Okay - after watching your video, let me say a few things. 1) The reason people can play the 'first' version of Mary had a little lamb is because that version can take a week or two to teach, and anyone can get it. The 2nd version you play with the secret sauce pattern will take MONTHS for someone to physically play with the same dexterity that you or I take for granted. The right hand was easy enough, but the secret sauce pattern will take me 6 seconds to learn, 6 months for a newbie to learn. Not only THAT... then they have to have the co-ordination to play the secret sauce pattern, WHILE trying to co-ordinate their right hand melody. 2) While you may think easy wins are great beginning - it usually leads to MAJOR frustration later on. There is no easy, simple way to just LEARN a language, and sadly enough this is the same with music. It's not just the written music, but it's also the physicality and co-ordination as mentioned in point 1. By teaching the students the written music in a more traditional pattern - you are giving them the tools to actually read the music themselves... you are giving them ways for them to figure out the notes. Once they have this - they have a key in which to practice at home and can start to think about how they physically play it. 3) Your idea of 'fundamentals' is vague... Are you talking about scales, arpeggios, HANON? When I teach students, I teach them only the theory that is involved in the pieces they are playing. If they are playing a piece of music that has a RH melody, and 3 LH chords, I'll make sure they at least know how to read they notes in the RH and give them exercises to help them switch between their 3 chords. I won't teach scales until they actually have pieces with actual scalic passages (and scalic fingering). This way I am making sure they know everything they need to know to help them learn this piece, but without overloading them with techniques that aren't relevant to them at this time. 4) Again, easy wins is a bit vague... I had a teacher who let me play and learn Fur Elise as a 9-year old. Did it have messy demisemiquavers? Yes... Was the balance between LH and RH poor? Yes... Was I technically and physically ready to play it? NO. Was I absolutely CRUSHED when time and time again I was allowed to learn pieces beyond my grasp, rather shoddily and without any finesse... only to learn down the track that I was being fooled into being better than I was?sh*t YEAH. Some things to think about. I was taught the traditional way, however I had a bunch of very poor teachers who were letting me get away with some easy wins... and when I got to University - WOW, was that a wake-up call.
First off, I agree there could be many types of "Secret Sauces". So yea, one could be playing block chords and holding them, which allows you to play more complex melodies over the top. Another could be the left hand pattern, which allows for a "cooler" left hand while the right hand uses simpler melodies (like Mary Had a Little Lamb). They should compliment each other.
...I think if you have a solid teacher that's your "base", and then you have a bunch of random YouTube videos, you can think "hmmm I wonder if this would work", try it, and see if it works. I think the big thing to keep in mind is when is when learning off YouTube you have to treat it as "let me try this and see if it works" and not "I'm going to follow this method because it's "right"
As for motivation, I think we need a variety of different types of motivation. The "Secret Sauce" type of motivation IS more of the "quick booster" type of motivation. But I've seen it work really well in "getting students off the ground" in early stages. For long term motivation, I've seen some pretty mundane looking checklists and charts work really well in building in that sense of accomplishment. In particular, setting a couple different goals (like a silver goal and a gold goal) in terms of BPM have dramatically improved the amount of time students practice scales from my experience.
In addition to that, the second song they learn using the same left hand pattern will be remarkably easier than the first - because you don't have to "relearn" the left hand.
It's not a real TED talk. It's a TEDx talk.
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I didn't know that TED talks were supposed to change people's behaviour. Are they?
They are "supposed" to be more than mere entertainment, like youtube videos of kittens. I think of them as offering insight or information, sometimes challenging thought.
Wanted to get y'alls opinion on this piano teaching TED Talk!Instead of focusing on the Fundamentals first, we should focus on "easy wins" early on in the learning process to build motivation, and come back to the Fundamentals later.There seems to be VERY mixed reactions I get from teachers, what do you think?
Instead of focusing on the Fundamentals first, we should focus on "easy wins"..
keypeg -- You didn't bother your teacher with the motivation aspect because you had it very clear from the start. It's not fair to assume most people do. Even if they are clear that they want to learn the piano properly, I'd venture to say most people don't really know what it entails until they get into it.
Giving them some amount of motivation, and some easier pieces which also sound like real music (not Hanon!) is very important imo.
The stereotype that piano teachers make you do unmusical boring exercises is for a reason.
A lot of teachers are not like that, and since you have a really good teacher, most teachers you will encounter will also be quite good, but you should keep in mind that you are looking at a skewed sample.
You're in the minority of serious adult learners who are quite clear about their intent to learn classical piano, know what it entails, and have been shortchanged in the past, and it affects your viewpoint.
Also, the remedial math students who come to you are, again, intrinsically motivated.
Traditional approaches so put too much emphasis on "talent," as traditional math approaches have on "intelligence."
A growth mindset suggests we can all succeed, and here are some paths that may work.
Intensive technique approaches (play scales and Hanon two years before being allowed a tune) do produce good fundamentals, in that 1% who stay.
The obvious difference we should be aware of is that keystroke3 is teaching through the internet which is of course very different to those who teach in person. He also teaches on a large scale with so many students it is practically impossible to get to know each one personally and deal with each one individually.