Musicianship Monthly #37: The Pre-Reading Resource Round-Up!

The start of a new month means it is time for a new "Musicianship Monthly" activity! 

What is "Musicianship Monthly?" Each month, I share links to free resources you can use to focus on a specific musicianship skill with your students all month long! Want to see past skills we have covered? Click HERE!

This month, as many of us welcome brand-new beginners into our studios, I am focusing on musicianship skills for pre-readers!

​Read on to find articles, worksheets, sheet music, and more designed to help these students in their first weeks of lessons to establish good habits, build foundational skills, and most importantly--to have fun!

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Articles and Teaching Tips

• Help your brand-new beginners (and their parents) establish good practice habits with the tips in this article: "Practice Skills by Level, Part 1: Beginners"
• Establish a firm technical foundation by focusing on the first 5 techniques every beginner should know, as explained in this article: "The First 5 Techniques Every Beginner Should Know"
• Are you working with  preschool age beginners? Very young students often require a unique teaching approach. Read a few of my top tips for teaching young beginners here: "Thoughts on Teaching Young Beginners"
• Finally, check out this lesson plan that includes a variety of pre-reading activities and can be used for a very first lesson with a new student: "A Fun 'First Lesson' Lesson Plan"

Pre-Reading Sheet Music
​These fun pieces will get your brand-new students playing familiar music right away, as well as help them develop their keyboard geography and rhythm skills in their first few weeks of lessons.

Click on the images below to download your free PDFs!
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Rote Pieces and Technical Patterns
Rote pieces can give pre-readers the opportunity to play music that sounds more complex, as well to learn technical patterns that serve as building blocks for concepts they will encounter in elementary piano literature.

My "First Perfect Patterns" collection was written with beginners in mind, and these pieces may be taught by either rote (for your pre-readers) or reading. The "Perfect Pattern Warm-Ups" at the beginning of the book introduce patterns including five-finger scales, broken chords, harmonic intervals, and more, in short technical exercises that can be taught by rote and transposed around the piano.

​Click HERE to see this collection, available for purchase at Piano Pronto!

Improv and Creative Activities
​Help your pre-readers explore the piano and get their creative juices flowing with these improv activities that can be done from the very first piano lesson!

Click on the images below to download your free PDFs!
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Worksheets for Introducing Musical Notation
Lay the groundwork for reading on the staff with these worksheets that introduce lines, spaces, clefs, and the very first landmark notes.

Click on the images below to download your free PDFs!

This worksheet introduces the concept of line and space notes on the staff and helps students practice drawing the treble and bass clefs.

These landmark note worksheets introduce the first 3 landmark notes: treble G, bass F, and middle C.

Games and Other Activities
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The "Piano Scavenger Hunt" introduces students to the correct terminology for different parts of the piano.

The "Note Match" card game helps students get comfortable matching any finger with any key on the piano.

The "Same, Up, or Down?" flashcards help students recognize short musical patterns containing steps and skips.

What do you think?  What other activities do you use with your pre-readers? I'd love to hear from you in the comments!