Chrissy Ricker
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Playing by Ear, Part Two: Listening for Steps and Skips

8/31/2016

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See my previous post on teaching students to play by ear here.
 
Once students are comfortable with identifying notes by ear that step up, step down, and repeat, it is time to introduce skips!
 
One of my favorite warm-ups for beginning students is to have them play a five-finger scale stepping up and down, then skipping up and down. This is a great way to get students listening for the difference between steps and skips. As they play, use your hands to show how far apart the notes are. Then, trade places and have students gesture the notes while you play the piano. Encourage students to sing the pattern as well, to feel the difference between singing a step and singing a skip.
 
Next, sing a few familiar melodies that use skips, using your hands to show the intervals. “This Old Man” and “Do, Re, Mi” (from The Sound of Music) are both good choices that use both ascending and descending skips.
 
Finally, test your students by playing a listening game! Sing or play two notes and ask students to determine whether they are stepping or skipping. If you use an iPad or computer in your lessons, there are ear training apps that will play an interval for your students and ask them to name it; I like the “Interval Ear Training” exercise in the Tenuto app (which can also be found for free online at www.musictheory.net).
 
For an extra challenge, check out my “Play by Ear Challenge” worksheets, which ask students figure out a phrase from a familiar melody by ear and notate it on the staff. Worksheet #2 focuses on steps and skips. Find all of my free resources here.

Do you have any tips for teaching your students to identify steps and skips by ear? Please leave a comment below!
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Free Resources for Teachers!

8/29/2016

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To help you jump start your own musicianship binder (see my post here) I would like to share some of my own resources with you!

I have created a new section of my website called "Free Stuff." This section will include worksheets and sheet music that I have created and used with my own students. Everything is "kid tested" and free to use and share with your own students.

The "Free Stuff" section can be found here. Feel free to bookmark this page and check back often for new resources.

Please leave a comment below if you find these free resources helpful. I would love to hear from you!



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Friday Funny

8/26/2016

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This Friday funny happened with one of my six year old students who is very bright and loves music. Before she started lessons and got a full size piano, she had a small toy keyboard that she liked to play with. Her parents now keep this keyboard in the car to occupy her and her younger brother on long trips.

I always know when we have a good lesson and my student is super excited about her new songs, because she will run out the front door saying, "I've got to get to my car piano!"  :)
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The Musicianship Binder

8/24/2016

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With back to school time approaching, I thought I would share a tip that really helped me to get organized last year!

If you have read some of my other blog posts, you know that I enjoy incorporating different elements of musicianship into my students’ lessons. Ear training, transposing, improvising and composing—these are all skills that I want my students to learn.

However, most of my students take thirty minute lessons, and every minute is precious! It can be difficult to cover our core lesson activities (repertoire, technique, theory) and have time left over. Last year, I came up with a way to keep myself organized and help me incorporate more musicianship activities into my lessons: the musicianship binder.

My binder has tabs for ear training, composing, and transposing. I also keep it stocked with staff paper. I put worksheets that I create for my students in the binder, and anytime I come across an idea that I want to use with my students, I print it out and put it in my binder too.

Since everything is printed out and in one place, it is easy to grab an activity for a student. I try to rotate through activities so that we do something different at each lesson. It is also fun to plan ahead and put together a few activities around a common theme. Right now I am putting together activities centered around fall, Halloween and Christmas.

What do you think? How do you organize the extra activities you use with your students?
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​Thoughts on Transposition, Part Two

8/21/2016

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Picture
To read why I think it is important to teach transposition, see my post here.

So, you are ready to teach your students to transpose. Now what?

My secret weapon for teaching my students to transpose: puzzle erasers! I got this idea from Diane Hidy’s wonderful site (www.dianehidy.com), and my students love them.

Of course in my studio we use cat erasers. :)
​

I start by spending a couple of lessons playing with the erasers and learning how to identify half steps, whole steps, and major pentascale patterns (WWHW) on the piano. I ask students to build a pentascale pattern, then play it an octave higher following the pattern of the erasers.

Once students are comfortable building major pentascales, we take a simple five finger song in the key of C major and try transposing it to a different key. Students build the scale with the erasers, put their fingers on the keys an octave above, and play the song in the new scale using the same finger numbers. I encourage students to look for patterns by asking questions: is the melody stepping or skipping? Going up or down?

For homework, I give my students a transposition challenge sheet. The sheet contains a simple five finger piece and a check box for each major key. I ask students to check off each key they can play their song in, with the goal of playing in all twelve keys. For a good first transposing challenge worksheet you can use with your students, click here!
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As students progress, I have additional transposition challenge sheets with left hand songs and songs that use both hands with simple harmony. This is a great activity to do with familiar folk songs and Christmas songs, many of which have a narrow melodic range and simple harmonies.

So, what do you think? Do you have any tips or tricks for teaching transposition to your students? Please leave a comment below! 


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    Chrissy Ricker is a pianist, teacher, and composer from North Carolina. These are her thoughts on teaching, composing, and all things music.


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