And We're Back Into Lessons!
I have a new favourite self-education site. I found it quite by accident, looking for a podcast to listen to while I exercised. As I started to listen to Tim Topham, whom I'd never heard of before, I was intrigued with his "No Books" approach to starting off his students. Instead, the first few weeks of lessons, he focuses on ear training, improv, and rote pieces.
Later, I went looking online for ear training games, and guess which website was the first to pop up?!
In truth, training the students' ears was already one of my goals for the second semester of this school year. I'd already tackled solfege with a will, and was quite eager to do more. One of my ambitions for the Christmas holiday had been to create my own set of ear training games. I didn't create (or even brainstorm) a whole series, like I'd been hoping to, but I did create one. The idea was to make the students choose whether they liked a tone or didn't like it.
It's a good thing I tested it before creating anymore. I wasn't impressed with my own game-making abilities! Maybe with a little more tweaking, it will still work.
But, I did create this simpler game, which worked really, really well.
Yep, it's the masking tape again! The idea was a success with the young students who tried it -- a jump left if they heard a step, a jump right if they heard a skip, and a jump forward if they heard a repeat, until they could touch the piano.
This week, some clapbacks have also been introduced. One fun twist with one student was clapping out the rhythm of "Happy Birthday," first while singing it, then with just the words, and then without anything.
Of course, one of the older students asked, "Why are we doing this?"
Besides the fact that being able to clap back a rhythm is a requirement on RCM's exams, a main reason for clapping back rhythm is to learn to recognize various rhythms by ear. This in turn has a lot of different functions, from picking out a song by ear to the student being able to hear when their own rhythm is off (without me having to tell them).
Next time, I will try to remember to take pictures during the lessons. That's one thing I have a hard time with. I always end up getting so absorbed in teaching that I forget to take photos of all the great things we're doing! Maybe, since ear training is the name of the new game, I'll even remember to take a few videos to show you how this works. :)
Later, I went looking online for ear training games, and guess which website was the first to pop up?!
In truth, training the students' ears was already one of my goals for the second semester of this school year. I'd already tackled solfege with a will, and was quite eager to do more. One of my ambitions for the Christmas holiday had been to create my own set of ear training games. I didn't create (or even brainstorm) a whole series, like I'd been hoping to, but I did create one. The idea was to make the students choose whether they liked a tone or didn't like it.
It's a good thing I tested it before creating anymore. I wasn't impressed with my own game-making abilities! Maybe with a little more tweaking, it will still work.
But, I did create this simpler game, which worked really, really well.
This week, some clapbacks have also been introduced. One fun twist with one student was clapping out the rhythm of "Happy Birthday," first while singing it, then with just the words, and then without anything.
Of course, one of the older students asked, "Why are we doing this?"
Besides the fact that being able to clap back a rhythm is a requirement on RCM's exams, a main reason for clapping back rhythm is to learn to recognize various rhythms by ear. This in turn has a lot of different functions, from picking out a song by ear to the student being able to hear when their own rhythm is off (without me having to tell them).
Next time, I will try to remember to take pictures during the lessons. That's one thing I have a hard time with. I always end up getting so absorbed in teaching that I forget to take photos of all the great things we're doing! Maybe, since ear training is the name of the new game, I'll even remember to take a few videos to show you how this works. :)
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