THE CURRICULUM MATTERS

When choosing where to take private lessons, parents are usually ambivalent about the music curriculum from which their child will be learning. Instead, they decide if they like the teacher. Sometimes it is someone who they know and trust, maybe it is for convenience or price. When asked what curriculum their teacher is using, most parents don’t even know its name – much less the philosophy behind it. However, especially for beginners, the curriculum matters just as much as the teacher.

The Conservatory Course is a result of years of research with thousands of students to discover a procedure for learning that works for everyone. Using classic methods of the past as a model, we’ve created a teaching method that is far more effective than the modern methods of today. Let’s compare The Conservatory Course with some of the most commonly used piano methods.

AMERICAN METHODS
The methods used by most piano teachers in American are distinctly different from those used by teachers around the world. In fact, when thumbing through American methods, teachers who are trained from other countries are confused by them because they do not fit within the natural order of studying music. This universal and historical weakness of American methods is the primary reason for the development of The Conservatory Course curriculum.

In order to highlight the unique strengths of The Conservatory Course, let’s take a closer look at the key components of the most commonly used modern piano methods, such as, Alfred, Bastien and Faber.

Colored pictures: Most piano methods published in America have picture illustrations on each page of music. Sometimes these pictures take up most of the page. At first glance, you might think the pictures are a teaching tool to make the music more interesting. However, big pictures, very large print, or characterizations of musical symbols do not directly help children learn music and are often a distraction from it. The pictures in modern methods are more of a marketing tool by the publisher to attract the purchaser than a teaching tool to help the student.

In contrast, The Conservatory Course is built on the philosophy that playing music is in itself an art form that stimulates imagination without the help of pictures. Without illustrations to distract from the meaning of the musical text, all the space on each page contains music to play. We have found that students who are learning to play musically from classic piano literature do not miss having pictures in their music book. The music itself is interesting and can make a direct route to the imagination.

Four separate books: Most teachers ask parents to buy four separate books per level: a Method or Lesson Book, Repertoire, Performance, and Theory books. When musical ideas are spread out over several books, they lose their relationships to each other and make the ideas more difficult to understand. Ideas introduced in this random disjointed way are quickly forgotten and do not build a good foundation on which to continue music study.

In past generations, children studied music from one book that contained the method in the front and songs on which to apply what was learned in the back. Just as the classical methods of the past, The Conservatory Course offers an all-in-one Music Book with the following sections: Method, Etudes, Exercises, Repertoire, and Amusements. For each Level, the Music Book is accompanied by a Course Book which includes the lesson plan from which students get their weekly assignments as well as a report of what was studied at the lesson. In The Conservatory Course, musical ideas are introduced in an ordered, relational, and objective way that are gradually developed for further understanding, building a strong foundation for continued music study.

Chordal harmony: All these methods introduce chordal harmony way too early in the form of analyzing chords by theoretical terms such as tonic and dominant (I and V7) or by hand position such as C position or G position. Students who learn by these terms and positions early-on are misled to think they know more than they do; or that they are learning to read, when they are not. If this happens all manner of problems will occur, and most students are unable to advance without remedial help. As a result, they do not become fluent readers.

In The Conservatory Course, students learn at lessons to read music like a book, and at the same time, react in precise time and touch on every note they play. Notes are not analyzed in groups until students have experience reading notes individually on the staff, and until the hand has been made strong to technically play note groups without collapsing. For example, in Level 1 of The Conservatory Course students learn to read and play single melodies, then quickly progress to two melodies hands together in parallel, contrary, and oblique motions. This is the best way to build the mind and hand to understand music. Students who miss this process will, sooner or later, have to relearn to play music that is not written in positions.

METHODS IMPORTED FROM JAPAN
The two methods used in America that originated from Japan are Yamaha and Suzuki. It is interesting to note that neither method it widely used for teaching piano in Japan. They are surprising ignored by most Japanese piano teachers who primarily use the traditional German Beyer Method. It is also important to recognize that students who transfer from Yamaha or Suzuki to other teachers usually have to start again from the beginning.

The logic behind both Yamaha and Suzuki is that children should learn to ‘speak’ a language before they learn to ‘read’ it. For this reason, the music is taught by copying the teacher, parent, or a recording; and not by reading. The problem is that children naturally imitate musical sounds. Once lessons begin, developing hand-eye coordination and reading visually should be the primary concern. In Yamaha and Suzuki, the student imitates the teacher and a parent is often expected to sit in on the lesson so they can continue to help the student at home. More students fail with this method of imitation than succeed because once students learn a piece by memory or by ear, and rely on adult help, they are not going to make the effort to read independently. Plus, the relationship between the student and parent helping in this way is often strained.

Yamaha Method: The first years of Yamaha are group classes of 8 to 10 students on keyboards. In the Yamaha Method, teachers sing melodic patterns that children imitate with the goal of singing solfege syllables by ear and playing the piano by ear. The program claims that the curriculum is broad compared to typical private lessons, as “Children sing, solfege, play the keyboard, sing songs with lyrics, move to music, play rhythm and keyboard ensembles and participate in music appreciation activities,” but in some ways this sounds more like a preschool class than a piano lesson.

The fundamental error in non-reading methods is that children are intellectually ready to read in kindergarten. An additional problem with Yamaha is that students are learning in a group. In a group, the teacher is unable to correct technique and many bad habits are formed during the first years of lessons that are very difficult or impossible to correct.

The Conservatory Course is better. From the first lesson, students learn to visually read musical notation that they will continue to read the same way all their lives. The lessons are private, so the teacher can help them learn the first skills of piano technique and the formation of the hand at the lesson. No help is needed from parents at home.

Suzuki Method: The Suzuki Method employs some of the same ideas as Yamaha. They teach playing before reading and parents are required to attend lessons for the purpose of helping at home. As with any method that encourages playing by ear, students eventually resent learning to read what they can already play without reading. Imitation is easy, whereas, learning to read is a long and complicated process that will be resisted by students who are not taught to read and play all at once. When it is time for students to start learning to read music, teachers must seek out other teaching methods as the Suzuki curriculum consists only of pieces to play with no explanations.

Although many of the standard pieces in the Suzuki method are similar repertoire, The Conservatory Course provides a more organized and sequential plan for teaching reading with more variety of experiences. With The Conservatory Course students are taught right from the start to respond to written musical notation. Everything is taught at the lesson and explained in the Music Book. Parents are not expected to attend lessons in order to help at home.

THE ECLECTIC APPROACH
Common sense tells us that teacher should have a plan for progress. The worst possible plan is to have no plan. Look on any music lessons website and you will see something similar to this, “Our teachers understand that every student is an individual, with personal musical needs and goals. We make it a priority to tailor how we teach and what we teach to your individual needs.” Giving a lesson by just telling students random ideas is not teaching. Teaching must have a method and objective goals. Using a variety of methods or using what the student brings is not a method. Frequently teachers go into the lesson not knowing what they are going to accomplish that day but instead react to what the student did or didn’t practice during the week. This also is not a method. These ways do not result in a coherent teaching strategy that can be proven to work as The Conservatory Course curriculum has done. Organizing a lesson plan for study from many resources by one’s self is an enormous amount of work and a great responsibility. It takes years of trial and error to know all the ways that information can be misunderstood by the student.

IN CONCLUSION
There are countless details for training students mentally and physically in music and there are countless errors that can be made. The following is a list of the most commonly used teaching errors that should alarm parents if they occur with your student:

The teacher or method book stating sayings such as Every-Good-Boy-Does-Fine as a trick to naming the lines and space of the staff. Most music teacher still use this saying, even though the staff is actually read in alphabetical order.
Finger numbers or letter names over notes which takes attention away from learning to read the notation. When the answers are written in, what does the notation do? It becomes invisible and the student is not compelled to look at it.
Students looking up and down while reading. Students who are dependent on looking up and down or memorizing their music will never learn to read.
The act of playing with fingers that are flat or collapsing rather by lifting from the knuckle. The finger joint must be stable like a knee joint, so the player can “walk” on the keys without wobbling.
The teacher counting aloud, singing along, or writing the counting in the music. Instead the teacher should play along to stimulate the student rhythmically.
Students making and fixing mistakes instead of playing slow with mental control. The first impulse will be repeat if it is right or wrong. Making and fixing mistakes is an enormous waste of lesson time.
Students playing too slow. Once it is read correctly, the music must be trained in the student’s hand, so it is can be played faster for a real musical experience.
When students want to pick songs for the lesson it is a sign they have not learned much, and teachers are searching for ways to keep their interest.
The teacher relying on parents to help students play the assignment at home.

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THE PURPOSE OF THE LESSON

March 22, 2019

The purpose or objective of the lesson can be summarized in these three basic goals that ought to be pursued simultaneously at each lesson: To develop the ability to read music independently. To develop proper technique and achieve quality performance. To study the universally accepted literature. 1. Are your students really reading the music? Reading music is the ability to convert musical characters and signs to be heard on an instrument or by singing. Most teachers believe reading is of primary importance for beginning students. However, teachers often do not detect when students are actually playing by ear, memory, or guessing. This problem may only become apparent when students reach music too difficult for them to imitate or remember. Look for these signs of poor reading comprehension: Needing help from parents during practice time at home. Can play a piece fast, but not slowly. Having difficulty reading while following the metronome. Play by rote or imitation to learn a piece. Having difficulty playing unfamiliar melodies. Looking up and down at the keys while playing. Inadequate reading skills are the result of incorrect teaching tricks used to speed up the process of learning to play for beginners. Teaching with these tricks delay and avoid the all-important fundamental task of learning to read music alphabetically on the staff and continue to compete in the student’s mind with the true logic behind staff reading. Here are some examples: Rhymes to name the lines and spaces of the staff. Finger numbers to help students read music. Multi-key hand position methods. Intervals and chords named prematurely before reading is fluent. Familiar music for method studies. Imitation and rote to learn new pieces. 2. Are your student developing technically? Do you have trouble correcting these technical issues? Fingers flat, not curved, or joints collapsing while playing. Fingers flying up or falling off the keys. Controlling touch and dynamics. The Conservatory Course for Piano gives clear direction on how to correct these problems common to beginning piano students and many other important technical factors . 3. Are your students developing musical interest? Right from the start, develop the interest of your beginning piano students by introducing children’s literature by master composers. Soon your students will find that classic piano literature is far from boring; on the contrary, it is very fun! Only when it is too hard, do students think it is boring and then go looking for something different to play, choosing what is most popular at the time or familiar to them. It is unfortunate that most piano students fail to become acquainted with the huge amount of delightful literature for beginners. This cycle will be broken if students’ progress quickly to successfully play literature at an early stage of lessons as is taught with The Conservatory Course . To know the piano, one must play its literature.

INTRODUCTION FROM MARY

March 22, 2019

The Conservatory Course for piano would not exist without certain convictions. The first is my conviction that, as a teacher, if I am to take credit for students who succeed, then I must also take responsibility for those who fail. Students are failing when they progress slowly, practice irregularly and poorly, seek recreation rather than learning, need remedial work, and finally, quit lessons. These poor results cannot be blamed on students, parents, lack of motivation or lack of talent. It is possible to overcome the difficulties brought to lessons by students, and their performance is shaped more by the teacher’s expectation than by students’ virtues or aptitudes. These underlying convictions caused me to believe that what I was doing, or not doing, made students succeed or fail. It was not until I made a resolute decision to attempt change that I came up with solutions through a process of documenting results and weeding out methods that were ineffective. Once ineffective teaching methods were eliminated, the remaining material resulted in constant progress at a surprising rate. This material evolved into a course that was further refined as it was used with thousands of students and by all the teachers of Hovland Conservatory of Music. The school turned out to be the perfect testing ground for developing a piano course because feedback from teachers provided a faster means of correcting the method than would ever be possible with only one teacher using it. The results of thirty years of experience, ten of which were spent in experimenting and research, is a systematic method which works for all students, not just the ideal ones. In fact, we have found that it is often the students that fail academically and technically that are the best teachers of teachers. These students are the ones that show when teaching is incorrect because they are the ones that are unable to make order out of disorder. Eliminating the methods that cause students to fail also results in better and faster progress for all students, no matter their skill level. Armed with a successful method, the problems that formerly required tenacity and persistence to overcome have been eliminated naturally. No longer do teachers need to give lengthy explanations, nor do students ask questions for clarification. Students are so actively learning the musically interesting piano literature and they no longer seek to play popular music at the lesson. Taught according to objective criteria, students do not need help from parents in order to practice correctly at home because they are prepared more fully at the lesson. Basic technical skills that previously required perpetual correction are resolved easily using the means for development contained in The Conservatory Course. The natural result of using this curriculum is an eventful and productive lesson experience. The Conservatory Course is able to produce consistent results because it follows a natural progression, which is the order in which ideas evolved over the course of the historical development of music. This ensures that only historically-credible facts will be taught, rather than the modern teaching tricks invented over the years for teaching young children (see Trick or Teach) and that these historical musical facts are taught in the order that is most understandable. The primary approach of The Conservatory Course is a proactive one, which means students are taught to read and play correctly the first time. This proactive approach anticipates and prevents problems before the arise, by putting into students’ minds what they need to know before they come to erroneous conclusions, and by training accepted piano technique before students fall into incorrect ones. In contrast, a reactive approach means to assign a piece for practice, then to assess at the next lesson what needs attention, adapting to the student’s problems after they have developed. The advantages of a proactive approach over a reactive approach are many, with these four being the most important: An enormous amount of wasted time and effort spent trying to correct bad habits and thought patterns is eliminated with a proactive approach. The proactive approach of The Conservatory Course greatly reduces the need for adapting curriculum to the student by narrowing the natural range of variation between students. This allows teachers to focus on accomplishing the objectives of lessons, rather than on striving to analyze each student to see what they need. Students enjoy lessons more because they experience repeated success and very little correction, and this in turn discourages premature quitting of lessons. Using this proactive approach, teachers acquire more control of the lesson and are not so dependent upon their students and parents to achieve success professionally or to make the job of teaching satisfying work.