All About Choosing Piano Schools And Teachers

[Dreamaurora]

Kee Kor:

Thanks for the advise. I will try to slow DS down. He is in a big hurry to catch up with his peers who have started earlier and overtake them. Rather competitive in nature.

I pushed myself very hard and rushed through the grades when I started learning piano for the same reason as your DS. I knew that I was very behind compared to others and I wanted to prove that adult learners can make it too in piano. It is a powerful motivation, but one that can easily go out of check and detrimental in the long run. It is always prudent to have a clear structured plan worked out closely with the teacher in order to achieve this. I think it is important to remember that the learning journey itself is more important; the exams are just goals along the way to guide the journey. I learnt the hard way myself how a combination of overconfidence and unrealistic expectation were actually causing me more harm in the end.

By the way, it is obviously better if the teacher herself could go through the aural lessons herself in lessons. If she is unable to fulfill this or feel that an external help is needed, then she should feedback to you. Then it is up to you whether it is worth the extra expense to get additional help just for aural or just sacrifice those marks and concentrate on the pieces, scales, and sight reading instead.

[Kee Kor]

Dreamaurora:

Kee Kor:

Thanks for the advise. I will try to slow DS down. He is in a big hurry to catch up with his peers who have started earlier and overtake them. Rather competitive in nature.

I pushed myself very hard and rushed through the grades when I started learning piano for the same reason as your DS. I knew that I was very behind compared to others and I wanted to prove that adult learners can make it too in piano. It is a powerful motivation, but one that can easily go out of check and detrimental in the long run. It is always prudent to have a clear structured plan worked out closely with the teacher in order to achieve this. I think it is important to remember that the learning journey itself is more important; the exams are just goals along the way to guide the journey. I learnt the hard way myself how a combination of overconfidence and unrealistic expectation were actually causing me more harm in the end.

By the way, it is obviously better if the teacher herself could go through the aural lessons herself in lessons. If she is unable to fulfill this or feel that an external help is needed, then she should feedback to you. Then it is up to you whether it is worth the extra expense to get additional help just for aural or just sacrifice those marks and concentrate on the pieces, scales, and sight reading instead.

Teacher's feedback was DS's singing which was horrible. Otherwise she said everything was ok. Not perfect but ok. She is however pleased with his pieces and scales so DS told me she is expecting a distinction.

[Kee Kor]

Can one still do ok in the upper grades if their aural skills are weaker or if they really can’t sing? As for singing teacher and myself can’t seem to get DS to do it. Sounds like killing chickens and ducks and really bad. Are there teachers to teach singing ?

[FantasyLandDreams]

May I know which music schools conduct aural class and sight reading classes? These are my weak components so want to find out more and seek reinforcements. Thanks.

[zeemimi]

Kee Kor:

Can one still do ok in the upper grades if their aural skills are weaker or if they really can't sing? As for singing teacher and myself can't seem to get DS to do it. Sounds like killing chickens and ducks and really bad. Are there teachers to teach singing ?

Yes. my dd obtained high distinction despite failing aural.

[sleepy]

zeemimi:

my dd obtained high distinction despite failing aural.

Can share how your dd practise sight reading for grade 8?

My dd is seriously bad in sight reading

[cse1217]

sleepy:

zeemimi:

my dd obtained high distinction despite failing aural.

Can share how your dd practise sight reading for grade 8?

My dd is seriously bad in sight reading

Does your dd hate sight reading? Is she willing to practice and make her sight reading better? Does her teacher give her any advice on how to practice for sight reading?

[Dreamaurora]

sleepy:

zeemimi:

my dd obtained high distinction despite failing aural.

Can share how your dd practise sight reading for grade 8?

My dd is seriously bad in sight reading

For my students, I insist a student must prepare one or two short pieces each week, drawn from either ABRSM's Joining the Dots series or actual pieces that are a few grades lower. The students must try their best to realise all the markings written in the scores and make musical decisions that accurately reflect the character of the music. My students who faithfully each week do this are strong in sight-reading and break no sweat in exams. Really have to be consistent with this, anyone who studies under me know that I always go through these short pieces at the start of my lessons even if they are not preparing for exams. I myself still maintain this discipline everyday.

Yes, simply sight-reading pieces are not enough to improve sight-reading, the students have to practice them so the mind and fingers remember how to execute the patterns if they encounter something similar in the future. Improving sight-reading is very similar to how we acquire new word vocabularies. A good English teacher will ask a student to practice writing sentences with the new vocabularies until the students understand how to use the new words in their proper contexts.

At advanced levels, particularly grade 8 and diploma, sight reading proficiencies will also be affected by the students' scales/arpeggios/chords and theory proficiencies. This is because at higher grades we need to able to perceive the general chords and keys, and accordingly be able to relate their fingerings to scales/arpeggios/chords already learnt.

[Dreamaurora]

Kee Kor:

Can one still do ok in the upper grades if their aural skills are weaker or if they really can't sing? As for singing teacher and myself can't seem to get DS to do it. Sounds like killing chickens and ducks and really bad. Are there teachers to teach singing ?

If we consider grade 8 ABRSM, there are only 2 tests where the student need to sing. The melodic memory and the sight-singing part, and these two are only like 1/3 of the aural test. There are other tests identifying cadences, chords, modulations, and finally the concluding viva. So as long these other sections are aced, should still be a pass for the aural. The sight-singing part at least try to get the rhythm correct, even if out of tune may still get some marks.

But well even if the aural is failed, at most 7 or 8 mark penalty to overall score, so if the pieces, scales, and sight-reading are all at distinction levels will still get distinction overall.

[jen]

Blissedsher:

jedamum:

Blissedsher

Reassess the suitability to the teacher. Is your girl doing what is beyond her ?
And your kid's practice regime.
How does she typically practice or try a new piece ?
When my boy was learning note reading, I made Flashcards. You may want to see how else to make her learn better.
Like now my boy has difficulty remembering (or plain lazy) musical terms for his theory tests, after translating them to flashcards to \"play\", he can remember them well.

Flash cards sounds good . I think I will make my own to try too
Anyone here know which apps on phone related to piano learning is good ?

For learning notes, \"NoteWorks\" is more interesting and caters to beginner to higher levels.