Yesterday I taught 8 lessons. Of those 8 lessons I believe two students practiced this week. And I spent 15 minutes of one student’s lesson watching the student search the room for any trace of her books (we were online). Mom joined in the fun and was also unsuccessful in finding them. The lesson started …
Author: McKenzie
When Life Gives You Lemons…
Right about now is usually the time when my studio is in transition. The spring recital is ending, school is out or close to it, and I’m announcing fun summer plans. This year I have realized that although the transition looks quite a bit different, we are still in transition as we navigate what this …
Adaptive Piano Lessons Domain: Physical
We have arrived at the end of our Adaptive Piano Journey! (For now … this is truly a journey that once you begin, never ends!). We have explored creative ways to foster excitement and creativity at the piano when you have students showing deficiencies in the cognitive, communication, socio-emotional, and behavioral domains. My earnest desire …
Adaptive Piano Lessons Domain: Behavioral
“Nearly all academic and social activities require interpersonal interactions; therefore, a behavioral disorder can affect every area of a student’s development: intellectual, educational, and social.”* Please read that again, and let it sink in a little deeper. What’s being said is that a behavioral disorder literally affects every aspect of a child’s life. I don’t …
Resource Roundup: Rote Learning
Why rote learning? There have been long time arguments about the validity of rote learning, and whether or not it is considered “cheating”. I have no intention of beating around the bush, and due to the fact that I’m writing a resource roundup on this, I will come right out and say that done correctly, …
Adaptive Piano Lessons Domain: Socio-Emotional
Music is an integral part of society. Here in America, our musical experience has been described as being a part of our lives from birth to death, experienced from the lowest to highest cognitive functioning, and enjoyed by one person at a time to thousands of people together*. So it is little wonder that we …
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Adaptive Piano Lessons Domain: Communication
Imagine that you greet a new student at the door. Although mom looks at you and politely says hello and begins a normal conversation, the student is clearly distracted. Your kind and genuine welcome do nothing to put him at ease. He never looks at you when he speaks, and doesn’t say much more than …
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Play Dough and Music
Since switching to online lessons, I will ask my students to have various household items on hand. The excitement of wondering how we will use them is usually evident the moment we start video chatting! They always hold their items up proudly, making sure I haven’t forgotten about their mystery assignment J I am married, …
Adaptive Piano Lessons Domain: Cognitive
The cognitive domain can range from exceptional cognitive ability to severe cognitive and learning disabilities. For our purposes today, we will be focusing on the side of the spectrum where we find disabilities. Students with learning disabilities do not necessarily have a cognitive disability. But we will be looking at strategies for teaching a student …
Resource Roundup: Lead Sheets
Do you ever look back and realize how drastically your teaching has changed? One of the ways I see this in my own teaching is with lead sheets! I don’t remember ever being specifically taught lead sheets. The methods I grew up in didn’t make them a priority (and rarely do today’s methods). And they …
