Aural tests in child who cannot sing.

My DS finds that he can hum more in tune than sing.

Wow, broken11girl, I think you may need to get some perspective on this.
Plenty of pupils get distinctions without doing well on the singing part of aurals. It's really not quite as urgent as you seem to be suggesting, and being rude to people isn't helping your cause.

Pls be excused my (rather crap) English Whowhatwhy, I am completely non-musical, I meant for my daughter.

Hi, hope you can help me.
My DD can’t remember clap part, how to improve this part? Singing low part is a bit weak as well, she always forget the last note.

A member of my family is a professional pianist, he was a Cambridge organ scholar, then conservatoire educated; he now teaches at one, in fact. He can’t sing in tune. So vocal and musical ability are definitely separate!

I am a music teacher and have only had one student like this, who couldn’t pitch match her voice to a heard melody.

I once heard an expert on supposed ‘tone deafness’ advise a teacher to try and match their voice to the singer as a first step, rather than trying to get the singer to match to them or a piano. Then they can hear and feel what it like to be in tune. From there they can try going one note up or down together, so that the singer calibrates and gains more control over their vocal apparatus

Greenleve you repeatedly use the word "we" when talking about your child's result and exams. You do understand that the mark your child got isn't yours don't you?

Broken11Girl, I think most people are posting to let the OP know that they are focussing on the wrong thing.

If you think how hard it is to teach the singing part of aural to very young children -as opposed to telling them to

make sure to put dynamics in the pieces,

or evenness of tone in the scales -

or even just "plough through the sight reading - don't stop and restart"

and you are talking about the same sort of mark levels.

DD did grade 4 clarinet last year, after getting a new teacher. Previous teachers hadn't even mentioned singing whereas this teacher realised early on that DD couldn't do it so did lots of practice with her. She also spent time focussing on other parts of aural with aim of doing very well in other parts to compensate. We also practiced at home (although as I too can't sing in tune I'm not sure I was very good at working out whether DD was!) Whilst DD didn't do brilliantly in the aural, there was a huge improvement from where she started. DD has previously only got passes (including one where she just scraped through) and this time got a merit, and it was basically down to improving the aural. As a PP said, if you can get the rhythm etc right then the fact that the notes are off-key is less of an issue. So even at Grade 4 it's not a total disaster if can't sing, but with practice it can be improved, and can largely compensate with other parts of aural.

0 - no work offered

That would mean no work offered for any of the aural tests not just one of the elements.

You can always tweet ABRSM and I'm sure they'd clear this up.

I was attempting to give the OP advice specific to Grade 1, which would be to just have a reasonable attempt, or to play the test on the violin instead. The examples I gave from my teaching practice in recent years were also grade 1s. Nobody ever failed grade 1 aural because of singing out of tune. I can see I'm making things worse so I will bow out now, and perhaps check with one of my two ABRSM examiner acquaintances if anybody is that interested.

I dont know how the marking work exactly, we have taken various tests for both violin and piano from prep test to grade 7. There were times we got distictions, many times got merit and only had a pass one. I had just checked our aural test and our results varied from 12-14. And as I mentioned earlier we refused point blank to any singing related however still perform other sections within aural tests.

I'm saying this because OP's DD needs to work on this NOW or get several marks lower than she actually deserves imo. As has been said, singing ability isn't the same as musical ability and if you think it is you are telling me and those DC they're shit musicians and csn DFOD.
THERE IS NO 4 MARKS FOR SINGING. IT IS SUBJECTIVE BUT UP TO HALF OF THE MARKS.

I know what I'm talking about, thanks.
Floot that is not correct. The actual proportion of the aural that is singing depends on the grade, eg in g4 you have to sing back a melody and sight sing as well as clap back a rhythm and answer questions about the style and character of a piece, so singing makes up about half of it.
Well done Waffle then you know that your statement that singing is literally worth 4 marks out of 150 is incorrect. I just don't believe that your pupils who refused to sing got 14 and those who can't sing but had a go got 15-16. If you refer to the actual abrsm markscheme above, 14 is strengths outweigh weaknesses, 15-16 is strengths significantly outweigh weaknesses. Frankly that gives far too much opportunity to be subjective to the examiner, and some will give singing more weight than others. Many will just dismiss candidates who can't sing.
So

The aural tests are made up of 3 or 4 little tests per grade, and at grade 1 only one of these involves singing so, just to echo others, it is not the full 18 marks at stake.

The singing will come in time. Lots of singing at home, join the choir at school (as long as it's inclusive) and whatever you do don't let on how terrible they are as lack of confidence makes it much worse to teach them. A good teacher should be doing a little bit of singing in most lessons. It is a useful device in lots of ways, not only for getting the exam marks.

Broken it IS given a general mark, but I have entered around 400 children for these tests, and they usually get the rest of the aural right. So my singing refusers (I don't have many) got around 14, and those that sang anything at all got 15-16. One boy last year who could sing the correct shape and rhythm but in the wrong key got 17. The point of my post was really to show that the singing aspect is a TINY bit of the exam and not worth tying oneself in knots about. I didn't enjoy it, so always played it on my clarinet instead.

I think what Waffle is saying is that the singing part is only 1/4 of the aural tests, so that the maximum you can lose on it is 4 marks, and that would only be if you offered no response at all.

Singing ability is definitely not the same as pitch- I'm the same as your DC OP & mamma

I'm genuinely confused now, as I understand it the aural test isn't subdivided but given an overall mark.

Here: gb.abrsm.org/en/exam-support/your-guide-to-abrsm-exams/how-we-mark-exams/

^Grades 1-8

Accuracy, musical perception and awareness, security of responses.

Mark
Aural tests

Distinction
17–18

Accurate throughout
Musically perceptive
Confident response

Merit
15–16

Strengths significantly outweigh weaknesses
Musically aware
Secure response

Pass
12-14

Strengths just outweigh weaknesses
Cautious response

Below Pass
9-11

Weaknesses outweigh strengths
Uncertain response

6-8

Inaccuracy throughout
Vague response

No work offered^

didi my DS is the same. Loves singing and doesn't realise he's out of tune. And yet manages to correct himself on the piano and trumpet.

It is literally 4 marks for the singing bit - and you get at least a mark for trying.

Would concentrate on the pieces and the scales.

Do remember that you can hum or even whistle the aural tests. It is not a test of a voice but a test of an ear.

It is definitely vocal ability, mine is the same, cant sing and hates it, refused point blank to all singing parts in her exams(we only do abrsm, so far we have done grade 5 violin and grade 7piano). We have always lost these aural marks. She is 10 now and still the same. I am sorry not having a positive experience to share. We didnt find losing these aural marks were painful compare to learning scales, there are so many scales to learn and she resists them too. She still has to learn them and then the pieces came as a lovely icing on the cake part(for us). We decided not to do any exam for some long time(may be till the end of primary, which by then she has 2 years gaps or more to the last exams she did), we might just do grade 8 for both.

Yes singing lessons maybe. Am going to mention it to his piano teacher. Thank you.