Tricks for giving your Students a Break at Piano

One thing that all good piano teachers ensure is that their student must never leave piano practice session out of anger and frustration. Yes, learning piano can become tiring both physically and mentally. Even if it is not piano, learning to play any musical instrument fluently is a challenging and demanding task that needs you to exercise daily practice. There will be times when you as a student will be happy with your performance and there will tough times when you begin to feel frustrated. It is the duty of teacher and student together that you should not leave piano with frustration and anger but the session should always end up with a happy thumbs-up kind of feeling.

Tips on Break for Students on Piano!

In this section, we will be sharing some interesting activities and strategies with the aid of which a student will not leave the piano out of anger or frustration. These activities would ease up the learning process for you and will give you a break from anything that is triggering your anger and frustration. The focus is to make a student feel energized and happy to play piano again and to motivate him to stick with his regular practice routine even if it is difficult for him/her.

Tricks that would work….!

1. Connect with a piece that you have mastered on previously!

Students at times become so frustrated with trying to learn a new piece that they would have a feeling of quitting piano forever. This is because they get to lack the confidence that they will be able to play piano fluently. One fine way of gaining their confidence back is to make them go wild with a piano music piece that they have complete command on. This could be a tune from a previous lesson that they know really well. Getting back to a well-mastered piece would not only give them a break but it will be more exciting activity for them. Let them make some diversifications with that tune. They might change the tempo, pedal it up or make it even more dramatic with their expressions. Trust me it would be fun for them!

2. Let them compose something on their own!

Another way to get rid of frustration of practicing is to give your students a break and let them compose their own musical piece. It could be anything that is inspired from another tune, a combination of many tunes or anything completely original. Give them all the freedom to compose whatever they like and most of the times you will be able to witness impressive creativity out of this break from students.

3. Play some games over piano!

This could be made as interesting as you want to. A number of interesting games to be played over piano can be found online and at different forums. You can even lend a list of games to your students and they can then take them home to use during a practice session whenever they feel like taking a break. Encourage your student to involve a friend or sibling or any other person in that game. These games would not only be a fun break but your student will end up learning some interesting and valuable musical theory.

4. Clap and Tap on Piano!

Fun can very well overcome all the frustration and anger that your student may begin to feel during a piano practice. Take a rhythm of their choice and let them clap and tap over the tune of that piece. Just assign claps and taps to different notes and do it together with him with a powerful beat.

5. Leave Practicing at a side and Talk!

If nothing seems to work, leave piano practicing and the instrument aside, communicate with your student. For effective learning it is extremely important that you communicate with your student frequently whether it’s before, during or after the practice session. This communication could be related to anything. When you feel that your student is getting frustrated during a learning or practice session, stop the lesson and talk to him/her about frustration. Tell them that it is okay to be frustrated and this frustration can result in something magically positive. This may sound confusing but that is the difference between a good and a bad frustration. Make them realize that the reason why they are getting frustrated is their interest in learning something challenging that feels difficult even after practicing. Tell them that in order to get your energy back for positively practicing towards their goal, they should go ahead and take a break.

Conclusion:

Activities and certain strategies that we have shared here will enable your student to take a break from a tiring practice schedule and they will be able to revitalize their mind, body and heart for a positive and more energized practice session later. Identifying the point where these breaks should be taken and which method would be appropriate completely depends upon your student and his/her preference. Let them choose which method of relaxation and break they would like to have or you can suggest them what may work best for them.