex Skills.

Because you go to a gym and use a stationary bicycle for cardiac exercise, does it mean that you can ride a real bike? Of course not! Because riding a bicycle involves a complex set of skills. You do not learn how to balance on a stationary bicycle, yet this is a missing but necessary link in training to ride a real one.

What would happen if you try to ride a real bike after training on a stationary bike? If you are an athletic type with a good sense of balance and coordination, it is less likely that you would be afraid of getting hurt if you fall off. Someone less skilled, however, could be afraid of falling, or fearful of even trying.

This is exactly what has happened for many centuries with piano learning, because there is a missing but necessary link in music education, just as there is in the example of training for a race on a stationary bike. This link is the visual perception of score and keys.

Learning a complex set of skills requires that all the components be developed together from the very start to build a strong, unified network. Losing any of the separate parts of the network, even for a short time, complicates the learning process for many students, except perhaps the most structured players.

Piano playing is about the relationship between the piano keys and musical notes – with plenty of looking and little actual seeing.

What is the difference between looking and seeing? For a moment, imagine yourself for the first time looking at a sheet of piano music and knowing that it is in a language that you do not know. Or imagine yourself standing in someone else’s kitchen looking for the saltshaker among all the spices on the shelf, but you are unable to see what the hostess could find with closed eyes. When a student of any age first stares at the piano keys and a music score, he/she is blind in the same way you would be looking for the salt among all the spices on the shelf. When a person cannot see, he/she needs to develop the skill to see, not the textbook knowledge about how to see things. Most piano students are constrained by music education that keeps them blind. Many well-known schools try to deal with problem of music blindness differently, but all the approaches have the same foundation – bondage on muscle memory. This is exactly how we teach blind people. How do the blind learn? They learn by touch. They also need assistance.

Russian music educators deal with blindness by endlessly playing scales and finger exercises and studies. Method books creators all over the world deal with blindness by offering 'hand position' curriculum, when hands and fingers are fastened to certain keys. Some schools have declared that reading music is not necessary at the beginning, and that playing “by ear” is a more fruitful approach. Some schools present beginners' sheets with finger numbers. Some inventors create systems of training muscles by blindly chasing lit keys or moving colorful objects on a monitor screen.
Some inventors use interactive computer programs to try to teach the eyes the knowledge of what they need to see.

These methods are like the stationary bicycle! They all overlook one important component of the complex skill to play piano: visual/spatial integration. Therefore, if we want to make piano lessons more effective, our duty is to let people SEE the music notes and their relationship to the piano keys from the very first steps.

[pianistimo]

i am so much in agreement - and yet - somehow in the suzuki training - some teachers effectively bring in sightreading later.  it did not work this way for my bro.  he started relying only on his ear and found sightreading a lot of bother and trouble because he could play things instantly by ear.  he actually still can play many things he hears and just sits down and plays it.  whereas i have to read the music to get the harmonies totally correct.

maybe it's fitting the student to the style.  my teaching style is geared to reading notes first, too, for the reason of not becoming over confident with the ear.  and yet, i think as teachers - there should be more emphasis on harmony and the ear in lessons, too.  it's fine balance.  and- of course, suzuki does stress the 'sounds' that one produces.  this is a good thing, too.

perhaps we are most comfortable with what produces the 'best results' to us.  for me- that would be seeing students able to 'take off' and use the piano lessons they've had to read more and more music and become adept by both reading and playing.  if you can't sightread - you're stuck playing one note at a time basically when you want to learn a new piece that you've never heard before.  learning early helps you become proficient, imo, by the time you are in the third year of lessons (or earlier).

guess that i never answered the question yet - yes!  i think lead sheets could be an effective introduction - and also, introducing no more than four or five notes per week of the staff.

a good way is to make a huge poster board and add one, two, or three notes per lesson.  start with middle c - the two c's on the second space from the top of the treble clef and second space from the bottom of the bass clef - and the two c's on the ledger lines two lines above the treble and two lines below the bass.  these are your basic SKELETON notes that a student can count alphabetically upwards or downwards from.  show them how to place their pencil on line/space/line/space in zigzag dots to count the lines and spaces.  hope this helps!

[lenkaolenka]

Dear pianistimo,
You mean this?
https://public.fotki.com/lenkaolenka/

[pianistimo]

method books usually bring in sightreading by keeping the hands in five-finger key patterns.  but, for someone just learning to sightread - it's much easier to use tetra-chord.  this helps them to 'feel' how a relaxed hand should feel.  lh5432 rh 2345

imo, setting them up to play melodies according to scales helps you 'kill two birds with one stone.'  not that i'm into killing birds, mind you!  they have to #1 identify the scale from the key signature.  #2 find the beginning and ending notes #3 set up their fingers #4 play the notes in the melody with the correct sharps or flats

now - as i see it - this gets them used to the idea that we're not always playing around middle c. 

**another thing that really helps is to give them memory tips on the key signatures.  if you have one sharp - you have a letter than can also be made by using one continuous line of your pencil (G).  two sharps = two distinct pencil lines for D  - one straight down and one to make the curve.  three sharps = three distinct lines in the letter A.  four sharps = four lines in letter E.  five sharps = use a roman type lettering for B where the lines that are curved turn to triangles.  that will equal five lines. 

[pianistimo]

no.  not exactly.  i mean just singling out all the C's first.  and then letting the student count the lines and spaces for themselves by putting a little dot on a line, then over slightly and dot on space, and so forth.  after a while - they won't need to say the alphabet up or down - as they'll learn 'face' 'every good boy... etc.'

sometimes they remember the 'saying' best - if you let them make one up for themselves.

dear  lenkaolenka... i hope i am not being dismissive in this statement, but because students don't typically read the staff sideways - it will still be a shift in their mind to read it once 'on end' and then each staff above the other.  if you have any sort of dyslexia in the student - they're going to be going 'what?' 

but, i think certain students could really take off with that!  just depends on the student, probably.  it's a great idea!

[tiasjoy]

This will be a challenge.  When I was young I had a very good ear for music and could play things by listening.  I was VERY reluctant to try and read music.  I found it frustrating and a waste of time when I could do it so easily the other way.

It was until much later that I realised that I could play ANY piece of music without having heard it first that finally sold me on the idea of persevering.  Now one of my favourite things to do is sightread difficult pieces just for fun.

I'd try and sell this idea to your student, as he may find the process frustrating too.  Also, work a lot with him with just TEACHING the names of the notes, identifying them in a score, finding them quickly on the piano.  In other words, equip him well with the ability before he has to tackle actual pieaces.  I do this a lot with my students, and if you call all the activities 'games' it's suddenly lots of fun.

If you use flash cards,  as well as naming the notes, get him to find the note on the piano.  Also play a key on the piano and have him write the notes on the staff etc.

Make sure to send him home with lots of opportunity to practise naming, finding, playing, writing the notes.

I'd be emphasising to him that you're not replacing the way he's been doing things, but adding/enhancing his skills.  Hopefully he'll see the benefit of learning to read music and will grow to love it ... then he'll do it more, and his well trained ear will be an asset, but not the only way of learning music.

I use lead sheets too for teaching improvisation skills. (however, my students already know how to read music - and I use this to try and free them up from the written notes - the exact opposite challenge you have!) They - lead sheets- may be a good way to introduce him to looking up at a page instead of down at his hands (if this is what he does).

[keyofc]

Thanks for all your responses,
and especially to Tias who has went through this transition.
Yes - that's exactly what I was telling him - imagine yourself playing in church or in a band never having heard a song - and being given the sheet music.
This is where you'll really be glad to know how to read.

[pizno]

 

i **another thing that really helps is to give them memory tips on the key signatures.  if you have one sharp - you have a letter than can also be made by using one continuous line of your pencil (G).  two sharps = two distinct pencil lines for D  - one straight down and one to make the curve.  three sharps = three distinct lines in the letter A.  four sharps = four lines in letter E.  five sharps = use a roman type lettering for B where the lines that are curved turn to triangles.  that will equal five lines. 

WOW, Piantisimo, I thought of this method all by myself one day, while trying to figure out how to memorize them.  I have NEVER heard of anyone else using this - in fact, people laugh when I tell them!  But it works!  And then for the flats, I do the thing where everything has to add up to seven.  If you have 5 sharps, you know you're in the key of B, and the key of B flat has 2 flats.  5 plus 2 is 7.  E has 4 sharps, and E flat has 3 flats.  4 plus 3 is 7.  Works for me!

Pizno

[lenkaolenka]

work a lot with him with just TEACHING the names of the notes,

-https://-https://www.doremifasoft.com/notealphabet.html

identifying them in a score,

-https://-https://www.doremifasoft.com/fruitlines.html
-https://-https://www.doremifasoft.com/trstpu.html
-https://-https://www.doremifasoft.com/bastpu.html

finding them quickly on the piano. 

-https://-https://www.doremifasoft.com/guesskeygame.html

Make sure to send him home with lots of opportunity to practise naming, finding, playing, writing the notes.

https://doremifasoft.stores.yahoo.net/sochandeartr.html

[brahms4me]

Forgive me for asking, but aren't we suppose to follow the forum rules about not advertising?  Seems to me that there's a lot of advertising going on.  There are other threads in which to do that.  It would be wise to read the rules more thoroughly.


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