20% Off Suzuki Method

Get 20% off Suzuki Method books over at Sheet Music Plus! Discount ends 3.20.2012

Go here and scroll down to sign up for their email newsletter...that is how I found out about this discount! Thanks, Sheet Music Plus!

Any other discounts that you know of? Leave a comment!

The Best Of: New Games and other stuff Edition

Welcome to The Best Of: where I round up some great links for you from around the www. that I have enjoyed this week!


Piano Finger Twister from Joy (looks like so much fun!)

Smash Hit Games with the Eggspert (again, why can't I be the student?)

Jennifer uses the Eggspert Quizzing System to play Accidental Adventure

Want to listen to some phenomenal pianists? Listen to music from Carnegie Hall!

Here are the goodies: Hal Leonard is offering 40% off select teacher resources until the end of March!

Slightly humorous, but so very important are the truths in this post about the person hiding in your church's back closet!!!!

Any other great links that you have read this week that you would like to share with us? Please do!

The Best Of: Food For Thought Edition

Welcome to a new weekly series of posts, "The Best Of:" where I am delighted to be able to share some of my favorite reads from around the web with you - all musically related, of course! Here's what I've enjoyed reading this week:


When Unwillingness in Practice is a Good Thing - What? Unwillingness is good? Read the post. :)

Piano Books as Gifts - Great thoughts!

Do You Have to Have a Degree to be a Good Piano Teacher? - Consequently, having a degree doesn't necessarily make you a good teacher, either. But I digress.

Teaching the Congregation a New Song - Especially for song leaders, but equally important for their pianists, too!

Joy-oh-joy! The traditional Wedding March is getting a makeover! Can't wait for that to come out!

And a free arrangement of It Is Well With My Soul - one of my favorite songs!

Happy Weekend Everyone! What have you enjoyed reading this week?

 

Neat Resource I Can't Wait to Try!

I recently was looking over the assignment book, The Right Notes, available through Alberti Publishing. Jen recently reviewed it, if you want to take a look at her post. This looks like such a fun resource! It looks like not only a fun, colorful assignment book, but also a great outline for talking about some of the details that tend to get left on the shelf. It has composer biographies, definitions and explanations of other musical terms, descriptions of eras, etc. Some of these things are certainly on my list of not-very-strong points! Just because they aren't my strong points doesn't mean that they won't me my student's, however. This assignment book will allow you to help you student learn about many different details from many angles.

The possibilities are endless with this book. If you use a practice incentive, you could use the topics on each week's page to earn your student some more points. You could give a younger student one oral question to answer from what he learned, or you could give an older student an extra-credit assignment to find out more about that certain subject. How fun! And who doesn't want a chance for some more points toward their ultimate goal?

The other great thing I see about this book is that even if you order the hard copy, it is surprising inexpensive for such a color-packed book. Making it super affordable for every parent! And what parent doesn't like that??

Enough rambling. Short story is, I am super excited to give this book a try. Try it and let me know what you think.

An App Giveaway

It seems like most piano teachers I read about these days are getting iPads for their studios. They sound like so much fun! I can't wait for the day that I can add one to my "teaching materials." (Solely for teaching, I assure you....ok, maybe not!) Actually my brother is entered to win one, and he is VERY sure he is going to win...and when he does he is going to give it to me, because he has no need for it, right? RIGHT?

Anyway, I enjoy reading about all the great apps that are out there in relation to teaching, and I can't wait for the day that I get to try them out. I have wondered, though...how on earth will I remember all these great apps? I can just see myself doing searches for "apps" on all of your blogs to see the ones you use. I will probably post a question on my blog, "What great apps are out there for teaching? What apps do you use in your studio?" I will search high and low for the best apps, comparing all those metronomes, and finally settling on what I think I will use the most.

OR,

I could compile all of your "app" posts into one convenient list so that not only me, but other piano teachers who add an iPad to their studios will have a place to go read the reviews about teaching apps.

Bingo!

Much like I did with the recital posts, I can keep updating this list with apps that you all think are great. I am going to begin putting this list together, so if you have blogged about an app that you would recommend, please leave a comment and let me know!

And in the meantime, Natalie from Music Matters Blog is hosting an app giveaway as we speak! Not just one, but TWO great apps, with three copies of each being given away. So you have six chances to win! So head on over to her review to leave your comment to enter and (hopefully) win!

Goodbye to Jen's Piano Studio Blog

Yes, you read that right. Jen's Piano Studio Blog is leaving us. But never fear! It is turning into Pianimation instead!

Jen is combining the valuable resources found at her blog and her studio website into one great place, Pianimation. It appears that this will make it much easier for us to use her resources. Thank you, Jen!

And in honor of the move Jen is offering a discount and a giveaway! Go here for all the details. You won't want to miss it!

Check out Pianimation and be sure to update your information if you already followed her blog.

Practicing Followup

To follow up on our two-week study of the best and worst ways to practice, I made a simple sheet to ask my students some questions about their own practicing. This has given me incredible insight into how they practice at home, and how to help them enjoy it more.

If you remember, I had gotten the handout and idea for my “group” game over at Sarah’s blog. She also had posted a sheet of questions that she used to follow up on the handout, but I felt my students needed something a little simpler. So I just gave them five easy questions to answer, and crossed my fingers that it wouldn't take them long to fill it out!

Here it is, available for you to download.

I have one student that is 7 and can’t read very well yet, so I asked him the questions orally. Because they are such simple questions, he didn’t seem to mind answering them out loud.

Here are some of the eye-opening answers I’ve received:

1. What is your favorite part of practicing?

-Hymn Arrangements

-That after lots of practice I will be able to play without looking at the notes. (hmmm…)

-Exercises (Who would have thought? She does the Edna Mae Burnam prepatory book. And she actually spelled it “exersioses” - how cute!)

-Playing my songs

2. What is your least favorite part of practicing?

-hard songs that take a long time to learn.

-“Watch Your Step”

-You have to look everywhere (meaning there is a lot to think about and pay attention to!) (at least I hope thats what he meant!)

-That I have to keep switching my hands from left to right.

3. What makes it hard to practice?

-The lines and spaces

-Wanting to be doing something else

-Learning the new notes.

-To do everything right.

4. What is your favorite song to play?

-Love is patient

-Gypsy Rondo

-Yankee Doodle

-Wiggly Worm

5. Have these practice tips helped you?

-So far they have all said yes!

So here is my question for you: How do you help your students enjoy their practice time? I know that they are not going to enjoy every song they have to learn, but overall, do your students enjoy practicing?

The Practicing Game

Recently I read a great list of 10 Best Ways and 10 Worst Ways to Practice, found on Marcia Vahl's blog. Sarah, from Discoveries Piano Studio, also read this list, and made this handout available for all of us. Thank you Sarah!

I wanted so badly to get this into my students hands, but how to do it in a way they would remember and that we could talk about it, without just giving them the handout they would probably not read thoroughly? Well, Sarah came to my rescue again with her ideas, but I adapted them a little to meet my own studio needs.

I printed both lists out on bright cardstock, and cut them so there was one practicing tip on each piece. I then put both headings on the wall with sticky-tack, and throughout the week, each student got to pick one tip and put it under the appropriate heading. Here are some pictures of how that worked. (Since my explanation just didn't make a lick of sense!)

See? Each student reads through the list (or I would summarize it for them if they were too young to read) and picks one to add to the appropriate heading.

By the end of the week, we had this:

So this week, as each student comes back, they are excited to see the completed list! Then I give them Sarah's handout and we talk about each one. It seems like it is making sense!

Click here, and you can download these lists for your wall, as I have done above. There are 6 sheets to this printable, and I rearranged the lists so that you can use multiple colors and mix them up a little bit. You will notice that I left out a few from the original lists - things like "Repeat Step 1" didn't seem like it would make sense until they saw the handout.

I hope these are a help to you!

New: Printables!

I am happy to share with you today a couple of printables. I shared with you before about my keyboard worksheet that I made to help my brother learn the fingering for cadence inversions. Yes, you can now download it for yourself! Feel free to use it in whatever way it will help you...it doesn't have to just be for cadences.

Keyboard Worksheet

I also just tried my hand at making a little composing activity for a little beginner. He is 7 years old, and I wanted something that fit in with what he has learned already and it doing in his lesson book. This is what I came up with. I plan to work on it tomorrow at his lesson, so we will see how it works.

Beginner composing activity

Since we know how bad my creativity is, I totally bombed trying to come up with a little rhyme to go along with this rhythm. I plan on having my student decide what he wants his song to be about, and then maybe we can come up with words together. If any of you think of some words to this, please feel free to share them!

I am still experimenting and learning about how to get these so you all can download them, so if any of the links above do not work properly, please let me know!

You Guys Make Me Ink!

If you've ever watched "Finding Nemo," you know the title for this post is a quote. But seriously, you all do make me ink. Well, you make my printer ink. Because you all provide such great printable material that I can't help it! I am so thankful for all of the great resources.

No matter how great they are, we all know that all these great printables leave us a little lacking on the ink side of things. Which then leaves our pockets devoid of moola, because ink is expensive. Well, sorrow no further!

A friend of mine pointed me in the direction of Printer Filling Station, a company that supplies ink and refill kits at a waaaaaay cheaper price. They have ink for EVERY printer imaginable! Betcha didn't know that your ink cartridges were refillable, did you? Neither did I, but I am happy to report that I am a firm believer in it now!

I bought black and color ink for my printer, and the kits came with very simple instructions and the syringes to fill the cartridges. Seriously, I felt like a mad scientist. It was great. I spent as much money as I normally do for a set of cartridges, but the amount of ink I got will refill my printer many, many times. Such a better investment for my money!

I had a little trouble with my black ink cartridge, but the folks at Printer Filling Station were very helpful, and we got the ink running after a while. I had let the cartridge go empty before I filled it, and I guess HP ink is kinda fussy that way. So now I just keep my cartridges topped off, and everything runs smoothly.

So give them a try! I am sure you will not be disappointed. If you have any more questions, feel free to ask! I can not say enough good about my experience with Printer Filling Station.

I hope to add a list to my sidebar soon of resources such as Printer Filling Station. Stay tuned!