I've never done it but I have thought about some of the YouTubes I've watched where people have done a "tutorial" kind of thing where they'll play a tune, then take it apart a bit for you, show you how they do some of the stuff they do, perhaps in slow motion, or give alternatives on how they might do something. I find some of that useful. Not sure how that would translate into actually "teaching", though.
Has anyone here tried teaching?
I have been teaching on the side for a couple of years. It was okay, but also a lot of work for the money, compared to my normal job. The main difficulty is that students are so different. I like to think I am good at explaining things. I did good with adult beginners, probably because I was one myself. I also taught children, very different from adults.
It can be very satisfying, and it can also be frustrating. It's very interesting. I don't do it anymore, because I like to do other things.
I taught guitar and piano (but mostly guitar) to beginners from six to sixty plus, for almost 20 years.
I gave up when covid hit, except for a few Zoom students.
Now, a finger problem means I can no longer play guitar, :-( but I compensate by using guitar VST's just for my own enjoyment, at home.
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I had some minimal success teaching my 8 year old son something today. It's like training a stroke victim to regain some of their lost abilities. Very hard.
I have not taught piano, or any music related topic. I don't have the requisite skillset and breadth of knowledge for it to be a paying gig, although I have no objection to sharing my time to help friends with some of the basics of reading music on occasion.
ErfurtBob
I can see how that could be. My teacher specialises in intermediate to advanced students as well as adults, but like many jobbing musicians, will also take younger children to fill the schedule. It is fair to say, based on my observations, that teaching youngsters and particularly young beginners can take an inordinate amount of patience and energy for the return.
I was a BC Registered Piano Teacher until 202O, with the outbreak of the pandemic we decided it was a good time to retire. I have not resumed teaching, but still enjoy playing the piano and recorder/baroque flute in an early music group at the seniors centre. By the yes it's me Tre
trecorda By the yes it's me Tre
I knew it was you tre! Great to see you here too.
I haven't taught, but I have tried to write a piano method book, based on everything I thought was lacking in Alfred's AIO. Well. It was a fun project for me at the time. Not anything that I today would present to a beginning piano student.
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The first time I taught music was in 2007-2008. I taught RCM theory rudiments, all three levels over about 18 months to a super keen student in Israel. I had just passed my own exams and like Animisha, thought there was a better way to approach this. It was also a review for me, and a way of testing my ideas. Drawing on my own teacher training, it seemed that concrete physical experience should lead ahead of abstract concepts, and be part of it.
I invented 3 points of a triangle: concrete experience, the paperwork part, finding it in music. For example, before teaching intervals, I assigned playing C unison, C Db, C D, etc. and writing in which you found the most and least pleasant. Then the next thing was built. Then the exercises in the book, and noticing these intervals while playing whatever music. The first experience of "most & least pleasant" popped in again when we got to Dom7 and the tritone, ideas of resolving.
One reason why it went extremely well was because of the attitude and hard work of the student. A regular teacher once suggested that there was a need for this, because they don't have time to teach this on top of regular things. Suddenly RCM theory, or ABRSM theory is due at that grade level, and it becomes a rush for the teacher. I did see one teacher who gave such classes on-line for groups. I realized that I'd probably not be able to work the same way in such scenarios. As one teacher put it, I had a "gem of a student".
When you teach, you learn more and new sides to what you know, through the teaching.
Animisha I haven't taught, but I have tried to write a piano method book, based on everything I thought was lacking in Alfred's AIO. Well. It was a fun project for me at the time. Not anything that I today would present to a beginning piano student
It might be interesting to look at. (spontaneous thought)
Not piano. Back in January I started teaching a friend some simply rock and blues guitar so we could jam a bit. He's coming along very well, definitely a good "student" and very motivated to practice. The trickiest part is that he's never played any instrument before, not even as a schoolkid, so he doesn't know even the most basic theory. That makes communication difficult sometimes, since I have to explain various terms and concepts before we can talk productively about the actual playing. He's got a good attitude, though, so we slog through!
Enthusiastic but mediocre amateur.
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Animisha
I like how you stayed with only one aspect of intervals - the numbers part (2nds, 3rds, 4ths, of any kind). You hinted at "quality" (major, minor) by having the reader play two notes that formed M2 vs. m2, and having them listen.
Was the written music created by you, or borrowed? The one thing I would not have are the numbers over the notes. I suppose they are fingering numbers (?) but since intervals are expressed in numbers, I first thought that intervals were being labeled - getting rid of those numbers would add to the presentation.
Did you find that the exercise of creating this also helped solidify it all for yourself?
keystring You hinted at "quality" (major, minor) by having the reader play two notes that formed M2 vs. m2, and having them listen.
At the time, I may not have been aware that this difference in the sound was called major and minor. I was more into listening than into studying music theory...
keystring Was the written music created by you, or borrowed?
It was stolen! At the time, I did not use Musescore yet, so I copied and pasted a lot. However, I may have written the fingering numbers with the help Photoshop myself. If you look at thirds, the idea was to play thirds with different finger combinations, not only with F1-F3-F1, but also with F2-F4-F2 and with F3-F5-F3.
Eventually, I quit this project. But,
keystring Did you find that the exercise of creating this also helped solidify it all for yourself?
yes, very much so! Compared to reading and memorising, trying to create your own piano method book really forces you to express what you know, and this requires quite another level of understanding.
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Animisha At the time, I may not have been aware that this difference in the sound was called major and minor. I was more into listening than into studying music theory...
You accidentally did some right things that would help others, and your thought process seems very good for working it out for yourself.
For interval names we have the "numbers" part: 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc., and then the quality part (major, minor etc.). Teaching one after the other is a good idea - just the numbers part for a start.
Exploring sound is a good thing to do, because intervals aren't just musical math. And you did that too. I don't know if you got as far as things like C Eb vs. C D# which both use the same piano keys and sound the same on the piano. They're called minor 3rd and augmented 2nd respectively. Recognizing that they sound the same, using your ears, is another part of being familiar with intervals. And you did that from the get-go.
Animisha It was stolen! At the time, I did not use Musescore yet, so I copied and pasted a lot. However, I may have written the fingering numbers with the help Photoshop myself. If you look at thirds, the idea was to play thirds with different finger combinations, not only with F1-F3-F1, but also with F2-F4-F2 and with F3-F5-F3.
Got it. This is good when doing it for yourself, because you're working it out at the level you can handle, and know what you're doing. It's a good way to study. If you were creating this for another student then I'd leave out those numbers because you're mixing two concepts, and in teaching it's more effective to bring in one concept at a time. In studying for myself, however, I'll do a mixture and cross-referencing like you did.
Animisha ompared to reading and memorising, trying to create your own piano method book really forces you to express what you know, and this requires quite another level of understanding.
Absolutely!
Thank you so much Keystring for your thoughtful analysis of my attempt to write a piano method book. I did better than I thought! At least, about introducing intervals.
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I taught for a number of years when my wife and I lived in South Dakota. There were very few piano teachers, and I felt that I was qualified enough to teach young children, at least for the first couple of years.
They would range in age from about 5 to 12. If they were beginners, I would just start by having them get familiar with the layout of the keyboard, notice that there were groups of two black keys and three black keys. Then I would show them that they could play something "pretty" just by improvising on the black keys alone. I would play something else pentatonic below.
Depending on age, when they were ready, I would introduce them to middle C and the D and E above, so they could play "Mary had a little lamb", always with myself accompanying them so it sounded more impressive. F and G, and Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" would follow, and the left hand would get in on the act with its lone "G" below middle C.
I generally used the Piano Pageants method by the composer Donald Waxman, as it was by far the most interesting in terms of the little pieces being "real" compositions; I highly recommend it. After going through two or three of those books, we'd graduate to pieces by Kabalevsky and Tansman, etc.
Also there was a book called "The Joy of Jazz" edited by Denis Agay, which I myself enjoyed as a child. I was generally asked to provide some sort of Christmas music arrangements, and sometimes the kids would bring in simple arrangements of popular movie tunes, etc. Last but certainly not least, I was eventually "obligated" to arrange a simple version of the opening section of "FΓΌr Elise", as I must have had 20 kids ask for it.
I figured that it was in general a good idea to coordinate piano playing with reading the notes off the page, as aside from improvisation, in the West that's how music is most efficiently communicated, at least its framework.
There's probably a lot that I don't remember, since it's been at least 25 years!
pseudonym58 That's a very interesting perspective! Thanks for sharing.
I think that for those of us who are in the learning phase, we can sometimes forget that even with our imperfect knowledge, we can make a real difference through teaching, especially in those places which aren't oversaturated with teachers. I find that I end up focusing so much on my weaknesses that I never feel ready to teach someone.
ranjit I have also had a considerable number of cello students, both children and adults. When teaching cello, sometimes I flip the instrument around and try to bow with my left arm and stop the strings with my right hand. This I do in front of the students to show them that there's nothing wrong with them and that if I tried to learn to play the cello in this new manner, I would have just as much difficulty as they do.