Ages 4-6
45 minute piano classes for groups of 2-3
What is Keyboard Games? Every Keyboard Games class is led by one of our Music Moves for Piano teachers and includes a rich musical bath of playful activities that will support each individual child on their own musical path. Our teachers are highly trained in an audiation approach- teaching students to play piano by ear and individualizing instruction for each student as they grow through our program.
What is Audiation? Students in the Music Moves for Piano program learn music through audiation, which is a cognitive process by which the brain gives meaning to musical sounds. Audiation is the musical equivalent of thinking in language. There is a sequential process to learning how to audiate, just as a child learns how to think through their exposure to their native language. Imagine how much context a child receives hearing other people speak in their native language before they begin to converse with another human or truly think for themselves. Years of constant reinforcement with their language is necessary for a child to learn how to think and speak.
The same goes for music. Before a child learns a piece on the piano, they spend time away from the piano, learning how to audiate their piece through singing, moving, and careful pattern instruction. This process brings meaning to their music making. As they grow in the program, students are also able to create, improvise, and compose music of their own.
When do you teach students to read music? Here at SWS Music School, we teach piano students to read music once they have had a rich, immersive experience with singing, creating patterns, and have learned folk tunes by ear on the piano. A student who starts with us between the ages of 4 to 6 spends a year each in Keyboard Games A, Keyboard Games B, and Book 1. Then they will spend roughly 2 years in Book 2 before they are ready to read music with understanding.
Research shows that students are ready to read music closer to age 11. Introducing reading before they have experienced enough with music can derail their musicianship and frustrate a student.
However, our students begin the process of emergent reading right away. We call this process “reading readiness” and for those students that begin in one of our earlier book levels, they will follow a sequential approach to learning how to read music in order to get them ready for the process of actually reading notation. We do not push notation on our students and our teachers are experts in knowing when a child is ready for the Reading and Writing Book (though, typically, we introduce the Reading and Writing Book during Book 3).
What happens during a Keyboard Games class?
Each class is packed with carefully planned activities to support your child’s audiation process, including Movement, Piano Activities, and Reading Readiness Activities.
Movement and Audiation These activities take place twice in a group lesson and serve as a way for students to learn music through movement and audiation. This assists them in learning music by ear and supports their work at the piano!
Students are able to express themselves through playful movements while learning important foundational skills for playing the piano and improvising on their instrument.
Students move and sing patterns in Major, Minor, Dorian, and Mixolydian, as well as other modes such as Phrygian, Lydian, and Locrian.
Students are challenged to move their bodies in Duple and Triple meter, noticing the difference through movement. They also learn creative movement to determine uneven meters, such as 5/8 and 7/8.
Students are assessed for singing in tune and receive guidance from their instructor when needed.
Students are taken through a sequential approach to singing tonal patterns and chanting rhythm patterns, carefully assessed by each teacher. Each student is met at their level and supported throughout the program.
Piano Activities There are several group piano activities built into each class in which students come to the piano to play individually, with the teacher, and sometimes as an ensemble with their lesson partners.
Students always review their pieces from the previous week, along with several others to keep all of their pieces accessible and easy to use for various creative activities.
Students learn a new piece at the piano each week, first by listening and moving to the song, investigating what they are hearing, and then learning it at the piano.
Students get a chance to improvise at the piano each week. In early stages, such as Keyboard Games Book A and Book B, students are encouraged to create freely and expressively, playing sounds of various animals, weather patterns, or telling stories with sound. When a teacher feels they are ready, they will build upon their creative pieces by providing them with rhythm patterns and expressive ideas like tempo and dynamic variations to incorporate into their creation.
Reading Readiness with Notation Activities These activities take place in class and sometimes serve as an activity so that the teacher can work with lesson partners individually up at the piano. Throughout the year, your child will learn and review these concepts for Reading Readiness with Music Notation.
Note Parts: Students learn about note parts (stems, beams, flags and dots) through playful games and colorful worksheets. Students spend time investigating their music to discover these parts written in notation.
Reading Rhythm Syllables: Students learn how to recognize “Du-de’s” and “Du-da-di’s” in their books, learning to read these words phonetically and finding them in their notation.
Students see what their everyday chants look like when written out with rhythmic notation.
Students will begin to notice intervals in their music including octaves and fifths.
Students will learn to spot two macrobeat rhythm patterns in their music, noticing “same” and “different” ones within the page.
Students will look for same-sounding patterns that look different (enrhythmic notation).
Students will begin to notice dynamic markings and articulation including staccato and legato in music by noticing dots and rainbows.
How often is my child expected to practice each week? Keyboard Games Book A and B gives students short pieces that build foundational music skills and inspires creativity. In order to have a truly successful and meaningful experience in our Keyboard Games classes, we advise students to play their pieces every day at home. This typically means about 5 minutes per day. By forming this habit, it helps students to understand the importance of building music into their daily routine. Teachers will send lesson notes home to parents that include video links, tutorials and listening links. We also invite parents to come back for the last 5 minutes of their child’s class, so that we can show you what we worked on and give you any additional support you may need.