Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Snow? What Snow?

Even though we don't have snow in Florida, our Primary kids still LOVE to sing this song, "Once There Was a Snowman". Excited for my students to start playing this song!

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Bringing a Little Warmth

Yeah, I know it's Fall and soon it will be winter. But before most of you all in Utah get snow for 8 months I wanted to share a little warmth with you. Whenever I play, sing, hear this song my heart immediately feels warm. Little kids love it and so I had to arrange it. Popcorn Popping.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

I really do love to see the temple

You see, I live in Panama City, FL where there isn't a temple for 6 hours in any direction. Birmingham, Atlanta, New Orleans, and Orlando temples are all about 6 hours away from us. It makes me sad. I grew up in Utah where almost everyone takes for granted that they have 5 temples within a 30 minute drive from their home. Well, we're taking a temple trip with some of our friends in a couple weeks and I also arranged this song for one of my piano students to play in my first recital for my students on Sept 29th (wish me luck!). Seeing the temple, being in the temple means more to me now than it ever has before. Hope you enjoy...I Love To See The Temple.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Poll Results

So last month I took a poll on which song you guys wanted me to arrange and everyone except for one person voted for Scripture Power. This song isn't in the Primary Children's Songbook, but kids LOVE it. Scripture Power

Monday, August 15, 2011

Love One Another

I gave a talk in church this week about expressions of love. I talked about three different ways we can express love to those in our families through spending time together, serving each other, and using words to express love.  Music can express many different types of feelings, but I think it is most powerful when we use it to express our love. So here is my beginning arrangement of Love One Another and if you haven't already today, tell someone in your family you love them :) Love One Another

Thursday, August 11, 2011

Starting out? Here's some tips.

Over the past week, two of my friends have mentioned to me that they are starting to teach piano or will be soon. So I thought I would post especially for them. I remember my first lesson, I was confident until I actually sat down and thought about what I would teach them during the first lesson in a couple days. Man, I was blank. Where do I start? There is so much! Do I start teaching how to read notes right away? What exercises would be best? And heck, what piano books do I even have them start with?

I was completely lost and that's when I had the brilliant idea to call my sister-in-law Cathy, who was an old pro at teaching. She asked me if I was starting with true beginning students. I was. She then told me four simple things to do during the first lesson.

First, start by asking them about the physicality of the piano. Questions like, "How many colors are on the piano? Do you notice any patterns? Where are the high notes and low notes? How many notes are on the piano?" That last question will always trip them up, they will start guessing how many KEYS are on the piano not NOTES (there are 84 keys on the piano and 7 notes).

That last question will lead you into the second thing you want to introduce them to which is the SEVEN notes on the piano. Show them where middle C is and talk to them about the pattern of the notes and how they just keep repeating and repeating over and over. Then assign them to find (pick three notes) all the A, F, and D's on the keyboard every time they practice. Then the next week ask them to find the remaining four notes.

The third thing you want to talk to them about is the 5 finger pattern. Teach them that thumbs are always "1" and pinky's are always "5". Show them how to play a 5 finger scale with the right hand only and ask them to repeat it. You will be surprise at how many kids have a hard time playing a simple 5 finger scale and that's because their fingers aren't strong enough yet. Have them practice the 5 finger scale with each hand seperately throughout the week. (Obviously, talk to them about playing with curved fingers and playing smoothly etc.)

The last thing you want to do is assign them their very first song. Play it up. All my kids were SO excited they were going to learn a song already. I have them play just the right hand of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" and I right out the 5 finger pattern for the song. (3-2-1-2-3-3-3-2-2-2-3-4-4-3-2-1-2-3-3-3-2-2-3-2-1).

You'll be surprised how much time all of that takes to explain. If you can't get through it all with one kid, don't worry about it just break into two lessons and explain the rest the next week. You don't want to overwhelm them during the first lesson.

Also, I wanted to mention that I had my students bring a three ring binder with them and page separators. I make five sections in the binder...Practice calendar, lesson plans, theory, exercises, and extra. Helps keep me, the parents, and the kids organized.

The books that Cathy recommend I have them start with was the Primer book from the Faber series (search on Amazon and you will find) and the first grade John Thompson book (I played from that when I was little, it's a classic). I'm on the lookout for a good finger exercise/scales book for my students anyone know of any?

Hope this helps, good luck!

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Are you a Fool?

Here is the link to The Wise Man and the Foolish Man

It's funny. I live in Florida right now and my house is literally built on the sand. I guess that means I'm foolish even though I didn't choose to build it here. Who doesn't love this song? It's one of the kids favorites. One of my piano students chose to do this song as one of his recital pieces. It's a very easy piece for beginner students to learn.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

I'm back!

I went out of town for my younger brother's wedding which was so much fun. Tomorrow I'll be sure to post a new song :)

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Awesome Website

I was looking around for some flash cards to print to use with my students and I found this website http://www.susanparadis.com/. Susan has tons of ready to print games and activities to do with students. It's a great resource for teachers. Just thought I would share.

Introducing...

Introducing my sister-in-law, Cathy, she is going to be posting some songs on this blog too. Which I'm very excited about because she is a musical genius!

Teaching Intervals

Something I do with my beginner students is give them a little exercise to do each week that is pattern based (so it doesn't require sight reading) and teaches both technique and theory. One of my favorite ones is teaching intervals using the left hand since so many songs can be played with just a few intervals in the left hand (a lot of songs from the Faber lesson book are based on this). I have them play a "C", then a 2nd (C & D), then a 3rd (C & E), then a fourth (C & F), then a 5th (C&G) and then back down again (5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd, "C"). I simply have them practice that little pattern 3 to 5 times each day with each hand separately, and eventually, hands together.

Within the same lesson I try and present a song that has an interval in it and we discuss which interval it is to reinforce the idea. "Do As I'm Doing" is a pretty popular one. Enjoy!

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Sharing Time

"Me? Teach piano? Well, yeah sure...I guess I could do that."

That was basically my thoughts when a sister in my branch asked me if I would start teaching her kids piano. Soon after that I had my first five piano students without even advertising. The week of my first lesson I had a little panic attack that went something like this, "What am I doing?! I don't even know what to teach them first! Do I teach them how to read music in the first lesson? What piano books am I going to have them get? Etc." Luckily, I have a sister-in-law that has taught piano for quite sometime and she basically walked me through how to teach the first lesson. Whew. After the first lesson, I started developing my own teaching style and now it feels like I've been teaching piano for years.

Sometimes it's hard to get my students to want to practice the piano everyday. I try different teaching techniques all the time, but I've found the most helpful things is letting my students pick the songs they want to play...songs that aren't even in their piano books. All of them love learning Primary songs and Hymns because they are already so familiar with them. The only problem is they are WAY too difficult for them to learn so early on. So what do I do? I create my own simplified versions. I thought this would be a good place to share them after I've written them to hopefully help other piano teachers and students.

The first simplified song I'll share is "Book of Mormon Stories"...what kid doesn't love that song? Enjoy!