An Abstract Overview of What I Actually Learned

Something I've been thinking about frequently as I wrapped up this project is on how the field of education is limited simply by the creativity of those who profess to be teachers. I've come to the find there is a balance between "tried and true" methods and exploring the mind of the beginner. For instance, scales. As a musician, I have mastered all major and minor scales. But did I need to do that? Did I need to spend 15 minutes of my precious hour of piano lessons each week, playing a repeating sequence of notes? I can list the benefits of scales ( they taught me to have even note intonation, finger mobility, discipline and more). But I could have learned those skills from a songs or other exercises. Did I need scales? Perhaps not. But scales are an engrained part of every musician's education. To get into any music program worth it's salt, you have to play all of the scales. Why has this exercise become such a staple in musical education? (This article works as a counter argument to my previous claims. Though it brings up a valid point, my question is still, "why couldn't I master the fundamentals doing something else?").
This brings me to another point. According to 12 Time MLB All Star Barry Larkin, "What people don't realize is that professionals are sensational because of the fundamentals." In these past 3 months, my biggest frustration in learning the violin has been just that. Learning the fundamentals of technique and musicality. Notes, pitch, rhythm, theory I all understand, but what no teacher can accurately explain, in my opinion, is music; the feeling and exact sound an instrument should produce. These abstract concepts are why we practice, and why experts are lauded, for capturing a uniquely beautiful sound. Some might argue that it's because of the fundamentals of music that this sound comes to be, and I'd partly agree. But there's more. A good musician know how to marry the two, technique and passion. So, Barry Larkin, I think you're wrong. The thing that makes professionals sensational is not just the fundamentals. It's passion. It's a love for music. It's something you can't teach anyone but that comes over time with practice.
That brings me to yet another point. I vastly overestimated the ability I had to learn an instrument. Which, interestingly enough, is why this whole project started. Because I thought teachers differed vastly from the mindset of their students. And I was correct. But I'm still salty I fell into my own trap, of sorts.
A lot of these concepts I've just discussed have been very abstract. Let's move now into the more concrete.
Here are some things I believe the music community as a whole could get a little better at:

• Unlocking the mind of the beginner. I think there ought to be some way, some test for teachers to poll their students accurately. The problem here, I will readily admit, is that beginners have only a limited view, based on their understanding of what is wrong. Maybe their bow keeps slipping on the strings, so they think the problem is with their bow and ask for it to be re-strung. Perhaps that's the problem. Or it could be their arm position, their shoulder rest etc. But what is important here is not that the beginner will automatically understand their problem better than the teacher, but that they go on their own quest of self discovery into fixing the problem. 
• Honestly, I think we need to let our students fail a little more. Learning is always more effective when it's internalized. So let them mess up, struggle a little, then guide them into finding the correct answer on their own. The best explanation I have for this is with the concept of fingering. Many of my piano students just won't use the fingering I provide them. They insist on doing things their own way, making more awkward finger crossings. This works, I suppose, in beginning songs. But I want to teach my students the principles behind fingering- not just to follow what I have told them. So I let them write it themselves and offer suggestions when needed. Explain, then let the students try to apply the concept themselves. Then keep explaining and keep offering chances to apply. Eventually, they will get it. 

There are many more things I believe could be changed, but I'll keep the list short and sweet. My main point is this: sometimes, we need to break with tradition, take a risk, make a change, and perhaps it will fail. But, perhaps we will learn something new and better understand how to efficiently learn. We're all learning how to learn here. 

The Final Countdown....

Getting excited to have this internship over. It's been a really interesting and enlightening experience but also, I am excited to be done!

For this week, I will just leave you with some pictures and a few words about teaching music. Here is me, teaching the First Year class how to play the Autoharp. 

  

A note about the purpose of the Autoharp:

     So the First Year is designed to prepare for the students to being playing the piano in their second year. The kids are way to immature and young to actually start with keyboards, so they ease into it with tone bells (basically just a little xylophone, and the autoharp, which is an instrument I'd never heard of in my life until coming to Let's Play Music). The tone bells are for pitch and pitch relations and mirror the students' eventual progression to melodic playing on the piano. The autoharp is for harmonic rhythm, that is first getting in tune with chords (which are a huge part of the LPM program) and secondly, following the rhythm of the song. More important than the chords is playing something at the right time. To me this was a lesson for teaching my own piano students- that first the rhythm should be there, then the notes. It's easier to fix notes then rhythms. In my own teaching, I implemented this by using a metronome and clapping the rhythm of the melody, before even beginning to address the notes. I have one student, Ayva, who really struggles with rhythms but totally gets everything else, and I've noticed she got better after trying this technique (though the metronome is less desirable to actually counting as a teacher can re-start the count as the student adapts). That leads perfectly into my next discussion; teaching. 

As I've watched Lorie teach and have started teaching some of the classes myself, I realize that teachers turn on a new face, an energetic and engaged side of themselves that was certainly not there minutes before class started. When you get in front of kids, you would think it would be easy. And it is. But a lot goes into making the class flow smoothly. You have to memorize lesson plans and be prepared for any thing that goes awry. I've taught now in about 6 of her classes, and all but one I felt really good about. The one time I feel I messed up was when I didn't jump right in, and lacked energy. If you get into it enough, these kids will never know the difference. Fake it til you make it, as I say. That's teaching for you. 

Composition is Hard

Composition is hard. 

This week, I am beginning to hone in on what I want my end product, my violin book, to actually look like. And boy is this process way more than I can actually handle. 

Why? 

1) There is an excessive amount of content I want to cover. The time in which I have to write this is dwindling, and even if I had limitless amounts of time, energy and willpower, there would still probably be the same struggle. There is just so much to say! And the problem also exists of writing down in a method that all beginners can understand. Live teaching is just so much more preferable. 

2) Composition isn't actually all that challenging, at least at a basic level. The challenge comes because there are so many different exercises. The sheer volume and number of different styles of violin exercises are staggering. But, hopefully I can mix enough of the different styles I have studied to make a sort of "Chose Your Own Adventure" type of book.

But, Finale, the music program I have to write all these exercises, is super easy to use, and totally doable, just takes the grunt work of actually inputing each note individually. Hoping to actually learn the keyboard shortcuts for Finale. 

Woo Hoo!!!

A Long Overdue Post

Many great things have happened this week. Here's a list:

• I decided to play a song on the violin at my personal, senior recital. (May 14th, you should all come). 
• I began learning said song on the violin and though it sounds horrible currently, there is hope.
• I utilized what I learned from Lorie's class in my own piano studio; ie incentivized practice times via candy bars and practice charts. 
• Along those same lines, I also began implementing a technique I picked up from Lorie, which is not pushing or moving the fingers of the students, but playing the keys, and having them move their fingers to the correct position.   
• Progress has been made in teaching at Let's Play Music. Lorie now asks me to teach 10 minutes of class, which is honestly a little scary, but really fun after you get into it. I have been more adept at channeling mysterious reserves of energy into the class that I didn't know I had. Also, I am managing to remember lesson plans, which is pretty challenging to do whilst moving in the flow of the lesson. 
• Lorie also asks me to sit next to kids who struggle more than others to help them keep up and I was able to make one of the little girls like me and I helped her understand her theory homework and get caught up. Kids know a lot more than I think they do. 
• I began writing the "basic musical introduction" part of my music book. 
• I properly learned to set up keyboards at LPM (which has taken me forever, but now I've got it down. This is progress). 

Here's me, teaching the third year class during their discussion of dictation. 

Important Updates

Well I got my first "official" homework assignment this week, and it fits perfectly with the end goal of my project. Woo.
Lorie's 3rd years, the final year of the Let's Play Music program actually compose their own songs, then perform them at the end of the year at their recital. Lorie asked me to input the completed songs the students composed into Finale, a music writing software, then print them out!
This has been great for me because she sat down and tutored me in how to actually use Finale, which was very helpful, and I am getting some great practice before I sit down and write my music book, where I am planning on using Finale to compose and write my own exercises for the violin.
Speaking of which, wow was that ambitious. I don't know enough!!! But I am just going to do my best and hope I can churn out something with all I have learned this year. I have a lot of ideas for the book. I will list them below:

• Piecing out difficult melodies then combining the different exercies into one final song. 
• Inspired by Let's Play Music's simplified approach to music. 
• A sort of "choose your own adventure" where the book is put into sections and then the student can decide which section is most difficult for them and focus on that section after learning the preliminaries of instrument
• Inspired by my own experience learning the violin and realizing I had a much harder time with technique then with the pitches and other concepts because of my musical background. 
• Classical music "listenings" with exercises taken from the melody of the classical pieces to help with ear training and difficult pitch concepts. 
• Inspired by Let's Play Music's use of folk and classical songs to teach solfegge and pitch relations

The 5th Week.....

This week was very exciting for me. This was my first chance to teach part of the Let's Play Music class. I got to teach about 10 minutes of the first year class (the easiest of the 3 classes). It was very fun for me to get to teach the kids. Since I taught 2 times, I really feel like the second time was an immense improvement. Practice makes perfect as they say, and even though I know all the material, it's really important to work on specific techniques for teaching. A huge art of teaching is adaptation and asking the best questions. It's knowing your audience and what concepts they struggle with.  The end goal of this project is ultimately to write a beginning violin method book. So I think one of the most important aspects I should add, as I can't exactly play the role of the teacher, is to incorporateA questions to promote careful thought in the minds of those reading my methodology.  Also, I believe that it's possible to create an adaptive method, a choose your own adventure of sorts that would ensure students could move at their own pace, onto topics they believe they need the most emphasis on. It's difficult to make a book change to fit the needs of students learning solely from its methodology. Nothing will ever replace the benefit of a teacher, but self teaching is possible by careful investigation.  
Next week is spring break- but I will be continually practicing violin. and begin writing some of my exercises to include in the book I intend to write.

Week 4

Week 4
Violin progress is going well. Slow, but well. I assumed I would be practicing more, to be completely honest. But I am still making progress. I need to begin working on composing my violin exercises. Composing is challenging, but I have some ideas now after working on the violin for almost a month. The problem I keep facing is reconciling my mental perspective of how I should be progressing to my actual progress, which is way slow and requires a ton of work. But, I do see now that my idea for the "expert beginner" thing wasn't completely crazy. I do see a lot of improvement in my ability to begin this instrument now than if I had started it as my first instrument (obviously). But the point is that I can self moderate what kind of exercises I think would be helpful, not just going off what my teacher expects me to practice. I also have tried making up exercises. The difficulty is that, since I'm the only test subject in this research project, it's 100% subjective to my perspective. 
Let's Play Music is fun as always. I am preparing about 10 minutes of exercises to teach next week. These exercises include teaching the children to Lorie is really letting me do a lot within her class and I am super glad to get a unique teaching experience. I really feel a difference in my piano teaching. I've decided to incorporate more music theory into my piano curriculum, which is occasionally difficult because I can't put all these kids through Let's Play Music. LPM really makes the theory fun and exciting, which is something I'm obviously trying to do- but it's theory. Also, I find myself approaching notes differently. Generally, I just tell the kids the right answer when they miss a note, or have them try to fix it then assist. But after watching LPM, I've found there's a better way, and it has to do with pitch relations. They do it with solfegge, but also by naming the interval between the notes in a simple way (ie baby step, skip or leap). The kids get a sense for reading the shape of the melody, which, once they find their hand position, it becomes way easier for them to play correctly. The problem I see (potentially) in this, is that there becomes less of a focus on learning the notes and that becomes a little weaker as the kids just rely on "feeling" the way the song goes based on pitch relations. To modify this, I believe it's really useful to do what Let's Play Music does and stress all the notes separate from pitch relations. But it's difficult, in an unstructured piano curriculum like I have, it's difficult to really get the bridge between notes and pitches. Still working on a solution to this, and I am super excited to integrate this concept into my violin book. 
At this point, I feel like I am finally seeing a lot of benefits from doing this project. It feels like a good use of my time. Learning how to teach is a useful skill and learning the Violin is a unique challenge that I really enjoy.