giveaway winner, and Summer Music Activity Jar freebie!

February 23, 2013 Jennifer Boster

Thanks to all who entered the giveaway for the free copy of our Rushing Water preschool lesson plan! Our lucky winner is:

xiaoxu wen said…

It’s so thrilled.I’m teaching my Chinese students how to enjoy picture books and music.Yesterday,I found this blog,the content is just what I want,I can learn so many funny methods of teaching music,thank you!I would love to win a copy,
wish me luck!

20/2/13 4:29 PM

Congratulations, xiaoxu wen!! Please be sure to contact me and let me know what your email address is so I can get you your free download!

Be sure to check out our “Rushing Water” lesson plan all about short and long in music, as well as our other fun preschool music lesson plans!

And now I’d like to share a new freebie that is available on the Free Printables page. I’ve been thinking a lot about the importance that parents and home environments play in encouraging children to be musical and to succeed in musical training. As a teacher I can only do so much, but if the parents create a home environment where music is appreciated, valued and USED (singing, playing instruments, listening), and if they encourage their child to love music, then the child will be SO much more likely to succeed in music training and lessons.

So, I created a fun printable to help parents have a fun, musical summer with their children! The Summer Music Activity Jar contains lots of simple musical activities to do with your child. Simply download the file, print it out, cut out the strips and put them in a jar. Whenever you and your child want a fun musical activity to do, simply pull out a strip and follow the directions! There are listening activities, movement activities, craft activities, computer activities, hands-on instrument activities and more. Should be a fun way to have a more musical summer at home! Hope you enjoy!

Rushing Water Lesson Plan & Giveaway!

February 20, 2013 Jennifer Boster

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This morning Nichole and I taught our favorite Early Explorers lesson plan and had such a fun time – and we are super excited that it is now available for purchase in The Teaching Studio Store so you can all enjoy it as well!

“Rushing Water” is a one-hour preschool music class all about water, from rushing rivers and streams to little raindrops. In this class we explore short and long sounds in music. We also learn through Bedrich Smetana’s “The Moldau” that music can tell a wonderful story!

We take a musical journey down a magical river, and through singing, movement and storytelling encounter castles, mermaids, waterfalls and more. Children (and teachers, too!) have a blast with this class. We also use raindrops and rivers to explore short and long in music in lots of hands-on and exciting ways. Today was the perfect day to teach this class, because here in Texas it was cloudy and rainy! I think those short musical raindrops were on the children’s minds as they traveled home from our class!

Would you like to teach this fun class? Our lesson plan is a 73-page downloadable e-book that comes with take-home booklets, templates, tutorials, all of the clipart/flannel board figures you will need, sheet music to four songs, a listening guide for “The Moldau,” and much more! We think you and your little students will love it! Here are a couple more previews and sneak peeks:

We would love to give away a *FREE* copy to a lucky reader! So comment and share away – receive one entry for a comment on this post, and an additional entry for each way you share about this lesson plan – whether it is Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, your blog, etc. Giveaway ends this Friday, February 22 at 10:00 pm Central time.

And for those of you who can’t wait to check out this awesome lesson plan, head on over to The Teaching Studio Store, where there are many great lessons available (and many more to come!!)

Summer Sightreading Challenge!

June 8, 2012 Jennifer Boster

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Tonight I want to let you all in on a little challenge I have given myself for the summer, and invite you to join me!

First, a little background. I recently have been reading a fabulous book called The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child. While this book is not piano-related, I couldn’t help but relate so many things in it to piano teaching. The book is written by a sixth grade reading teacher who decided that by requiring students to only read 3 or 4 books (chosen by the teacher and read as a class with tons and tons of supplementary materials) over the course of the school year, students were not only not enjoying it, but were not becoming better readers. The only way, the author says, to help students become good readers is to require them to READ BOOKS – and a lot of them. She requires her students to read 40 books (of their own choice) over the course of the school year. It really is an intriguing concept, and it instantly made me think of piano. Of course we want our students to perfect their pieces, spend lots of time practicing each line, each hand, each nuance – but what has a student gained if they have a handful of pieces polished to perfection, yet they do not spend much time actually “playing” the piano, or “reading” through pieces? Or worse, they are not able to sightread a piece, and therefore are not able to just sit down at the piano and PLAY a piece for pleasure.

Anyway, it’s food for thought! I do think that sightreading is a vital skill that one should have to truly be considered a fine pianist. A good sightreader is someone who has a solid understanding of music theory and has the skills needed to apply that theory to make music. Plus, a pianist should be able to sit down and play for enjoyment. (I’d love to hear your take on sightreading…its importance, its place in piano lessons, etc.)

Now on to my challenge – as a busy mama, wife, and piano teacher, I have unfortunately too often set aside my pianist self (for lack of time and motivation – mostly time!) and not put my piano fingers to good use! This summer, I have challenged myself to sightread 100 pieces of piano literature. I want to get myself playing again. And playing a lot. I want to dive back into the joy of actually making music! I have set aside the evenings after I tuck in my children to do this, and am keeping track of which pieces I read through and how many pages I have sightread each day. I randomly decided to begin with Debussy (I grabbed this wonderful collection from my shelf and started playing! Claude Debussy: Piano Music (1888-1905)), and in the past week have played through twelve of his piano works (I am counting individual movements of larger suites, sonatas, etc. as one piece).

So, who’s with me?? I would LOVE to see many of my readers join me in this challenge, and enjoy playing some great music this summer! You can choose any composer and any pieces that you want. Maybe you’re dying to play through ALL of Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier? Maybe some Chopin preludes? Whatever it is that you’ve been wanting to try, now is the time to go for it! I am super excited about this challenge. Now, I have had a week’s head-start, so I will try to finish my 100 pieces by August 24. For the rest of you, let’s try to complete the challenge by August 31.

So, in conclusion –

THE CHALLENGE: Sightread 100 pieces of piano literature this summer!
DEADLINE: August 31, 2012
LET US KNOW: If you want to be in on the challenge, leave a comment on this post! Feel free to grab a Summer Sightreading Challenge button from my sidebar to stick on your blog to help remind you. Plus, it never hurts to let others know you’re working on a goal to help give you some extra motivation 🙂

I will occasionally check in and let you know how I’m doing on the challenge (how it’s going, what I’ve been playing, some great pieces I’ve discovered) and I’d love to hear updates on your progress as well! Thanks for joining me, and happy music-making!

SHHHH…Your Piano Teacher Thinks This is Practice: review and giveaway!

May 29, 2012 Jennifer Boster

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Today I am excited to tell you about a new practice resource made available by Andrea and Trevor over at Teach Piano Today (which, by the way, is an amazing resource full of fun and creative ideas for piano teachers…I am excited to peruse their website more and I’m inspired by their creativity!).

SHHHH… Your Piano Teacher Thinks This is Practice is a book with 88 fun, creative and sometimes random practice exercises and games that will “exhilarate, motivate, and inspire piano students to practice each and every single day… with no hassle, no struggle, no prodding, and no bribing!” (quoted from their website – sounds like a good deal to me!)

The format of the book is super fun, with cute illustrations on each page. It’s kind of like a top-secret notebook full of fun things to do; it is written in a fun and humorous way, and even includes a couple of notes to the neighbors, apologizing for the loud piano music and saying “the book made me do it!” This book seems like something I would have loved as a kid!

As I read through these exercises I found myself smiling and laughing at some of the clever and inventive ways the authors have come up with to encourage children to practice their pieces. Don’t just clap a rhythm…hop it on one leg! Call up a relative and give them a performance over the phone! Each exercise has students drilling measures, playing pieces in creative ways, identifying and practicing difficult measures, working on articulation, turning pieces into fairy tales, balancing on one foot while drilling rhythm, doing number games to determine number of repetitions for a section of a piece, coloring, cutting things out, etc. There will never be a dull practice day with this fun book.

(Here are some sample pages made available by the authors on their website.)

Not only are these exercises creative and fun, but most of them also encourage good and sound practicing techniques. I think that through doing these exercises students will not only have more fun with their practicing, but they will become better and more thoughtful practicers. This book is meant as a supplement to the student’s regular practicing. It is a perfect way to add a little excitement to the practice session.

I really think this is a fantastic resource and cannot wait to use it with some of my students. As there are 88 daily exercises in the book, I can’t help but think what a wonderful summer practicing program this would make! I LOVE that when you purchase the book, you are granted the right to make unlimited copies for your private piano studio. What a great deal!

Andrea and Trevor have been kind enough to offer to give away a copy of their book to TWO lucky Teaching Studio readers! To enter, please leave me a comment! Giveaway ends on Friday, May 1 at 11:59 pm Central time. Winner will be announced Saturday morning.

Giant Floor Staff!

April 20, 2012 Jennifer Boster

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Happy Friday everyone! I hope you’re all having a lovely day and have a fun weekend planned. As for me, I am sitting here in my pajamas enjoying the beginning of my weekend and a day off from teaching piano.

Those of you who have purchased my graphic to make a Giant Floor Keyboard will be excited to hear that I now have a Giant Floor Staff graphic available! My vinyl floor staff turned out great and I am so excited to use it in my music classes and camps! I have already gotten some good use out of it in my private lessons. It is so great to have a super fun and different way to help my students learn the notes on the staff, which allows them to get off of the bench and move around.

I debated about putting a clef on there or not…and ended up not. I wanted to be able to use it for bass clef or treble clef notes. I think I may try to make some big clefs that I can put on there when needed, but for now it has worked fine without.

It is nice and big (about 90 inches long 28 inches tall, not including the white border) and is perfect for children to walk, stand, jump, and run on (I know this because my four-year-old son got some great use out of it this morning….also, it is nice and sturdy!!)

Just like my Giant Floor Keyboard, I had it made on www.bannersonthecheap.com. They have excellent prices, high-quality products and super fast delivery time. Totally an awesome deal, and the ease and quality is worth the money, in my opinion!

I created my own custom-designed 3′ x 8′ banner by uploading my staff image. Stretch the image to fill the banner area (leaving a small white margin around the outside, if desired) and select the box to center it horizontally. Click “Save and Continue” and you are all set to order your Giant Floor Staff. Easy peasy.

You can use fun letter name beanbags…

…colorful craft foam notes (hmmm, makes me want to play Twister)…

…or simply allow children to walk right on there and be the notes themselves!

Students of all ages and levels (even preschoolers) will get so much use out of this giant staff!

The graphic is available for purchase here as well as on the “Printables & Downloads” page.

Giant Floor Staff Graphic
$3.00

Summer Teaching Ideas

May 19, 2011 Jennifer Boster

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Summer is a great time for piano lessons. Unfortunately, many students (and parents) think that summer is a time for taking a break from piano lessons! This is so sad to me, because not only do students lose ground (and have to spend the first month or two of the fall making it up), they also lose the extra opportunities that the summer provides. Make sure your students know that you will continue teaching through the summer, and talk to them about the fun things you will be doing in their lessons.

(On a scheduling note, what I do is ask parents to tell me up front the dates of any family vacations, summer camps, and other conflicts. Usually these types of things are scheduled well in advance. I then look at where the holes in my schedule will be, and put students in those holes when they are in town—which means they will sometimes come twice in a week or for a double lesson (more about those later)—to make up for when they will be out of town. This way my income stays fairly consistent, and I don’t have a huge list of makeup lessons to do at the end of the summer.)

Here are some of the things I do with my students during the summer that we don’t always have time for during the school year:

Composing: We have a composition recital at the end of each summer, and we also put together a book of everyone’s compositions as a keepsake. Having the students learn to notate their own compositions is also a valuable theory lesson.
Playing by ear: Make a list of well-known tunes and send your students home each week with a melody to figure out by ear. If this is easy for them, have them add LH chords and try different keys. If they master that, have them experiment with different arrangements—break up the LH chords, add harmonic notes in the RH under the melody, move the melody to the LH, etc.
Improvising: This is related to playing by ear, but more on-the-spot, and could use a familiar melody or a composed one. Teach about chord progressions and melodic construction. For beginners, have the student improvise the melody while you play the chords. Try having the student use only black keys while you play a repeating chord progression in the key of F#.
Jazz: Okay, I don’t really teach a lot of this, since I am not well-trained in jazz techniques myself, but I thought I’d include it since it’s a good idea. And you might have some extra time to take a class yourself and learn some techniques to pass on to your students.
Transposing: Start with simple folk tunes and move on to more complicated pieces. Students have to read completely by intervals which is great for their sight-reading as well.
Theory: Ha! Of course your students do their theory diligently throughout the school year, so why have I included this? Because even the best students occasionally get out of the habit of completing those weekly theory assignments, and the summer is a great time to set some new goals and re-commit. Theory is also an essential part of all of the things I have listed so far, so if you are teaching composition, improv, etc. your students need to understand the theory behind what they are doing.
Duets/Trios/Quartets: We have an ensemble recital every summer, which is a great opportunity for students to make new friends and experience the pleasure of making music in groups—something which the solitary pianist rarely gets to do.
Accompanying: For another type of ensemble experience, find a voice or instrumental teacher that you can do a combined recital with, and match up your students with soloists or groups that need an accompanist. The skills they develop will be among the most valuable they can gain in their time with you.
Sight-Reading: This is another skill that is extremely valuable, and will be the determining factor in whether or not your students continue to play the piano after they stop lessons (which 99% of students eventually do, even those of us who study it in college). Use the more relaxed pace of summer lessons to spend extra time on sight-reading skills.
Basic Skills: flashcard quizzes, review of intervals, counting, etc. If these skills are not completely mastered, what better way could you use your time? Use the summer to conquer them once and for all.

Regarding double lessons/multiple lessons in a week: there are so many valuable things to fill this time with! Use the extra time to practice with the student and teach practice skills in more depth than you usually have time for. Or spend the extra time working on a new composition, learning to improvise, doing flashcards, or working on sight-reading skills. These double lessons can be some of your best lessons if you use the time well and take advantage of the momentum you can maintain in a longer lesson.

I hope these ideas are helpful as you are looking forward to summer this year. Please share more ideas in the comments!

Summer Teaching Survey Results

May 18, 2011 Jennifer Boster

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Thanks to all who responded to our survey! I loved reading your great ideas for summer lessons. Anyone have other ideas to add?

Tell us about summertime in your music studio – what do you do differently? What fun camps or activities do you have planned? What does your summer look like this year?

This summer I am doing a 6 week course called “A Classical Summer”. Each student will be assigned a classical composer to learn about. 1-2 songs from that composer will be learned. Our weekly 30 minute lesson will be less formal as we work on compiling information on the composer & how to put the “report” together. We’ll be doing more hands on activities as well. On week 6, a group lesson will be held for each student to give a creative “report” on their assigned composer & then play their learned pieces. I have talked with my Piano Technician & scheduled a group lesson for week 4 to have him come & talk to the students about the piano, how it works, what “tuning” is, & also general information for the parents on what to look for when searching for a used piano to buy. I am excited to start summer lessons already!

I give students the option of four to eight lessons, paying four lessons in advance. We schedule on an individual basis, and we only do fun pieces of their choice and popular repertoire. If they are beginners, we continue in the lesson books. I always look forward to the break from every day teaching, and I enjoy looking for new music, attending workshops at my local music stores, and organizing my studio.

I require each student to pay for eight lessons. That gives me a few off, them a few off, but keeps them fairly consistent in lessons. I also try to be more flexible with scheduling. Students who want more than eight lessons can pay for the extra lessons one at a time. I tend to do more games in lessons and work on fun songs to keep summer exciting!

I offer “packages”of either 4, 6, or 8 lessons where families choose to take that many lessons during the summer. Once upon a time when I made my packages larger (8 or 10 lessons), I had so many families that didn’t take lessons because they didn’t want that many. I figure I would rather see students (and get paid for) 4 lessons than nothing. Generally all my students take lessons, with the exception of those that are out of town all summer. Families choose which days they come and request times that work best (mornings, late afternoons or evenings). I don’t promise them the same time each week they come like I would during the school year. I also offer a summer piano session where students without a piano come and take 6 lessons, usually 1 lesson each week. This is like a merger between standard private lessons and a piano camp. Obviously students aren’t excepted to practice on a piano between lessons (I encourage them to practice finger numbers, note names, etc) and if they wish to buy a piano and keep taking lesson in the fall, I essentially start from the beginning again. Currently about half the students that do the trial session continue with lessons so it’s a great way to acquire new students. (it’s essentially a 6 week interview, so I know what to expect come fall!)

My summer is the same as usual. In my part of the world, Canada, kids go to school from Labour day until the end of June, so we break for the summer and come back refreshed and ready to go when school starts in September.

Planning a Piano Camp

May 11, 2011 Jennifer Boster

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Today I wanted to talk about planning a piano camp! I’m going to share a few ideas and suggestions, and I hope that many of you readers (who have planned many more camps than I have!) will share your suggestions and wisdom as well.

Things to consider when planning a piano camp:

What age group/level will your camp be available to? – the camps I have planned have been for preschoolers age 3-5 🙂

Who is your target audience in advertising for your camp? Is it current students who are already in your studio? Or are you using this as a tool to find new students in the community? Are you advertising to the community at large? To friends and neighbors? To people who attend your church?

How many days/how long will your camp run? We decided on five 50-minute sessions during one week’s time. The last day is a Parents’ Day where the parents come and join in, see what their children have been learning and hear a little “recital,” then we give out certificates and present the children with their binders of camp activities to take home.

What do you want the focus of your camp to be? Music theory? Performance? Music appreciation? Duets/ensemble playing? Piano fundamentals? – the purpose of my camp is to introduce preschoolers to music and to the piano, and we teach piano fundamentals, music & movement, basic music theory, etc.

Are you going to use an already-prepared curriculum, or write your own? I wrote my own curriculum, and started out by jotting down all sorts of game/activity ideas and brainstorming with the other instructor. We decided on a few main concepts that we wanted to teach, and went from there.

Scheduling activities/planning the curriculum: we found it helpful to have a similar schedule/routine each day of the camp – this helped in planning and is nice to have a predictable routine for the kids to count on. We broke the activities into different categories, such as instruction/story time (we taught a lot of keyboard concepts in the form of a story of some sort – it really captured their attention!), music & movement activities (which usually got them up and moving around while learning different concepts), table time (where we would either do some kind of craft or review/learning activity while sitting at a table), time at the piano, etc. We found that it was important to have a variety of activities, and to break up the high-energy games with some lower-energy, sit-down activities.

What materials will you need? How much will the materials cost? What preparations need to be done beforehand? – this was a big consideration for us because we wanted to send each student home with a binder of camp games and activities so they could review what we learned at home; this turned into a BIG job of making binders, but we loved the end result! We have learned to look for good deals on the materials we need, and to think of ways to streamline the preparation of the materials to save time. We also sent each student home with a camp t-shirt!

How much will you charge? Will you charge a materials fee and then a tuition fee, or just have it all in one? How much do you need to charge to cover all material costs and have enough left over to cover your time? How much can you charge and still make it affordable to your target audience? This is the topic that we probably debated on the most – we wanted to make our camp affordable (many of the people we advertised to are families with young children who live in our area with a parent attending medical or some other school), but of course we still wanted to make some money. This is a topic that can be discussed a lot, but I think in general if you make it comparable to a month’s worth of piano lessons, that is a pretty good guide to go by.

What ideas and suggestions do you have for planning piano camps? What kind of piano camps do YOU have planned for this summer?

Summer in My Studio

May 10, 2011 Jennifer Boster

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Ah, summer! For a piano teacher, summer can mean different things – maybe it’s a not-as-busy time with students taking a little time off; maybe it is busier than ever (but also more fun than ever!) with summer camps and programs! Although we have visited this topic before, I thought that with the summer fast approaching it would be a good topic to revisit!

What kinds of things do you like to do in your studio in the summer?

My summer (as far as piano teaching goes) will be like this:

*teaching as normal, except that I am more flexible with scheduling due to family vacations and the like; students still pay in advance at the beginning of the month, but we sit down and pull out the calendar in advance to decide how many lessons each student will receive.

*a friend and I will be holding the second session of our Early Expressions Piano Preschool Camp! We are super excited. More on planning a summer camp later…

*my baby will arrive at the end of July, so I will be taking off all of August and half of September for a maternity leave of sorts. Before that happens, I plan to come up with plenty of things for each student to work on/practice for that month and a half while I am not teaching! I am thinking memorizing pieces, doing some listening assignments to become more familiar with some great piano literature, theory and ear training practice online, and “checking in” with me periodically via email.

So, tell me, what does your summer look like this year?

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Lines & Spaces and Steps & Skips

April 1, 2011 Jennifer Boster

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I love it when last-minute ideas turn out to be the funnest activities for students! To teach about lines and spaces and steps and skips, I got out the ol’ trusty masking tape and slapped it on the rug to make a quick musical staff. I cut out notes out of sheets of craft foam (LOVE that stuff!) and voila – a fun musical staff game!

Here is my giant musical staff. Please excuse the graininess/yellowness of the photo, and the fact that I can’t seem to get it to rotate!

I used this fun game for preschoolers. We had already introduced the staff, and how notes can be high or low. We first practiced walking up the staff in steps – line, space, line, space, line space (this was fun to tip-toe!) – and in skips – line, line, line or space, space, space (hopping works well)! We also played each on the piano – steps by playing every single note going up or down, and skips by playing every other note. We then practiced putting notes on the staff in steps or skips. The kids loved walking on their notes after they placed them on the staff, as I played the steps or skips on the piano. We then played a game where I would hand them a note and call out “step!” or “skip!” and they would have to place the next note on the correct line or space. It was fun with two kids at a time – they started on a note at the bottom of the staff, and I would hand each a note and call out “step” or “skip” and they would use their notes to try and get across the staff (wouldn’t it be fun to pretend the staff was a river to cross?).

As I was playing this game with a student who loves to get stickers as rewards, I had a sudden stroke of genius as I drew a staff on her assignment sheet and had her put her little circle stickers on the staff on lines or spaces, as if they were musical notes. So fun!