Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Teachers Forum Student stuck in "positions"

Ok. I feel like I had a similar post before.

I have a transfer student I've been working with since September. She's in Alfred's Premier 2A (or is it B? the green ones!). Has been taking lessons for 3 or 4 years I think. 10 years old.

Problem? the book is starting to move around a bit on the keyboard, and she's stuck in "positions". For instance, "C Position", "D position", "E Position". I don't know where she got this from since I'm pretty sure Alfred's doesn't teach specific positions beyond C and G.

We are only working on 2 songs, max, per week, because it takes a long time to go through and learn every note. Her theory book is no help.

We are working on Christmas songs now. This is good. After playing Silent Night (and not moving her hands once), I asked her if it sounded like Silent Night. She said "No". I'm trying to seize this as an opportunity. If it doesn't sound right, let's figure out how to fix it. Same thing with Deck the Halls - I was able to utilize her "ear" to figure some things out. (Where does it sound wrong?)

She knows the notes! I ask her and she knows! I've even done "speed notes" (a bunch of notes on a page and I time her to see how many she can do in a minute)

Thoughts? Ideas?

If it took her "3 or 4 years" to get to Alfred Premier 2B, then don't expect her to get too far. That's slower than a crawl. She probably doesn't practice piano very much.

Demonstrate?

I don't really understand teaching from five-finger positions at all, especially because the methods that use it the most claim to teach reading effectively, but when students get used to positions they only read finger numbers, not notes!

I do understand that when a student gets accustomed to one way of learning, especially in the earliest stages, it can take the student a long time to break out of it into new ways of learning, especially if the student does not naturally get excited about new information and new challenges.

I disagree.

Students will read only finger numbers when either teacher write in for them or the editor of the book provide all for them. When finger numbers are not there, then they are forced to read the notes or to read in intervallic way (skip and step)

You have just described 90% of the kids who transferred to me from Suzuki teachers.

But your description of the 5-finger positions is not quite accurate. I think you're confusing books that came pre-printed with a godzillion finger numbers with books that emphasize intervallic reading.

Don't knock the Suzuki students! I was one for 4 years and I turned out just fine!

What do you mean "hand positions"?

My impression is that there is a distinct mental difference between thinking in terms of keyboard geography and thinking in terms of what the hand does.

So there's a difference in viewpoint, between how I get a finger, any finger, somewhere near the D key, and how I get my finger 2 to play a key, hopefully the D. One requires you to know where the key is, the other where the finger is.

Or maybe I've completely misunderstood.

That's the problem with some books (old Alfred, Bastien) because kids are so used to thinking fingers 1-5 in certain positions (middle C, C, F, G, D) and that's all the kids know to play.

There's really nothing wrong with teaching 5-finger hand positions (or pentascales), as long as you teach all of them, eventually, major and minor. That's what's covered in the CM Syllabus for levels Prep and One.