Tag Archives: piano teaching

Piano Student End-Of-The-Year Assessments

By joy (admin) | Published: 21 May 2012

I’m back!  I ended up taking two weeks off instead of one, I know.  :)  But it felt great.  It feels great to be back too. At the MTNA National Conference in NYC this year, one of the sessions I attended encouraged teachers to do yearly or quarterly assessments/evaluations of their students.  Some teachers accompany [...]

Posted in improving as a teacher, piano pedagogy, private lessons, settings:, studio business | Also tagged | 5 Comments

Blogging Break

By joy (admin) | Published: 7 May 2012

Just a quick post to let you know that I will be taking the week off from blogging.  My brother is getting married this weekend, so my husband and I will be staying in Michigan with my family for a few days.  And the early part of this week is going to be busy with [...]

Posted in what I'm up to | Tagged | Leave a comment

Music Motor Match – A Rhythm Matching Game

By joy (admin) | Published: 4 May 2012

A large percentage of my studio right now is beginner/early elementary students.  I like having simple and short games to play with them at the end of the lesson that reinforce concepts we are learning in their books.  Motor Music Match is a game that I created with these things in mind.  Take a look: [...]

Posted in beginners / elementary Level, games, games, printables, rhythm | Also tagged , , , | 6 Comments

Spring Recital Details

By joy (admin) | Published: 1 May 2012

As I mentioned yesterday, our Spring Recital was Saturday!  Here’s how it went down: It was held at the local library.  They have an atrium with a Steinway baby grand piano.  In the past, I’ve always held recitals at churches (and once at a school).  I look for churches with grand pianos that can be [...]

Posted in recitals / performances, what I'm up to | Also tagged , | 7 Comments

Listening Sheet for Young Students

By joy (admin) | Published: 24 April 2012

As I mentioned last week, during my recent Piano Party/recital rehearsal I gave a listening sheet to my young beginners to complete as they listened to their fellow students perform.  Here’s what it looked like: I put each sheet in a plastic sheet protector and gave them a dry erase marker with a piece of [...]

Posted in beginners / elementary Level, ear training, other resources, Preschool / Early Childhood Music, recitals / performances | Also tagged , , | 9 Comments

Review: Daniel McFarlane’s Repertoire for Students

By joy (admin) | Published: 19 April 2012

Australian composer Daniel McFarlane has composed a number of student-level repertoire books which are available on his website.  Daniel was kind enough to send me digital copies of his books so I could review them here. In appearance, all of Daniel’s books have easy-to-read scores with no illustrations.  The titles of each piece are in [...]

Posted in beginners / elementary Level, by student's level, intermediate level, repertoire / methods, reviews | Also tagged , , | 5 Comments

Rhythm Value Cards for Dictation and More

By joy (admin) | Published: 17 April 2012

Here they are…the rhythm value cards I mentioned in my post yesterday!

Posted in ear training, games, games, group classes, music camps, printables, private lessons, rhythm | Also tagged , , , , | 10 Comments

Piano Party Success!

By joy (admin) | Published: 16 April 2012

On Saturday, I held a Piano Party for my students.  It was basically a group lesson and rehearsal for our Spring Recital which is coming up in a few weeks.  Most of my students have never met each other, so this was a good opportunity for them to learn a little about each other and [...]

Posted in games, group classes | Also tagged , , | 6 Comments

Music Worksheet: Identifying Space Notes on the Staff

By joy (admin) | Published: 12 April 2012

Here’s a new free music worksheet that I just added to the Printables page: This worksheet introduces the idea of identifying the space notes on the staff using the mnemonics FACE and All Cows Eat Grass.  These are the only two mnemonics I use.  I don’t teach separate mnemonics for the line notes anymore (like [...]

Posted in beginners / elementary Level, group classes, music theory, private lessons, worksheets | Also tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Forum Q&A | Attending Conferences

By joy (admin) | Published: 10 April 2012

The last Forum Q&A post was about assignment notebooks/pages for students.  It was wonderful to read all the great responses!  Click here to read the comments, and click here to read my follow-up where I share my method of tracking assignments. Being able to attend state and national-level conferences is one of the many benefits [...]

Posted in conferences, improving as a teacher, professional development | Also tagged , , | 2 Comments

MTNA 2012 Conference | Session on Composition Camps

By joy (admin) | Published: 9 April 2012

The last session of the conference I attended was a wonderful one!  It was called: Get Out of That Musical Box: Teach Students How To Compose! Dianne Higgins gave a delightful presentation about the summer composition camps she holds each year.  It has been a great success even since the first year she tried it! [...]

Posted in 2012 MTNA, composition, music camps | Also tagged , , , | 1 Comment

MTNA 2012 Conference | Getting Started With Online Marketing

By joy (admin) | Published: 4 April 2012

On Monday of the conference, I attended the Faber Exhibitor Showcase and the Keynote Address given by the wonderful Benjamin Zander!  Natalie has already posted notes on these sessions that are very similar to mine, so I’ll let you read her summaries here and here. The next session I attended was given by the MTNA [...]

Posted in 2012 MTNA, professional development, studio business | Also tagged , , , | Leave a comment
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