Hi everyone - been reading you guys for a while now so thought I would ask your all-knowing advice! :)
I often let my beginners cheat by using finger numbers and marking when the hand position moves. Has anyone else ever done this or is it generally regarded as a very bad thing to do ?!
(They gradually learn to read properly as well and are usually self sufficient by about GR2)
Here's hoping I'm not a complete cowboy! :D

Hi Carol - no, I don't think you're a cowboy at all. If your pupils are learning to read and becoming self sufficient at some point then you're clearly doing something right ! You may get a few ideas as to how you could perhaps encourage some of them to be independent sooner - if you wish - I'm always picking up new ideas from the forums.

Here are a few thoughts....

When a new beginner comes along for lessons, what he or she wants to do above all else - usually at least - is to play a tune. At this early stage I also "cheat" by using finger numbers. They go home thrilled that they can actually play something. Kids don't always say so - but you can tell. An adult beginner will often say - gosh, I didn't think I'd be able to play a tune after one lesson!

Obviously this "finger number" lark continues to some extent during the first book. Teachers vary here - some like to wean off sooner, some don't mind staying with numbers for longer. Kids vary too of course in how long they need the help of a few numbers. I personally prefer not to be using numbers by every note once a book is started, and I find ways of encouraging a pupil to look at the notes, look for steps and skips (2nds and 3rds) and even sometimes use a different hand position (eg playing a piece which uses DEFG starting with the thumb) so that finger numbers and notes don't become too inseparable. I try covering up the numbers with another book or sheet of paper in a lesson and monitor how "lost " they are - it's not worth upsetting a child who struggles, but we perhaps focus on one or two notes that they can recognise well and work from there.

I think the important word is "wean" though, and it can be a gradual process. I do a lot of work on note / pattern recognition, and I aim by about halfway through the first book to be using finger numbers on only the occasional note - with MOST pupils. There's always the child who needs help for longer. If the book has more numbers than I think we need, we snopake a few out. This is often done with the pupil's help; we look through and decide perhaps where the awkward corners are - often the start of a new line is a place where we leave the number in, especially if the note is one of the less familiar ones. I have a tippex "mouse" who likes to eat finger numbers, a young and not very confident kiddy will sometimes respond to the idea of a hungry mouse and will choose a few numbers for him to eat

My view for what it's worth is that the sooner a pupil is self-sufficient in note reading the sooner their practice takes off. If I can help a pupil to not need fingers numbers sooner, it seems worth doing. And yes, there are some who do need help in spotting when a "position" moves too.

I am also moving away from using FACE and EGBDF but that's another topic. But I'm convinced that unclear "keyboard geography" is one big reason why quite a few children give up around grades 1-2, maintaining that it's too hard. I'm always looking for ways to bridge the gap between knowing a few notes around middle C and having confidence to find one's way around the whole of the keyboard - I have a hunch that as far as note-reading goes, this is the key for most pupils; many who transfer to me from other teachers have not made this transition and have small pockets of knowledge that somehow don't quite join up. Those who are able to learn independently have generally got the idea and their reading can take off.

Hope this is useful for starters. You should get some interesting - and probably very different - replies.

Quite possibly, although I do not think replies should be too much different. There are many ways to fluent reading; anything that works is 'correct'.

carol*piano, maggiemay says it all for me.

Granted, I belong to the 'wean them off the numbers as soon as poss' school. In fact, I often do not even mention them utill I feel the student can cope without them, or they notice them themselves. Your way is different and sounds fine to me.

You do not sound like cowboy at all.

Steve

Thanks guys - it works for me and is good for kids who aren't ever going to get very far with the piano - this way they can just have fun with it and learn some cool tunes! :D

Dear Maggie and Steve,
If you do not use numbers hardly at all; do you restrict your beginners to only playing pieces featuring notes they know and if so does this not get boring?!
I think maybe I try and move things too quickly sometimes so my pupils (and me!) don't get bored :D
Carol :)

I tend to try to wean off finger numbers fairly quickly too as I have had a number of pupils come to me and think that middle C is called 1, D is called 2 and so on. And in one case my pupil was still slipping up nearly 6 months later even when I had really worked her hard on learning the note names - she had played with fingers to such an extent before that if you pointed to a note on the piano she would call it by a number not a name. But you'll find teachers do different things - and pupils are individuals (I think Steve and I agreed on this on a different thread on something else) - so despite what I would normally do with most pupils, I may find myself doing the complete opposite with one particular pupil if that's what was needed! So in a sense there's no hard and fast rule. Pupils need to watch both notes AND fingers at the same time anyway later on when hand position changes become the norm.

Thanks for your input chocolate dog :)
I certainly agree with the different approach for different pupils thing - though sometimes I feel a bit mean when being a lot harder on my more gifted pupils!
Carol :D

Good question - not exclusively, and sometimes a piece with unfamiliar notes can pave the way to learning those notes.

If I find a particular pupil getting a bit bogged down in pieces with the same notes in, we might do something by ear or by rote to add variety. Perhaps transpose a familar piece into another key.

I use books that gradually introduce new notes, starting from middle C and working outwards. I stress reading the direction and distance, rather than the note names; names are there for when the pupil gets stuck and needs to work them out.

Hope this helps

Steve

Steve - can I ask which books you use? (Only if you are happy to say - don't want to nick your trade secrets!! :D )

No trade secrets. Everybody around here knows what I use.

My farourite is Johb Thompson Easiest Piano Course. With younger or less able pupils I supplement this with Fanny Waterman's Me And My Piano because, guess what - loads of finger numbers because then the kids can cheat on the reading

This is not as inconsistent as it seems. They are still being forced to read by JT. The FW is there to provide some easy learning material to boost confidence.

Otheres here like Tunes For 10 Fingers. The Chester books often get mentioned. The Carol Barratt books often feature.

By-the-by, Carol, as an extra boost to confidence. I said earlier that you do not seem like a cowboy to me. I could have added that cowboys do not post, 'Am I doing OK' threads.

Steve

Thanks Steve :)
I have actually been teaching for over 10 years now but still sometimes feel like a fraud!! Am always full though and usually have a waiting list - mostly I think because I'm also a ballet pianist and general accompanist about town so people know I can play!! :D

Hey, I am an accompanist about town and was a ballet pianist during my student days.

I did another brief spell as a dance accompanist for some exams about 10 years ago. Times had changed; there was no rehearsal time and the tap classes were incomprehensible. The examiner annoyed me so much with her peremptory demands and expressions of irritations as I took 2 seconds to find the page headed something-incomprehensible-or-other in a book full-of-something-incomprehensible-or-other, that I never did another session. Neither will I.

In another exam, this irritating woman kept demanding that I play a song that I had never heard from some blasted musical I had never heard of, then demanded to know why, "I didn't know the standard classical song repertoire." She nearly blew a gasket when I offered to let her pick a concerto of her choice to play instead. Thankfully, my gamble proved correct; she was unaware that concertos cannot be played at the drop of a hat by any other than a world class virtuoso

Steve

Tap and modern examiners were always the worst - I don't do that any more!
I can play the RAD ballet syllabus in my sleep though
Generally I like being an accompanist about town but sometimes I feel I should specialise more

Specialising has its advantages. I did this for 20 years when my wife and I lived close to Oldham (England, if you are not from the UK).

10 years ago we moved away. 6 years ago we settled in our rural village in North Notts, miles from nowhere. Since then I have been the 'accompanist about town'. I will never forget the week that I was performing Beethoven's 4th piano concerto on Sundy night, then accompanying kiddies choir concerts of Disney songs for the rest of it. Boy, but how were the mighty fallen?

Haven't actually said 'no' to anything since, and am not sure where I would draw the line. Actually, I do. I would refuse to accompany the local over 70's community choir.

Or would I?

In my experience those who rely more on finger numbers would not cope with notes they don't know as they would not know where to begin without being told every time.

Am from UK - sleepy rural Dorset
Anything to do with playing at old peoples home generally mind numbing - mind you young peoples choirs can be just as bad!
I like swapping between styles - keeps the brain active

I used to take 'A' level students to play in old peoples' homes. The residents would loll apparently uninterested in their chairs. Some would chat. Others would wander in and out. Applause there was none.

Then, a few days later, we would receive a letter from the home owner\manager saying that the residents had talked of nothing since and when could we do a return visit.

Last Christmas, I was daft enough to say yes to a request to go and accompany a nursery Nativity. On arriving, I said, "Point me to the piano."

"We haven't got a piano" came back the reply. I reminded them what I had come to do. "Oh, we have a keyboard" came back the reply.

You guessed it. Remember those Bontempi that sold for about 25 pence for Christmas about 20 years ago. It was one of those.

Undaunted, I sat on the nursery chair with keyboard on lap and asked, with naive expectance, "Got any dots?". Incomprehension. "Music?" Incomprehension. "Never mind, I'll cope."

Those 5 years training primary school choirs at the start of my career came to the rescue again.

Steve

I am a dab hand at nursery rhymes and xmas carols without music now - actually it's been good for me as I used to be surgically attatched to sheet music!!
Incidently, do you get paid for things like that? Do you charge your going rate or cheaper? Do you ever risk doing freebies cos then everyone wants one!
Sorry to be harrassing you with endless questions

Course not. It is nice to chat. Actually, I cannot do 'small talk' and become tongue-tied with strangers. The intervals in between my postings here are roughly the same as those in between my turgid attempts at conversation. The kids look at me in amazement when I say I could never go to a party, especially if they have watched me perform

What I charge for these things depends on who, what an why. I did the nativity (twice) because the nursery owner met me when he engaged me to be the accompanist at a music festival he was running in Gainsborough. From that, I am teaching his son and five other 'recommends'. I know who my friends are, si I did it for nothing.

Asked to stand in somewhere in an emergency, I will want at least what I shall lose from not teaching that night, plus say 50% for inconvenience. EVerybody is happy, especially me if I can rearrange my teaching schedule.

I charge nothing for accompanying my pianists when they take exams on other instruments - builds up goodwill that I can tap into whenever I need to mess around with peoples' schedules. For examination accompaniment with non-pupil candidates, I charge the entry fee (+50% for grade 8 to reflect the extra prep I usually have to do).

Steve

Thanks Steve - I'm afraid I got a bit over-excited finding this forum and someone who works in a similar way to me (though infinitely more competant I'm sure ) I guess it is exclusively a pianist thing and indeed a pianist who lives in a relatively small town thing.
I like the flexibility, especially now I have a 5 year old daughter which is a good excuse not to work as many hours as I used to!
It's not such a problem if musisians aren't great socially (I am generally anti-social ) as we never have any free evenings to go out anyway - it's not a job condusive to an active social life!!
Carol

I wonder if it is a musician thing - I enjoy parties but only if I know a lot of people there - I'm definitely not good at conversing with strangers, especially if put on the spot and introduced to someone!

Hey Chocolate Dog that is exactly like me -spooky! I am super confident when playing the piano though
Maybe I can only manage confidence in one area of life?!

*puts back of hand to forehead* It's because we give our all to our art. *sighs dramatically* We have nothing left to give to anything else.

It a performers thing....

Actor, dancers even clowns can have the same problem. Although a lot of good actors get around it by putting themselves into a character when they meet people.

I know there are exception to this but they only prove the rule!!

I felt a lot better a couple of years ago, when a bitingly funny 'alternative' comedian confessed to spending parties sat in a corner reading a magazine.

Steve

No no no no!!!!!!
Do not do it!
Not trying to have a go, but I have learned from experience that this can cause great problems with note reading later on, and makes sight reading a real struggle.
I even scrub out most of the finger numbers in their books with a black biro-especially in the Fanny Waterman books, where there are far too many, in my opinion.
I have several pupils who learned this way and then had to 're-learn' to read music at about grade 2, using the 'FACE' and 'Every good boy...' rhymes etc.
They got really demoralised, and I lived in fear that one of their other instrumental teachers or music teachers at school would notice, and question how I had been teaching them for the last few years.
It is easier to be strict on them from the start than to fix it all later.

I have several pupils who learnt using 'FACE' and 'EGCDF' , came to me confused, and have had to re-learn / find other ways of reading music even at pre-grade one level.

Incidentally I almost never use ink in any of my pupil's books. To remove finger numbers I use snopake or tippex (so it stays neat) and for other marks I use pencil which can be removed if not needed.

In absolute desperation occasionally I will use a highlighter.

Have you tried Snopake Index tab highlighters? Little flourescent coloured film tabs that stick on like post-it notes. I got the idea from a piano teacher I know. You can stick them over any awkward bits, even write on them if necessary, and peel them off when the danger has passed.

The students love them, but I find I'm using the pink ones up much faster than the other colours because I teach teenaged girls and that's the colour nearly all of them ask for.

No - I haven't but will look out for them next time I'm in a stationer's.
Thank you!