Value of Teaching to Play By Ear

A couple weeks ago, I posted a list of melodies that work well assign piano students to take home and learn to play by ear.  Over at ComposeCreate.com, Wendy Stevens talks about the value of teaching students to play by ear during a lecture she gave, Composition for Kids: Time-Saving Ways to Teach Composition in your Studio. (If you haven’t already, you really should check out the entire series of videos she has posted — they contain some very practical ways to encourage and teach composition in the piano lesson.)

Wendy also created a great handout that you can give to your students, to assign them tunes to play by ear, harmonize it, transpose it, and do something creative with it.  This handout is available on this post (the link to the actual handout is located just underneath the video).  Be sure to check it out!

Joy is a pianist, piano teacher, and graduate student earning her Master's in Piano Pedagogy and Performance. She has been teaching piano for five years. She enjoys blogging about her teaching experiences at colorinmypiano.com.

Joy has blogged 259 posts here.

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