Need some beginner teaching advice.

[missdoc77]

Not sure if this post should be in the teacher section or here, so please tell me if I would get better response elsewhere.  We are getting a digital piano on Friday for my 10 year old step daughter... well, for me, too   I grew up playing, took several years of lessons but only played for fun after high school.  My step daughter has shown an aptitude for piano even in the few times she's been able to play around on one.  I can show her a simple tune and she remembers it but has not shown any patience for learning to read music yet.

So she's been begging for a piano and now is getting one.  My question is - aside from professional lessons, which we can't do yet - how might I get her interested in learning to read music?  Are there some games or particular books/activities to help her get started?  I feel I have enough knowledge to take her through the basics and see if she gets serious enough to pay for lessons eventually.  But I need some ideas to keep her engaged in the "book work" and not get fidgety as kids tend to do with parents more so than with a teacher/non-parent.  The other challenge we have is that she primarily lives with her mom so won't have access to the piano daily but we're gonna do our best! 

Thanks for any ideas!

[ajspiano]

you could take the focus away from a book.

you can do alphabet games - obviously thats not that interesting in its basic form, but you can turn it into a challenge that isnt about just ABCDEFG..

for example, you may initially process the lines and spaces separately..  FACE, EGBDF. How fast can you say EGBDF? can you stop on each of them? can you skip a particular one? Asign them numbers E1, G2, B3 etc.  which letter is number 3? - try to get to the answers quickly.

This kind of stuff will provide basic skills that are going on inside the notation as a whole.

Clap rhythms - ask her to write down the rhythm some how.. if she can't think how, make suggestions. If she comes up with her own idea thats great, you can show her "how you would have done it" and use proper notation ideas.

once you get into writing different pitches on the staff go to teoria.com - its nothing fancy but kids generally like the idea of using some kind of "computer game" to learn.