Hi my daghter will be sitting her grade 2 flute exam in about 5 weeks at the moment she has lessons through the school . When she came home and said her music teacher thinks she is ready for grade 2 I was quite surprised as to me she still seems to be really struggling with 2 of the peices , I did want to say I don't think you are ready but did not want her to feel I did not beleive in her and thought her teacher must know more than me (this is a new teacher from the one she had for her grade 1) .But this close to her grade 1 she could play all 3 peices perfectly and did really well in the exam only missing a distintion by 1 mark .
She is practising loads every day But I am wondering about getting her some extra music lesson in the run up to the exam but I don't know if private music teacher will do lesson for a short time eg. 5 weeks ,to help her . Just wondered if anyone had experience of this .
sorry for the rabble post

thank you Lisa

I actually refused to allow my daughter to be entered for G5 Clarinet as I realised that she would struggle with it. It wasn't the smartest thing to do and it has contributed to her virtually giving up Clarinet (there were other factors). At the time i was angry over the whole thing, she also wanted her to be entered for G4 Sax which she wasn't ready for either. I allowed the Sax entry to go ahead because I knew someone who could help her get through it. At the end of the term i stopped school lessons and transferred her to the person that had helped with the exam.

I think you might have difficulty getting an established teacher to take your daughter simply to get her through the exam. The might consider it if you were prepared to transfer to them at the end of the term.

Please, please talk to her teacher about your concerns. Maybe she can offer some extra help in the run up to the exam. Transferring to another teacher or taking lessons from another teacher will most likely confuse your daughter, and won't solve anything in the longer term - if she passes the exam only because of the extra lessons outside school, you will find yourself back in the same situation when the next exam comes along.

No doubt the teacher has her reasons for doing what she is doing - some prefer to have their students 'peaking' just in time for the exam, rather than being ready weeks in advance. Maybe your daughter is playing really well in lessons and not so well at home. Who knows? But unless you discuss things with her regular teacher, you will all get yourselves in a right royal muddle.

If you don't get a satisfactory response form her teacher, maybe you should THEN consider either withdrawing daughter from the exam or transferring to another teacher (but as others have pointed out, a new teacher would probably be loathe to go ahead with an exam after only a few weeks).

Hope you get it sorted...

Every time my daughter takes an exam I doubt her teachers' judgment! So far, I'm pleased to say, her teachers have been proved right every time too, and she's done well with no disasters. I very much sympathise with what you say about trying not to sow seeds of doubt in your daughter's mind about her prospects for success. Do talk to her teacher, but I think 5 weeks is still a long time if, as you say, she is practising hard.

Totally agree, talking to the teacher is always the best option before deciding what to do next. it is something I would always do first.

Hi Lisa,

I'd second SueHM's suggestion that you talk to her teacher. If you start by asking the teacher for advice on how best to support your daughter's exam prep (or something similar) then this should hopefully open up communication without the teacher immediately feeling that you're questioning his/her judgement or teaching ability. If the school doesn't allow this kind of discussion with instrumental teachers then talk to the head of music instead.

Different teachers have different approaches to exams. Some will enter students as soon as they think they are likely to pass an exam with appropriate practice etc, some prefer to wait until the student is more likely to be able to achieve a merit/distinction. Some like students to be ready for the exam before they are entered, others have concerns about students getting stale and prefer them to peak at the time of the exam rather than before. There is nothing 'right' or 'wrong' per se with any of this approaches.

You say that your daughter is 'practising loads' everday, but is she actually practicing what is needed (and I don't just mean the correct pieces)? There is often a big difference between 'practicing' and 'playing' and your daughter may be working in a way which restricts her progress (e.g. by reinforcing the mistakes she is making) rather than promoting it. This is something which her teacher will be able to give guidance on.

There is still over a month to the exam and some people work best once the panic/adrenaline starts to kick in - you'll have to judge whether your daughter is in this category or not (although you may only be able to tell with hindsight!).

Hope things work out okay.

Thanks for all your advice I'm sure your right I should speak to her teacher , just feels a bit awkward because its in the school day and I've never met her (must learn to be more assertive ) the main thing she seems to be having problems with is the speed of the pieces she sounds good until she tries to play along to the cd, she can't play fast enough to keep up and then starts to make mistakes (when playing alone she is not playing it slowly just not as fast as the cd) I know she still has quite a while before the exam , just want to help in any way we can
thanks Lisa

Some of the CD accompaniments are far too fast. If your daughter can play correctly at a steady speed then that is what is important. Which pieces is she playing?

She is playing Marche Militaire, The Liberty Bell and Humoreske

I can't speak for the flute cds but all I can say about the cello cds is that pretty well every teacher I have ever spoken to says that the cds are far too fast and that no-one would actually expect a learner of the relevant level to actually play at that speed. (The same goes for the cds that go with the Suzuki books). From personal experience I would be more worried as to whether the child has been properly prepared for the supporting tests i.e. scales, sight reading and aural (in order of usually increasing risk of neglect). I have tended to find that it is these that are most in need of additional support, some teachers just refuse to teach the aural - or alternatively because they can do it assume that everyone else can. If you think that your daughter can do these she is probably fine.

In actual fact the only time I have had a megacatastrophy the (guitar) teacher just hadn't taught my daughter the scales. I ended up trying to teach her myself on an instrument that I didn't play. I didn't listen carefully enough to my daughter's doubts as she had expressed similar doubts for the previous grade (2) and got a distinction!




I was writing my reply at the same time as Andante in C!!

Ok. In that case, stick with the successful speeds and ignore the CD. I've had pupils score highly on Marche Militaire playing it slower than the CD tempo. I've also had one get a fail mark for attempting to play Humoreske at the CD speed and coming unstuck, when a slower tempo would have secured her a much better mark.

In the absence of other evidence I would trust the new teacher on this.

Does your teacher accompany her ? Will she accompany her in the exam.

My child's teacher does not accompany, but relies on his pupils to get their own accompanist : this invariably means two or three sessions before the exam just going through the pieces together, which have, for us, given that extra support just before the exam is taken.

Although the accompanist is not a flute teacher, the extra session a week in the two or three weeks leading up to the exam have been very helpful, without stepping on anyone's toes. The pianist is helpful about things like dynamics, rhythm, speed etc.

I would like to add that my candidates' pieces are not generally up to speed yet for this session of exams.

No her teacher will not be accompanying her in the exam sadly, I hope we will get the same lady as last time
Lisa

too.

Hi, My daughter is taking her grade 2 Flute in about 2 weeks time the same pieces as your daughter except the Menuet instead of Marche Militaire. As we have been snowed in for over a week and she had to miss a couple of lessons, we got the CD out for her to practise along with. She just about managed to keep up but was slipping up in a couple of places. When she went to her lesson yesterday her playing was not as good as it had been before attempting to play with the CD and she slipped up in quite a few places. I must admit I became concerned that she may not be ready for the exam.

I am sure that she was rushing through the pieces with the speed of the CD in her mind as she played. I have now arranged for her accompanist to meet with us this Friday for a run through so that she can realign her playing to a time that alows her to play all the notes properly. My advice put the CD away!! Definitely try and meet with her teacher and see if she can have a run through with her accompanist about two or three weeks before the exam. You still have five weeks practise I think she will be fine. Do you mind me asking does she breath during the scales ? my daughter can't get through the 2 octve D major scale without breathing at the top.

If you are better with computers than I am you can use free software (Audacity, I think) to create slowed down versions of the CD tracks. I've got my son to help me with this a few times so that my daughter can practise with accompaniment at a manageable speed. However, I agree with Grove that practising too much with the CD can be a bad thing; you can be sure that your accompanist will sound quite different from the CD, which can come as a bit of a shock!

My daughter's Piano Teacher gives her great advice about speeding things up. The fastest way according to him is to play the tricky bit in small chunks over and over until you are really secure, speeding up only when you are secure. That way you will also be able to play the easy bits faster. Might help if she's a bit slower than the accompanist recommends.

I agree with not worrying too much about the speed of the CD for her last exam daughter didn't even try to get the fastest piece to the same speed. They are more useful to listen to, so you can make sure that you are playing with as nice a sound as possible. It's much more valuable to have practice with the accompanist in the run up to the exam.

My teacher has always told me that you are allowed to breathe at the top of all scales right through to gr8. Even if this isn't correct (only being at gr6), speaking as someone whose scales have been the strongest supporting test and has always to date breathed at the top of a scale. Yes the speed of scales and technical control is supposed to increase as you become more fluent through the grades but certainly for the grade's i've done (1, 3,4) I have breathed at the top of every scale so this should not be a problem.

I have always been told that the best place to breathe is at the top, rather than half way through an octave etc. Plus it's better to play and put a breath in, getting all the notes, than to play without a breath and fizzle out before the end of the scale.

Good luck to all of the parent's children taking the exam this session.

My daughter didn't get any comments on extra breaths in a 2 octave scale until about G4(she did G2 but not G3). At the time she just wasn't phyiscally able to do two octaves all in one breath.

Thank you that's very useful to know. I will help her to try and focus on breathing at the top of the 2 octave scale if she can last that long. I agree the fizzle out at the end of a scale isn't good. I am sure her teacher has told her that she should be working towards doing it all in one breath but, as you found, she's just not physically able as a tiny 9 year old.

My daughter was 11 when she took G4 and I asked after the comment if the AB would ever consider making allowances for young children on the scale front, purely with this problem in mind. The official line is that they would not as they felt it discriminatory to adults.

If you check out Youtube there are some very young children with G8 and I wonder how they have coped with the scales in one breath.

I've got a couple of things to add here...

One is a general agreement that the accompaniment CDs are too fast.

The other is seconding the need to talk to the teacher. As a private teacher now, who used to per i in schools, I refuse to take on pupils who are already having lessons with other teachers. I've had one or two bad experiences, and I see it as rather unprofessional...

Hi just wanted to thank everyone who replied and to let you know she finally got her results merit 125 so we are all over the moon
thanks again for the advice
lisa

Well done to her! Glad that everything worked out fine in the end.

Great result - well done to your daughter.

What happened in the end? Did you manage to discuss things with the teacher? Did you get extra help or not?

I wondered too!

Congratulations to your daughter.

Congratulations! Hope your daughter is really starting to enjoy flute now.