Greetings;

I play jazz and have studied jazz independtely for some time. I play more intitutively - if you know what I mean.
I am interested in teaching my students and preparing them for the exams.

I have the books Jazz Piano from Scratch and Jazz Piano Level 1.
I listened to the accompanying CD. And reviewed the books.

Typically I would start by teaching the student intuitively by having the student learn the tune.
Then I would have them use the target notes.

However, I have a quick question on the choice of target notes.
QUESTION #1: For example the target notes of "he is Sadly melting" on page 26 of the piano pieces books has target notes for the first measure of G C E F

Then in the 3rd measures the target notes are G C B D are G A B D. Could you please explain why the target notes are different in view of the fact that the chords are the same. Do these notes represent a mode?

QUESTION #2: Are these target notes the only notes that should be used or are they simply targets?

QUESTION #3: I notice the left hand is pretty steady. Typically when I play jazz I vary the left hand a lot.
Should the student be taugth to just keep the left hand steady for the purpose of these exams?

QUESTION #4: I have the same question about the 4 target notes in "Here We Go Again".
Do these notes represent a mode? I just ask because I was expecting 5 notes which would represent all the notes of a pentatonic scale.

QUESTION #5: I notice that all the target notes tend to vary from 3 notes (as in the case of Bedford Square Blues). I was wondering if there was some rhyme reason for having these notes as the target notes.

QUESTION #6: How does the ABRSM suggest that a person present the student with this topic?

This is perhaps a bit new to me because I have been either making my own melodies or making making melodies based on chord tones or scales as opposed to 3 or 4 target notes.

Thank you very much for the information.

did I ask a tough question?

I think you asked 6 tough questions! I'm afraid I can't help you, and the jazz forum does tend to be a little quiet. Hopefully someone knowledgeable will help you out in a while!

Some answers to your questions can be found on page 158 of Jazz Piano From Scratch. The notes given are for guidance only and you can use extra notes or different notes from those given. The pitches given relate directly to the scales given for the grades (but in some situations represent particular solutions for particular parts of a tune). If your pupils produce improvisations which are musically satisfying using different notes then that is fine.

As regards the left hand then it too can be altered but this will depend on whether your pupils can cope with changing it and improvising at the same time.

I don't think that ABRSM has a suggested method of approach. It will depend on how familiar your pupils are with jazz styles. If they find improvising difficult perhaps they could improvise using one note only from the given pitches and then gradually add more notes to make something more melodic.

The way the target notes are printed tends to make students play the notes in the given order which may not be a good idea.You might like to suggest that they try different improvisations starting on different notes each time.

I hope this answers most of your questions. I personally do not think you need to have learnt loads of scales to be able to improvise. You can get good results from the pitches given.