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Teaching piano to DD at home - book recommendations pls

9 replies

twosmallbuttons · 18/02/2015 14:24

DD (4.5) has expressed an interest in learning to play the piano. Her older cousin (8yo) has rapidly gone up the grades and she now hears him play lovely pieces. DH plays when he can on our piano at home.

It's too soon for a proper teacher so can people recommend suitable books to help me & DH get her started at home? I've read some reviews of books on Amazon that warn about American terminology, so I'm keen to get it right!
Thanks

OP posts:
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UptoapointLordCopper · 18/02/2015 20:26

I taught my DS using Me and My Piano and Chester's Easiest Piano Course. He liked it and we finished Book 2 before he started lessons with a "proper" teacher...

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TheFirstOfHerName · 18/02/2015 20:34

I taught DS1 at home for a year using the 'Tunes for Ten Fingers' books, because the piano teacher at school had a long waiting list. When he started proper lessons, she said he had already made two terms worth of progress.

Friends have used the books by John Thomas.

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Ferguson · 19/02/2015 19:27

I think the second person to reply probably means JOHN THOMPSON, and I will give some links in a moment.

However, I have replied on this topic many times, so if you Search MN with my name, and piano, keyboard, music theory you will find several items that may help.

Progress will partly depend on how much you or Dad know about music, and can impart that information to DD.

I often compare learning music to the way Numeracy is taught in some schools; children learn a set of instructions, and can perform items with reasonable accuracy, but often the UNDERSTANDING of the subject is overlooked.

John Thompson's Easiest Piano Course, is a good system for younger children. It is probably much cheaper from:

www.bookdepository.com/

However, there is also an accompanying CD, so that may not be included, at the cheapest prices. The CD IS included at the Yamaha Music site:

www.yamahamusiclondon.com/

And here is a host of other possibilities:

www.musicroom.com/browse/genre.aspx?category_id=store6_arrangementgroup5_arrangement61_genre58

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Ferguson · 19/02/2015 19:40

If you look a bit further down, there is a similar thread with a lot more information from a professional music teacher, concerning a family living in Africa.

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ShellingPeasAgain · 19/02/2015 22:10

Piano teacher here. I'd recommend the Piano Adventures series and would look at My First Piano Adventures for a 4 1/2 year old. It works off stave for the first book so introduces note reading by direction and interval rather than using a fixed hand position based with both thumbs on middle C. This means the children learn to read music by looking at the relative distances between notes (eg 2nds, 3rds, 4ths) and whether they move up or down rather than relying on finger numbers. They also get to explore all over the keyboard and improvise too. The series has some good website support as well, for both MFPA and the Piano Adventures Primer series which is aimed at slightly older children, say 6/7.

It is a US publication so the MFPA books do use US terminology but there's nothing to stop you from saying a quarter note is also known as a crotchet or whatever. This doesn't seem to confuse my students at all. The Piano Adventures Primer book also come as an international version (lesson and theory books combined) which do use UK terms.

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Wisteria36 · 22/03/2015 11:02

Am a music teacher, but don't normally teach piano. However I'm teaching my ds (5) using My First Piano Adventures and it's great. We are about half way through the practical book and will probably order the writing book too soon. The American terms haven't been a problem, we just translate where necessary. In some ways the American names make more sense to children as quarter note and whole note for example are easier to relate to each other than crotchets and semibreves which are tricky words for small children to understand.

Things I love about MFPA are: most pieces have a teacher duet part; there is lots of use of the extremes of the piano and both white and black notes rather than just a fixed area around middle c (which is how I learnt as a child); lots of hand position exercises and black note tunes to reinforce; ds likes the cd backings though these drive me a bit crazy after a while!

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Worriedandlost · 24/03/2015 00:12
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JulieMichelleRobinson · 27/03/2015 14:23

Music for Little Mozarts, from Alfred's - I use this with students from reception to around year 2. There are four books in the series, with full notation appearing about halfway through book two and hands together playing (very basic) in book three. It is quite expensive if you buy absolutely everything - cuddly toys, special bag, CDs, twelve books (in total), flashcards and supplementary books available. However, it works so well with that age group that all the parents I work with have been happy to buy the whole set (not all the toys, just Mozart Mouse and Beethoven Bear). It's an American thing so uses American terminology, you'd have to buy it online, and it moves quite slowly but I find that at such a young age the speed is about right.

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JulieMichelleRobinson · 27/03/2015 14:31

Oh, I also use neither American nor European terminology at that age - I talk about "note", "long note" and "ve-ry long note" and how many counts things are.

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