Beginners on Zoom

[whistlestop]

Hi
I vowed not to revert to zoom ever again unless deep snow, sniffles or somesuch prevented students travelling. However, a new adult would like to learn and she would need to travel so far, I feel moved to offer 60/40 zoom and in-person to minimise this. (No teachers in her locality) Trouble is, last time I was zooming, I had no complete beginners and I'm looking for a method suitable for adults that doesn't rely heavily on teacher-accompaniment to flesh out the first pieces. I know from experience how unsatisfactory duetting is over zoom (one of us will sound like breaking glass...) Does anyone have any ideas, please?

[lostinidlewonder]

You may avoid the drudgery of having to read sheet music with early beginners by writing up some sheets yourself with predominantly single positions and input the finger numbers while highlighting the position their fingers should rest on with a keyboard graphic and numbers on that. Then you could give actual sheet music which represents that number system and they can make some connection with that. I have a specific way in writing these types of alternative sheet music but you of course could come up with something yourself which makes logical sense for your students, certainly is a fine way to introduce early beginners and get their hands coordinating while avoiding reading actual sheets until they have some coordination and experience under their belt. We should learn to speak before we read. If your lessons are often structured around duetting you can send them an audio file so they can practice along with it on their own.

[elijah]

Hi,

I would really recommend "Rockoutloud.live" for teaching, I've been using it to teach for about two months now and so far it has been really great! The audio quality is really good and there is also a special "duet mode" which is also great to use. It does, however, cost $10 a month to use - though I've found it to be worth it.

Hope this helps!

- Lij

[keypeg]

Would that expense be justified for a single student?