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A good little article on teaching sight reading:
http://www.music.sc.edu/ea/keyboard/ppf/1.2/1.2.PPFke.research.html

Teaching Sight-Reading at the Piano: Methodology and Significance
by Dianne Hardy

Research on Sight-Reading

A majority of experimental research into the area of sight-reading has dealt with studies of a visual nature, an area that is observable in a way that the kinesthetic and aural are not. Young (1971) found that successful sight-readers have more progressive and regressive fixations on the music than unsuccessful sight-readers. Students need to read patterns and phrases rather than perceive notes individually and it is important to teach students to think notes in groups, as well as see them. One's ability to play with speed depends upon organizing thinking in such a way that it will flow rapidly and unhampered. The eye should move forward to notice details in advance of the playing. Bozone (1981) and Giles (1983) established that better readers grasped patterns of as many as six notes in a fixation. Haug (1991) noticed that the quick eye fixations of accomplished sight-readers allowed more complex scanning of music. Successful readers fixate all areas of chords simultaneously (Young, 1971) and group patterns or melodies into fewer chunks than poor readers; therefore, they are able to retain more in their short-term memory, which reduces the memory load. They also use higher musical structures when grouping than less successful readers (Halpern and Bower, 1982).

Further evidence that knowledge of musical structure affects sight-reading ability was presented by Sloboda (1982) and Wolf (1976) who found that good sight-readers tended to overlook musical errors if they did not meet the criteria that the pianist set up about how the music should sound. Wolf presented an actual case history, documented by Goldowsky, involving a misprint in Brahm's Capriccio, Opus 76, No. 2. After being overlooked by pattern readers who had corrected the note mentally, the mistake was discovered by a poor reader who read note-by-note.

Sloboda (1976) cited in Stebelton, in a similar study using music that had been altered, found that changes in the middle of phrases were the least detected, while alterations that began and ended phrases were detected best. He also investigated pattern recognition with musicians and non-musicians and found that musicians retained more information than non-musicians. Stebelton (1987) said that this finding supported the theory that overall contour or global information precedes detailed information in perceptual processing at brief exposure.

These findings indicate that the study of music theory should be carefully and systematically incorporated into piano study, particularly as it applies to the specific music being studied, either as repertoire or reading material. A good sight-reader continuously draws upon past experience in recognizing musical symbols and as long as the symbols are familiar, they may be read without hesitation because they are grounded in the student's memory. Readers must be acquainted with the meaning behind the symbols also. Each group of notes is read in positional relationship to the surrounding notes within the harmonic structure of the composition, so an awareness of repeated note patterns, phrases, chords, rhythmic groupings, themes - in short, the organic structure of the music - is essential to good reading.

Other visual studies have found the following: the reading span varies with the type of reading material used, as does the organization of the eye movements (Buegel, 1981) cited in Stebelton. The duration of the visual fixation increases as the musical selection gets more complex (Van Nuys and Weaver, 1943). Increased memory span depends upon improvement in understanding the pitch patterns or melodic segments of a piece, while increasing the rate of reading depends on improvement in one's ability to group rhythmic figures. Visual perception is affected by the spatial relationship of notes and the fewer times a student looks down at the keyboard while reading, the better the sight-reading will be (Fuszek, 1977).

Eaton (1978), cited in Hardy, examined the role of the tactile sense in sight-reading, identifying the sense as being the ability to locate notes on the instrument without looking at the hands. His sight-reading test measured note reading, psychomotor, and memorization skills and indicates that keyboard psychomotor skill is the most important factor in sight-reading achievement with note reading being second and years of experience third in importance. The tactile sense develops through the acquisition of keyboard technique. The famous teacher, Joseph Lhevinne (1972) advocated technical training for developing tactile feeling of the keyboard. He said that practicing scales greatly facilitates sight-reading because the hand leans instinctively to the most logical fingering. Hilley (1977) suggests that locating notes in relation to the black keys and feeling for intervals develops the visualization of the topography of the keyboard, which in turn, improves tactile facility. Along the same line, Novak (1968), cited in Hardy, recommends teaching students to see notation, grasp it in the air and then play it on the keyboard. Additional means of developing the feel for the keyboard are transposing and playing with the eyes closed (Dumn, 1984).

Many studies have been conducted concerning the reading of rhythm. Elliott (1982) categorized many types of sight-reading errors and found 70 percent to be rhythm errors. Rhythm durations can be grouped into patterns and several models have been proposed to explain how rhythmical patterns are perceived. A proposal by Lonquet-Higgins (1978), cited in Hardy, using rhythmic structures by the barlines and the beams connecting eighth and sixteenth notes, show that the most important factors in determining the metrical hypotheses are the lengths of notes and where they occur in relation to the beat.

Sloboda (1976) found a tendency for readers to relax momentarily at the phrase boundaries, thereby interrupting the rhythmic pulse. Lowder (1983) documented that pitch errors are usually accompanied by rhythmic errors, especially at the bar line while Hughes and Watkins, (1986) in using a tape-recorded soloist for subjects were able to raise rhythm accuracy scores of sight-readers. Boyle (1968) improved rhythmic reading skills in students by utilizing bodily movement. Teachers need to help students achieve a sense of forward motion toward rhythmic points, such as the strong beats at the bar line and the crest of the phrase. While the eye is taking in details of what is coming, there is the necessity to remember what has just been observed; so sight-reading is, in this sense playing from memory. Strict rhythm must be observed and students need to be told to keep the basic beat at all costs because pausing or correcting note errors is not acceptable. Instead good reading involves a rapid and sure grasp of the meaning and sweep of the phrase, rather than a painful note-by-note accuracy. Ahrens and Atkinson (1966) quoted Sir Ernest MacMillan as saying: "Good sight-reading is nine-tenths rhythm and one-tenth notes". Teachers can have students sight-read with the aid of a metronome, as it will force the student acquire skill in keeping the basic pulse.

Several researchers investigated the importance of a well-developed ear as an aid to sight-reading. Auditory imagery is present in the music reading process and it increases efficiency in sight-reading. Aural imagery is a technique of translating notes into sound as one reads ahead in the music and students can be taught to do aural imaging as they pre-study a piece before attempting to sight-read it. Luce (1958), cited in Hardy,discovered a significant relationship between sight-reading and ear-playing with students while Bozone (1986) and Cutietta (1979) found sight-singing to help the sight-reading process. MacKnight (1975) showed tonal pattern instruction in teaching initial note reading, to be superior to note identification teaching techniques when developing both sight-reading skills and auditory-visual discriminatory skills. She suggests an intervallic or directional reading approach because of the stress on note relationships, one to another.

Many authors point out the advantages of directional or intervallic reading over note identification reading citing the carry-over into the development of sight-reading skill (Chronister, 1990; Dumn, 1984). They argue that music reading is not music spelling and that intervallic reading develops aural imagery in the relationship of the sounds. Richards (1967) maintains that students taught by note naming usually have a more mechanical note-for-note sound in their performance, while pianists taught by intervals possess a greater sense of musical flow in playing meaningful groups of notes.

Grandiloquent stating of the obvious ... reading note patterns rather than individual notes ... but not an inkling of how to readily identify the patterns ... "there's the rub".

Thanks rintin, an excellent link.

Thank you greatly, rintincop,

I enjoyed this link so much - actually I was thrilled to read it.

It verified for me, that these many years of teaching have helped me find what the "experts" are circling in on as essential.

This article really speaks to me and it was a unique thing for it to appear here and help me realize that teaching is a sense of direction, a growth process, an application of important sequences and patterns in our training.

The body-mind connection and all the learning styles makes great sense.

And, yes, good teaching should be most achievable by being eager and curious about what is happening in the music teaching world around us.

If anything in this article is not already in your "bag of tricks" please take the time to continue exploring the ideas that are unfamiliar to you. I'm lucky in that my schedule has always included daily reading time.

The transfer of things about teaching has to come from within, or transfer to within from what we learn from others.

Really good inspiration and clarification here!

So, rintincop, what else do you have up your sleeve?

Betty

Several researchers investigated the importance of a well-developed ear as an aid to sight-reading. Auditory imagery is present in the music reading process and it increases efficiency in sight-reading. Aural imagery is a technique of translating notes into sound as one reads ahead in the music and students can be taught to do aural imaging as they pre-study a piece before attempting to sight-read it. Luce (1958), cited in Hardy,discovered a significant relationship between sight-reading and ear-playing with students while Bozone (1986) and Cutietta (1979) found sight-singing to help the sight-reading process. MacKnight (1975) showed tonal pattern instruction in teaching initial note reading, to be superior to note identification teaching techniques when developing both sight-reading skills and auditory-visual discriminatory skills. She suggests an intervallic or directional reading approach because of the stress on note relationships, one to another.
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Can someone translate this? I'm sure there's something useful in it, but I don't quite see it.

Thanks!

this article is totally against gyro's principles...

Really helpful to me. As I tried to focus on recognizing chord shapes on a score, my ability to read has improved.

AZNPiano, it is saying you need to hear the music in your head BEFORE you hear your fingers produce it.

AZN asked: “Can someone translate this? I'm sure there's something useful in it, but I don't quite see it.”

That’s because this section it about aural development of “to hear” combined with visual (to see) and tactile (touch - to sense or feel) for sight reading AND sight singing.

BP: Create a vocabulary – add yours to mine:
Ear Hearing Audio Audiation Auditory Acoustic Pitch Voice Pitching Solfege

BP: I’m finding the main thoughts and removing extraneous words from the document. I am also capitalizing important categories or subjects or thoughts. (I’m sorry about that, but I am working for my own edification and also trying to use this document as a section to communicate (summarize) for other teachers who might have trouble grasping and following the text. This is the way I work when editing and reorganizing.)

Statements are reduced for simplification of thought:

A WELL-DEVELOPED “EAR” IS AN AID TO SIGHT-READING

AUDITORY IMAGERY
1) IS A TECHNIQUE OF TRANSLATING NOTES INTO SOUND
2) IS PRESENT IN THE MUSIC READING PROCESS
3) INCREASES EFFICIENCY IN SIGHT-READING

STUDENTS CAN BE TAUGHT TO DO AURAL IMAGING as they PRE-STUDY a piece BEFORE attempting to sight-read it.

BP: Difference of opinion:
Clarification on…..”ONE READS AHEAD IN THE MUSIC”…..(from the document)
This is something I disagree with because I use a laser like beam of vision on the music page of the notes appearing in the present moment, and my eyes process the page by moving ahead at a steady rate of speed according to the tempo of the piece. All things coming up in the next measure of music are picked up as non-specific movement of distance and direction, also the texture, but are not specific notes to be played until I get there. Phrasing is also noted slightly ahead.

To me, eye movement training is important early on in the beginner music reading process. If it has never been addressed with you, it is not too late to work with it, but habits in place will resist a change, patience is required, you cannot change it just by demand, it is a learned behavior..

Many, many pianists prefer to read ahead. Those who are already sight reading adequately should probably continue in the way they have learned

Restatements:
Luce (1958)
DISCOVERED A SIGNIFICANT RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SIGHT-READING and EAR-PLAYING (ie, “playing by ear”)

Bozone (1986) and Cutietta (1979)
SIGHT-SINGING HELPS THE SIGHT-READING PROCESS

MacKnight (1975)
1) TONAL PATTERN INSTRUCTION IS SUPERIOR TO NOTE IDENTIFICATION TEACHING TECHNIQUES IN TEACHING INITIAL NOTE READING
2) Develop SIGHT-READING SKILLS
3) Develop AUDITORY-VISUAL DISCRIMINATORY SKILLS
4) Suggests using an INTERVALLIC OR DIRECTIONAL READING APPROACH because of the stress on note relationships, one to another.

BP: You could create your own outline and do research on things aural.
See: GIA
See: Edwin Gordon
See: Audiation

Betty

Especially, as Betty has noted: 'Cutietta (1979) found sight-singing to help the sight-reading process.'

And I find singing in general a great help to solve "technical" problems.

If I can't get a piece of polyphonic music learned -- often because of LH deficiencies -- making myself first sing the difficult voice alone, then sing while playing the others, and then sing while playing all mysteriously solves my "technical" difficulty.

For me sight reading is about being able to imagine a style & emotion & sound in one's head automatically from all those funny black ink squiggles and then reproduce it on the fly. Being able to sight sing is the ultimate litmus test for sight reading. If you can't imagine it, you can't play it.

One of the things you get from singing the pitches is that your body "rides" with the note in every way. You realize it's a lift for higher notes and a "drop" for lower notes - and it has a physical depth to it when YOU sing it not just finger it into being.

This is how I teach basic dynamics - crescendos and dimuendoes - when singing they occur naturally, and you also feel them in attack and release of consonants (using words), and in tension-relaxation while progressing through the phrase.

To be a good pianist and a good accompanist, it helps to have the experience of what a soloist (singer or instrumentalist) is coping with in the production of lyrics and pitch.

Articulation is very, very voice-like. It should be taught early on instead of waiting for upper levels and the master classics and performance pieces.

When I play I hear an orchestra (sometimes) or a vocalist (frequently) as a "side effect" of how I articulate, phrase, and express the music on the piano. I'm not just imagining it, because I have been told that's what listeners are hearing too. I think it's because I did a lot of choral accompanying, solo voice and instrument accompanying, had a voice teacher for a piano teacher, and an orchestra teacher for a piano teacher. These things wore off on me.

So sing more than you do. Don't worry if you sing like Kermit the Frog, he's adorable in his own right, if you don't mind wearing green all the time.

Betty

Sorry chaps ... it's all froth ... no substance to help the average bloke identify complete note patterns over individual notes ... the system of
notation is notoriously plagued by bad signals ... which prevent the ready identification of note patterns ... even more daunting is the dopey theory to convert a conjectured wobbly visual image into some vague aural photograph.

But with respect ... all the pedantic bleat is mere flotsam and jetsam.

Here's a reminder of a Nat King Cole's hit "Unforgettable" (Irving Gordon) to act as an example of what Joe Soap might like to master at his grand ... and ask the learned gentry how they would conjure a solid note pattern image from a notation liberally garnished with

1. Neume symbols whose visual image does not match the duration
2. Phrases which include triplets, dotted notes, sharps and flats
3. Split LH and RH staves which vary the octave location of notes
4. Measures which vary in width relative to note complexity

Who’s fooling who? It’s all done with mirrors!!

web page

As a student I find it amazing that sight-reading is still taught using 19th century technology.

From everything I'm reading above, sight-reading is essentially musical speed-reading! Nothing new to me here. However, when I went through a required course in speed-reading in high school, there was quite a bit of supportive material to help with mastering this skill, and this was in the 1970s! Now, I can just imagine how much support material is available in the way of tapes, programs, etc.

It seems to me that sight-reading would benifit greatly from both dvds and computer programs that train the eye motion and also implement a steady tempo through the score. I've seen people mention one program for sight-reading, but I'm not sure if it is designed using the same techniques as we used in speed-reading training.

Rich

Rich, your absolutely right - especially with today's technology.

Could it be so simple that we start with one line and one line at a time add a line until we have 5 lines. We get "free" spaces by doing this. ("Horizontal, equidistant, lines building upward"). A Music Staff without clefs or symbols.

Line 1 _______

Line 2 _______
Line 1 _______(Space 1)

Line 3 _______
Line 2 _______(Space 2)
Line 1 _______(Space 1)


Line 4 _______
Line 3 _______(Space 3)
Line 2 _______(Space 2)
Line 1 _______(Space 1)

Line 5 _______
Line 4 _______(Space 4)
Line 3 _______(Space 3)
Line 2 _______(Space 2
Line 1 _______(Space 2

Let this sink in and ask them to draw and label lines and spaces after you have demonstrated them. Do not yet apply letter names. Do eye training on identifying what the student is seeing until he's proficient, then add a 2nd Music Staff and put the clefs together showing Middle C's location (one clef per hand! show treble is above Middle C, show bass is below Middle C.

Stop. No other information. You want the student to identify notes on the staff first of all by clef - Bass or Treble/(RH/LH)/Line numbers 1-2-3-4-5 or Space numbers 1-2-3-4.

This is a first step to presenting notation on the Music Staff.

However, there have been previous steps building and working with the musical alphabet before the lines and spaces appear. A-B-C-D-E-F-G (reverse)F-E-D-C-B-A.

Then finding the 2 black keys with "D in the middle" C-D-E. And, 3 black keys (a continuation) F-G-A-B. Finding all same note names all over the keyboard by visual and aural association. (Notice the sound being alike by higher and lower) All "A's" etc.

Without KEYBOARD ORIENTATION and a MUSIC STAFF ORIENTATION we are asking a lot of our students (adults too) to be able to get letter names right on the staff and find their keyboard locations.

You need to get them participating as though they were the inventor of these systems and could explain/teach this to someone else.

How do other teachers handle this?

Betty

You’ve taken us all back to basics Betty,

But the real issue is how to identify complete note patterns rather than dawdle with the slow recognition of individual notes.

All the big-wigs go on about sight-reading on a broader scale ... BUT DON’T SAY HOW.

btb:

Yes, reading my spatial relationships by distance between intervals and direction.
(Up/Down/Same notes compared to the previous note or group of notes).

We did not yet put notes on these 5 Lines and 4 Spaces. I think it's important to really see the lines and spaces as totally empty until you finish the building.

Then put one note at a time on one line as in my previous posting above and play with it by calling it every letter A - G; the supposition is that if the line is G the space below would be F and the space above would be G. If the one line is B, then A and C. "If ----- then ------". (Good "game".) Make up your own variations.

"HOW TO sight read on a broader scale...." is: 1) Comparing movement in direction and distance. The hand follows the movement. If the distance between two notes is a 7th, the hand opens to a 7th, easily finding the notes needed.

2) Then there are larger chords having notes in common, the notes that are the same location may/may not need a change in fingering. The 1 & 5 fingers of both hands do the framework - longest distance, and the 2-3-4 take their places as necessary on the inner notes.

3) Learn to read by adjacent (conjunct) notes ("neighbors" 5 finger positions and scale work)

4) Then read by adjacent spaces or adjacent line in 3rds, then in 5ths, 7th's. (Disjunct)

5) Then recognize intervals that are 4th and 6th and 8ths. (Also Disjunct)

(See if you can find the patterns). Intervals can be read in melodic or harmonic patterns.

6) When playing hands together read the chord from the bottom note of the bass clef up to the top of the highest treble note. Expand or contract fingers as necessary to create the hand position to play it (up in the air above the keys).

7) Then there are rhythm patterns that help you read and do the counting by establishing what the patterns are.

Is any of this helping?

Betty

Sorry, the question was loaded Betty,

I have long since sorted out the instant recognition of note patterns ... but don’t believe it can be readily done using traditional notation ... simply because the antiquated score gives a visually distorted image of music ... so distorted that it is necessary ... preparatory to playing ... to call on supportive aural faculties to convert the neume symbols into some sort of fuzzy image ... reaching out like a blind man tap-tapping his way.

Only when we are presented with an accurate visual image of the pitch and duration of notes (in graphic linear format) is it possible to capture the true shape of note patterns ... and their part in building the structure of music.

btb, can I just assist you here by paraphrasing what you said?

I have long since sorted out the instant recognition of note patterns = "I have worked out my own notation system which works for me but don't hold your breaths waiting for me to give you an example of it"
but don’t believe it can be readily done using traditional notation = "but I can't do this myself with traditional notation"
simply because the antiquated score gives a visually distorted image of music = "simply because I personally don't seem to understand it"
so distorted that it is necessary ... preparatory to playing ... to call on supportive aural faculties to convert the neume symbols into some sort of fuzzy image = "and I show I don't by not realising that the notation actually represents sound"

Or have I misunderstood you totally?

Nice shooting currawong,
Your between-the-lines paraphrasing was half right.

1. Hit a Battleship
2. Hit a Crusier
3. Deep blue sea
4. Deep blue sea

Excuse the "Battleships" jargon ... a hangover from a game with the grandchildren .