A Little Game of War

At group lesson last week we played a fun game with my beginning to intermediate students with the musical notes dice with sixteenth notes on it.  This die has six different notes ranging from sixteenth note to whole note.  Each note has a different value.  I paired the kids up by ability level and they would each roll a dice.  We had colored chips in the middle (although pennies, jewels, rocks, beads would work.)  Whoever got the higher value of dice would get one of the chips.  If they got the same value then they would roll until someone won and that person would get however many chips it took to roll the winning dice.  They always had to say what kind of note and how many beats (ex: "quarter note, one beat." "sixteenth note, one-fourth beat."    What I really liked about this was that even the beginning 4 year old knew the note names values of the dice after only about 2 minutes.  This was a fun way to really drill this concept in a short amount of time.

You can buy these fun dice HERE at The Practice Shoppe!

Trick or Treat...or Share

Here's a fun October practice idea called "Trick or Treat...or Share."

I have 9 pieces of paper (about index card size) with pumpkins on them. Three of them say "Trick" on the front; three of them say "Treat," and three of them say "Share." Laminate them if you want. On the back of the cards, I put post-it's with what we would do during practicing. The child chooses a card, and we would follow the instructions on the back. You might incorporate these in your normal practice routine every once in a while--in between other things they are practicing. Here are a few examples of what you could put on the back of them.

The "Trick" Card

The "Trick" card has a trick that the children perform. Here are some examples:

1. Play this preview spot so many times, for a particular reason (i.e. getting the 3 in tune.) Wow! Tricky!
2. Name that tune, tell the composer, and play the song in the dark with good tone.
3. Do jumping jacks while telling your favorite joke. Note this doesn't have anything to do with practicing. It's just a good break to get them smiling.

The "Treat" Card

The "Treat" card has nothing to do with food, unless you want to add that. Instead, the children end up with a reward that has to do with music.

1. Mom/Dad plays something for you on your violin (or at least tries to play something)
2. Listen to a classical piece that is not a Suzuki piece.
3. Watch a video of someone playing the piece you are on (or another piece). This could be a famous virtuoso or someone else you just happened to find on youtube. Talk about what you liked and anything you didn't like.

The "Share" Card

The "Share" card has something that the child could share with you or someone else that happens to be around--even a few stuffed animals would work.

1. Share a hug.
2. Play your favorite song for someone else or an audience of stuffed animals. You could even make the stuffed animals say one thing they really liked about the performance.
3. Make up a song that sounds spooky.

Hope you have fun with this idea if you decide to try it!

-Tabitha

Practicing Work-Out!

I got this idea from James Hutchins on the Suzuki Parents as Partners Online conference two years ago.  Since then I've used it a lot with my students and want to have it readily accessible to my students this year so I put it behind the front cover of their practice books this year.

Basically, a "workout" is focused practicing using review pieces.  My "workout" page is just a list of the Suzuki violin pieces in books 1 & 2 in order.  You could make your own "workout" page with your own list of pieces that would be easy enough to practice without thinking about the notes.

I assign a time for the workout.  With my own kids, I like to choose a specific time that is on one of our Cube Timers so that they can just flip it over and practice (so easy!!)  For this specific amount of time my students play through their list focusing on whatever it is I've assigned them.  For some it could be playing with their eyes on the highway, for others, it might be keeping your scroll up.  It could be to help posture points, intonation, or focus.  If the student can play the first piece all the way through with the focus point they can move on to the next piece on the list.  They keep playing through the pieces until the timer dings - then they are done with their workout for the day.  They mark where they stopped and start there for their workout the next day.

I love assigning workouts because it really lets a student focus on one thing for 5 or 7 minutes without the student thinking about the notes or bowings.  For Suzuki students, this is a very efficient way to do their review.

If you are a Suzuki violin student/parent/teacher you may download my workout sheet (I laminate it and write on it with a dry-erase marker so that we can reuse it - and have the student mark their spot with a post-it flag.)  You can also make your own list for different instruments or repertoire.  Let me know what successes you've had with your students using a "workout!"