Teaching youngsters early on to find the pulse, to be able to decipher whether its in two, three or four time, to be able to count, is the singlemost thing that I find modern music teaching techniques too often ignore or don't do enough of, to the student's deficit.

Another Eurythmics method I use is to teach the basic conducting patterns for 2/4, then hand them each a stick and get them conducting to a march recording.

After the 2/4 wears thin and is basically under control, I introduce the 4/4 pattern and here we go again.

Then comes 3/4, with this one I start with the waltz, like Strauss' "Blue Danube" and after awhile with that will switch to "Bluesette" so that they can start digging that even jazz waltz tempo as well.

I also kill two birds with one stone when doing this, selecting recordings that, without them really realizing it, increases their Music Recognition skills. The important thing here is to know the repertoire and select the simpler things from it.

My final with kids is Serge Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf" -- which gives a chance to introduce the sound of many of the orchestral instruments as well as the knowledge of a great piece of music that comes with a story. Each character is represented by a different instrument of the orchestra.

Here's a Youtube of David Bowie's narration of Peter and the Wolf:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpoizq-jjxs

After my classes, there isn't a kid whose been through them that does not recognize a Chalimeau Register Clarinet as "the cat". etc.

Bowie's recording is great for use with kids in these classes, BTW.

I teach these at our church summer school while my wife devotes her time to being the "schoolmarm" for the more academic endeavors there. But it all started a long time before that, when we made the big decision to homeschool our own kids. Long story short, we started up a homeschooling academy back then and ended up with about 20 kids on our hands daily. They're all grown up now.


--Mac

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