Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Teaching How to Read Notes

My piano students could use some review and practice reading notes. I think the pseudonyms work pretty well and are good to know, but there are other techniques to figuring out the notes. So I would like them to be able to recite the phrases for each clef, but I don't expect them to do that while they are playing necessarily. Skills related to note-reading: 

Understanding of How the Staffs Relate to the Piano. 
  • Following each note on the staff one-by-one, you are also going up the notes on the piano one-by-one.
  • Any note can be written on either staff by adding the appropriate amount of "imaginary lines" underneath the original 5 lines.
Shortcut:
  • Pseudonyms- FACE, Every Good Boy Does Fine, All Cows Eat Grass, Good Boys Do Fine Always.

A problem I have found teaching the pseudonyms is that it is hard to remember which clef the sayings are attached to. Perhaps I could think of a clever way to stick it in their memory.

FACE- our face is on top of our bodies and rhymes with space, therefore the correct placement is on the Treble Clef's spaces. 

Every Good Boy Does Fine- "Every" starts with the last letter of FACE, so they belong together.

All Cows Eat Grass- Grass is on the ground, therefore it belongs on the lower staff.

Good Boys Do Fine Always- Grass is Good.  (And Good starts with the same letter as Grass, so those two phrases belong together.)