Learning The Piano
How You Can Make Your Child’s learning to play the piano experience more interesting and meaningful
In a recent survey, more than 70% of parents will like to introduce music to their children and more than 60% of these parents chose the piano. As much as you like your child to develop a passion for playing the piano, how can you as a parent motivate your child?
Below are some tips from my personal experience to make learning to play the piano more interesting and meaningful rather than just excelling in examinations and pursuing the certification.
Be involved
1. Instead of just sending your child to the lesson and picking him up after the lesson, request to sit in at least for the first two lessons. A good piano teacher would not mind having you join for the first few children piano lessons and instead appreciate the benefits of this arrangement.
This is because when the child first attends the lesson, he could feel insecure and having you around will make him more comfortable and increase the interactions during the lesson. Through interactions, the teacher will have a better idea of the learning style and quickly pick up your child’s strengths and weaknesses.
History
2. I know this may sound boring, but personally, I have benefited from knowing the history of music and can relate better and find more meaning in pieces that I played. Music has a rich history and culture. They can be classified into different periods or eras such as baroque, classical, romantic, etc. In these periods, the music, architecture, fashion, and art tend to have similarities.
For example, an important feature of the Baroque period is the use of ornaments. The opulent use of ornaments is not only reflected in the architecture but also in the music. One of the many ways to identify baroque music is the number of times “ornaments” are used in the music pieces. Children love stories.
You could tell them stories about the baroque period and show them pictures on the ornamented architectures and how the people like to dress up in heavily decorated clothing. Having this additional knowledge will be more meaningful to your child the next time he plays or listens to a piece of baroque music.
In addition, the music pieces for the examinations are from different eras, having a more in-depth knowledge will definitely help your child to pick up faster and master the pieces well.
Pop music
3. We know that we should spend more time practicing the music pieces, scales that form part of the piano music examinations. However, playing the same pieces over and over again every day could sometimes be boring.
I remember the times when my piano teacher brings out her book about pop music and ask me to play a pop song. It will naturally bring a smile to my face.
Playing some pop music or music that you like outside of the usual music examination pieces brings fun and great enjoyment. To make a lesson more interesting, these new pop music or pieces can be used as materials to practice and improve sight-reading.
Learning the piano, should not be purely for getting good grades and certifications. Be creative and your child will be looking forward to his piano lessons and it could also be a good bonding experience for you and your child.