Photo Credit: woodleywonderworks
If your life has been anything like mine, I’m guessing things were a bit nuts as summer came to a close and school started up again for the year. Between fitting in last minute traveling and trying to get my schedule and our teachers’ schedules squared away plus getting used to a new full teaching schedule, it’s been a hectic time.
While things are starting to settle down a bit more, I know our students and their families are still adjusting. Most every student that I’ve seen in the past week and a half has been a little less prepared for their lesson than normal. Now having to suddenly wake up earlier in the morning, to adjust to being at school all day, to do homework including possibly a lot more of it, and going back to activities, these kids haven’t been able to practice their instrument nearly as much as they’d like or should. It definitely will take a few weeks for everyone to fully transition to the school year. Until then, here are my tips to make the summer to school year transition go even smoother:
#1: Be patient
Depending on whether or not you took lessons over the summer, you probably don’t remember everything from your lessons last spring. Maybe note reading is suddenly more difficult or the muscles in your mouth aren’t as strong and well equipped to form your embouchure as they used to be. In any case, you’ve likely gone backwards just a little bit. Understand that this is normal. Virtually everyone experiences this. Instead of getting mad and frustrated with yourself, be patient and kind. Your teacher will do lots of review and everything will come back to you in it’s own time. Trust that that’s normal and perfectly ok.
#2: Practice Consistently
Nothing about summer is consistent except of course that everything is inconsistent. Now that school and activities have resumed, go back to practicing on a consistent schedule. I recommend choosing a time every day to practice and sticking with it. If you’re a morning person, practice every morning after breakfast. If later is better for you, consider practicing everyday after dinner. If you keep a consistent time, practicing will become second nature just like brushing your teeth. Practicing, and more importantly, consistent practicing is essential to get the most out of your lessons.
#3: Practice Accurately
Sitting down and practicing– getting the motivation to do it is really half the battle. Once you do practice, you don’t want to just practice for the sake of practice. You want to practice your piece with accuracy and to accomplish the goal of perfecting all or just a bit of the piece during each practice session. Don’t just play and hope you are playing things right. Double check your notes and rhythms. Make sure you are adding dynamics, articulations, and any other details marked in your music. If you do practice a piece with incorrect notes all week, it’s so much harder to change it then it is to just learn the piece more slowly, but with the correct notes.
#4: Quality over Quantity
I’ve mentioned this many times. It’s so much better to have a shorter practice session where you accomplish a lot than to have a longer practice session where you’re unfocused and not making any or much progress on your music. With a short chunk of focused time, it’s incredible what you can accomplish. Even if you have five minutes to spare, sit down and work on a section. You’ll be amazed what you can accomplish cumulatively from many short sessions.
Now I want to hear from you. What tip do you think you most need to keep in mind when practicing during these early weeks of the school year? Teachers, do you have any other recommendations to help students ease back into the school year? Leave a comment below with your thoughts. If you haven’t already, please “like us” on Facebook and subscribe to the newsletter. Thanks for reading, and have a peaceful day!
Sincerely,
Cassie
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