How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, Practice, Practice Like any skill from learning to read to tying your shoes, beginning piano takes repetitive practice to master. The good news is that practice doesn’t have to be boring and can be accomplished in as little as 5-10 minutes at a time. The familiar songs in our course give your child the opportunity to apply the musical concepts you’re teaching with each lesson. The kids have so much fun playing these songs, especially if you sing along! The special time with you creates such wonderful memories. It’s easy to get caught up in the fun and forget that as your child plays, you are cementing the building blocks and constructing a solid foundation for further study.

Positive reinforcement and the fun times together motivate young children. Your child will likely let you know when they’re ready to practice. Don’t be surprised if this happens several times a day and only lasts a few minutes each time. Require your child to work on the songs that need practice before playing the songs already mastered. This will keep you moving forward. The reward of playing the song he already knows will motivate your child to spend time on the new song – even if you only make it through a couple of measures in that new song during each practice session.

Consider allowing your child to pick out some small stickers and save them to be used only during practice time. You can make a small chart and have your child place a sticker on the chart each time he practices a new song. Or better yet, use the left side of the pages in the music book. This will create a powerful picture that shows your child the more he practices the better he gets.

The bottom line - it does take practice time for your child to master beginning piano. As many of you know, Piano for Preschoolers was born out of my search for a method to teach my own children to play the piano when they were preschoolers. I couldn’t find a method that was fun and exciting enough to motivate them to practice and continue learning. I found plenty of programs that were either gimmicky or more like video games than piano lessons. None of these really taught children to read music and play the piano. I found plenty of programs that were so boring they squelched any interest my oldest daughter had in learning to play. With Piano for Preschooler’s unique method your child can instantly play songs he recognizes. The color strip guides your child to the correct notes and that success motivates your child to continue practicing and gives him the opportunity to apply each musical concept.

The first time your child plays Twinkle Twinkle Little Star it will sound enough like the song so that you can sing along. With practice applying the lessons you teach in our program, your child will play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star while counting aloud to the proper rhythm, with proper finger numbers and position, while recognizing the names of the notes and which key plays which note, and yes not even seeing the color anymore but only the notes on each line or space. All that can be accomplished in the short bursts of practice I’ve described and you’ll both have a ton of fun in the process.

Write to me at angie@pianoforpreschoolers.com and let me know what other tips and suggestions you’d like to hear.

Angie