Flapping fingers!

[nick_uk]

Hi all. I'm new to this site and also teaching. I've got 2 students who have trouble with keeping their fingers on the keys of the Piano. One is 8 and the other is 11 years old. When they play a note their fingers that are not playing rise into the air. How do teachers normally correct this? Are there exercises that you give your students?

[DenverSop]

I've had trouble with this particularly in younger students, too.  

I usually have them play hands separately and place the idle hand just above the playing hand so they can feel when their fingers are rising.    

However, I am also interested in techniques more experienced teachers are using.  It's always toughest to correct the problems we never struggled with in our own learning process!

[pianoannie]

This is a very common occurance in young children, and sometimes in not-so-young students.  I don't dwell on it throughout the lesson, but I do demonstrate and explain to beginner students (as needed during the first few months of lessons) how the fingers SHOULD look compared to what their fingers ARE doing.  I tell them that it is quite common for new students' fingers to fly up like that, (I don't want them to think they have a rare problem) but that with careful attention to their fingers in their warmup exercises, their fingers will begin cooperating better.  (I don't focus too much on flying fingers during the student's playing of a piece, because they are so focused on notes, rhythm, touch, etc that one more thing is just too much).  
For warmups, I have them place one hand on 5 white keys, with an imaginary "bubble" under it to form the proper curve.  I'll have the student play just ONE note repeatedly, (with the same finger of course), while watching for flying fingers.  They are not to repeat the note until all fingers have rested back down on the keys in a nice curve.  They are to repeat this exercise with all 10 fingers, until (after a period of months) they can fairly well eliminate the flying fingers.  Warmups also include very slow 5-note patterns (ie CDEFG) with every finger resting on keys; if one "pops up" he must bring it back down before playing the next note.
These are exercises that can be done on a tabletop or on one's thigh while sitting in a chair or car, so the student can gets lots of finger practice during the week.  
It sounds pretty basic but it really does help.

[sybre]

I read this in the Oxford piano method i think, for really young children. Tell the child to imagine his/her hand is a 'bridge' and a little mouse is hiding under that 'bridge' and he/she is not supposed to let the mouse escape. So i guess that helps them to keep all their fingers down. I get that problem with my students too and i think most of the time it's because they are too tense and need to relax their fingers more. Hope this helps a bit.

[nick_uk]

Thanks for all your replies. I've started to use the warm up exercise that you recommend Pianoannie. This looks like it will help sort out the problem of those flying fingers.

[kerry]

I had this problem and my teacher placed an elastic band over my fingers to remind me to relax my hand position.  It helped me a lot as it gives gentle pressure to your fingers.  Thought this might help.