Advices from experienced piano teachers PLEASE?!

[bon_bear]

Hey all! I'm very sorry if I sound repetitive! But I'm pretty sure many have asked the following question I'm about to ask. I've tried searching through the forum but all kinds of unrelated threads came up.

I've just been asked to teach piano to a 5 and a half year-old little girl whose parents would like her to take exams and progress through grades (RCM). From what I hear, she has "some" experience in terms of playing piano (beginners) from taking a course in the community centre - though for a very VERY short period of time.

I've always wanted to become a piano teacher since I was little so I'm really looking forward to this! But my question is, since I'm very new to this profession, I want to know if there are certain ways to introduce piano basics to her as I know this is very important if she continues to develop her interests in piano.   

I heard Kelly Kirby is the best method to approach her. Though, I can't really remember how that was like. Besides Baby C, and Doggy D and Father Bass Clef...
If anybody could provide me any links to websites, places of where to look for books or anything else that may be useful to me, that would be very much appreciated!

Thank you very much for sharing your advices to me! Thank you in advance for your helpfulness! I'm looking forward to your responses!

Eliza Yen

[quasimodo]

I'm not exprerienced nor a teacher, but here's the advice of someone who seems to fill those requirements:

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php/topic,2192.0.html

[hyrst]

There is an enormous differnece between a 3 or 4 year old and a 5 year old - and an enormous differnece between individual 5 year olds.  You could do a lot of preparation and then find out his little girl doesn't want to be treated like a baby - I don't recommend adding terms like 'doggy', not good and just extra to learn.  However, you do have to work out what all the basics are of music, what are the foundations stones of reading (the logic part, not the 'name' part), moving, technique, aural awarenss, rhythm - there are so many aspects.  Be creative and fun, but not babyish.  Use concepts, not technical terms - e.g. 'steps' rather than 'intervals'.  Be visual without belittling.  If the girl has already had some back ground, you need to find out what she understands and how she conceptualises it before trying to teach anything.

[nyonyo]

I used to teach piano. My students from 6 years old to infinity.
I found it is very difficult to teach young kids who cannot count or read.
You have to have a lot of experience on how to deal with little kids.
We cannot make them count since they do not even know how to count.

Since you really want to teach, if I were you, I would take this kid and try your best.
It is a learning experience.

Good luck...

[lostinidlewonder]

For the young you are basically there to increase their experience with music in all ways, not necessarily what their hands do at the piano. You have to get them listening intelligently to music, experiment with aural tests like clapping back rhythm, beats, making up the endings of a melodic phrase, singing the higher or lower note of a chord you play etc. Sometimes I am teaching them coordination, and it goes so far that I get them to try to rub their stomach with one hand and pat their head with the other, then change the actions.

It is good to perhaps initially separate reading music from learning their music. Often early beginners learn better by memorizing immediately what they have to play instead of learning it through constant reading. So to keep these two disciplines separated until the student has memorized a handful of pieces sometimes makes things less stressful for the student.

Early beginners are probably the hardest students to teach. At least with students with some experience you can work with something, with beginners you have to start from scratch. You have to sometimes go so far back that you are testing if they can actually do have the basic coordination to use their hands at all. Some might be stuck playing everything with their 2nd fingers pointing out of a fist, some can't even play two notes in one hand against one in the other. How you go about removing these completely beginner problems are not so hard, identifying them and making the student notice it and act against it is matter which is unique to the student however.

[tompickle]

https://pianomorning.com has a lot of primer level songs as well as theory sheets.  Good luck!

[point of grace]

i love teaching little children
the first activity i do with them is with a dice i made, each face with a different color and the name of the note (even tough they can read or not, they have to be familiar with letters i think =) )
so i prepare pieces of papers with the same colours and put them in the right place of the keyboard, in the central part.
so they use the dice and touch the right key. they love it, and you can make many variants too...

sorry i have no much vocabulary, hope this help and post more games if you came up with one!!

bye
Yanina

[dan101]

My students usually don't start before the age of six. If you really want the five year old to progress well, chances are that the parents will have to help a lot at home. Also, exams at that age seem too early.

[bluessax576]

I agree with (sorry, I forget who it was), that said not to use terms like baby c, doggy d, or whatever they were.  The first thing you need to do is to ascertain whether the child can read and count, if they can't do it on their own (appropriate to their age of course, we're not looking to count to 100 by prime numbers), then they need more time.  As far as teaching, make sure you take very small steps, and are very explicit. I.e. don't show her the keyboard and then try to teach all the notes on it, start at the very beginning: this is the keyboard, it has white and black keys, hit some white keys, hit some black ones.  hit the groups of two black keys, three black keys, three white keys, four white keys, which way is up (the top), and down (the bottom).  You see where I'm going here right?  Just take NOTHING as the given, if they know something already, or figure it out exceptionally quickly, great, praise them for being so smart, move on, and continue to take it one tiny step at a time.