Lesson II

Welcome to Lesson II! Hopefully, your child had a fun time this week practicing her sticky and lazy sounds!

Take a Bow.

Before we get started with the lesson, review with your child what we learned last week. Briefly touch upon sticky and lazy sounds. Then, make sure your child can point out the favorite note. Make sure during the lesson to be vigilant about no noodle backs and great hand positioning.

Here's what we'll be working on today:

1. Hand Positioning and Posture
2. Scale in c major
3. Meet Quarter
4. Pepperoni Pizza

1. Hand positioning and posture are so important that they will be on our lesson plan every so often. Positive reinforcement is the key - tell your child that in order to earn a sticker, you must catch her doing great things like having a straight back and a baseball hand.

2. The scale in c major consists of five notes that start an octave above middle c. C lives under the two black notes and has a nose. Sometimes, we have to work diligently on this seemingly minute point. Many children just feel overwhelmed trying to find the right note to play. If your child falls into this category, don't worry! It usually take about a month.

Remember that lazy loves this song so we need to make it sound like him. We simply play the notes c,d,e,f,g,f,e,d,c, or 1,2,3,4,5,4,3,2,1. One common mistake is playing the fifth finger once on the way up the scale and once on the way down - make sure your child does not do this because it is a hard habit to break. Each time your child can play the scale, give him a sticker. If he's trying really hard but can't quite get it, give him a sticker. Remember, this is the first song your child is learning from you on the piano so it may take some time.

3. Our first rhythm! Meet quarter, he hasn't cleaned off his face in ages so he's all dirty. but that's okay because this way, we can always recognize him. Moms and dads, make sure you pronounce the word quarter with a hard T. We want quarter to have a hidden rhythm in there (setting the groundwork for sixteenth notes).

Here is what a quarter note looks like: Let's clap him!

Good job! Now clap two in a row (quarter, quarter). Now, three... Now four. Give your child a sticker for doing a good job!

4. Now it's time to start our twinkles. To to forewarn you, the twinkles are tough. I know some adults who would have trouble with their tedious rhythmic differences. The key to understanding them quickly (getting them over with quickly, rather) is listening. I cannot stress it enough. Listen, listen, listen. Then listen some more. Ambient listening is just fine. Put it on during dinner, during bath time, in the car, be obsessive.

Since you've been listening so well, you know exactly what the first twinkle sounds like. I like to put the rhythm "pepperoni pizza" with it. As you'll notice, there are six syllables (notes, in this case). However, there are only four beats: the first two beat have two notes the last two beats only have one each.

Try to get your child to play and clap this rhythm many times during your lesson. Get him to play it with finger number one on our favorite note. As always, stickers for positive reinforcement!

Practicing:

1. Scale in c major (starting on our favorite note)
2. Clapping quarter
3. Pepperoni Pizza (with finger number one on favorite note)

Take a bow. Well done.... high five!