How do I help my child prepare for flute lessons?

by Pam Murchison, teacher with Kathy's Music, LLC

How do I help my child prepare for flute lessons?

Whether you’ve decided that now is the time to begin private flute instruction, or you’re looking to start down the road, there are some great ways to help your child prepare for private flute instruction! Here are my top five tips!

Attend live music events and listen to recordings of flute music

There are many community events that are age appropriate for your child, such as the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Fiddlesticks programs.  These events often feature an Instrument Petting Zoo, where children can see and even play instruments of the orchestra.  What better way to get your child excited for flute lessons? Pittsburgh has a wealth of free parks concerts throughout the summer, another wonderful, family-friendly way of introducing yours to live music.  In between concerts, listen to recordings of flute music in the car, or look for videos of flutists on YouTube. Some of my favorites are Alexa Still, Jeanne Baxtresser, Emmanuel Pahud, and Mathieu Dufour.

Make your own instrument

Making a homemade flute is a fun project (click here for instructions). This project will provide your child with an inexpensive method of exploring the instrument and will help your child learn how the flute works. Or, you can purchase a recorder.  It’s easy to produce sound on a recorder, and their simple construction makes them very easy to hold.  These instruments are inexpensive (less than $20), and can be a great way for children to explore wind instruments.

Prepare an area for practicing!

Practicing is a huge part of learning a musical instrument, and designing a dedicated area in your home can be easy and fun!  Designating a specific practice area underscores the importance of practicing, and provides a distraction-free zone for your budding flutist.  All you need is a music stand, good lighting, and a chair.  A desk or dining room chair works best, and a small stool on the floor can be helpful to keep little legs from swinging. Add some pencils and a mirror, and the practice zone is ready!

Read books about flute

There are many age appropriate books about the flute for your budding performer. Some of my favorites are “The Magic Flute: An Opera by Mozart” and “Fiona the Flute Fairy.” Check out the website “Flute Monkey” for more suggestions!

Attend classes that teach the basics

For children ages 5-7, the Kindermusik’s® Young Child curriculum covers all of the basics of music literacy, and provides a foundation that will benefit the child throughout his/her life.  Note recognition, rhythm reading, and ensemble skills are all necessary for music study.  If your child is a graduate of a program like this, now is the time to review materials and re-familiarize him/her with concepts of music notation.  However, this is not a requirement for private flute instruction! It simply gives the child a bit more confidence and information going in.  If I have a student who is brand new to music study, I like to spend a couple of weeks going over music fundamentals before we introduce the flute in lessons.

Why take private flute lessons and school band?

by Pam Murchison, teacher with Kathy's Music, LLC

Deciding to take private flute lessons in addition to enrolling your child in band is a great investment in your child’s musical development.  Having a private flute instructor is like having a personal athletic trainer: the individualized attention helps the flutist to reach his/her absolute highest musical potential. 

Here are some specific benefits of pursuing private study in conjunction with school band classes:

Individualized attention

Lessons benefit your child whether she is more or less advanced than the rest of the group. Even in a small group setting of 2-3 students, the needs of the individual will necessarily be overlooked for the needs of the group.  If a student is struggling, it might take longer to receive the guidance needed to progress, leading to frustration.  If a student is more advanced, he might be held back by the level of the group. This also leads to boredom and frustration. Individual music instruction will give your child exactly what she needs when she needs it.

Engaging the student

Repertoire can be customized to suit your child’s particular interests and needs in a lesson.  This is difficult to tackle in a group lesson when the curricula is standardized.  Our goal is to engage and the choice of piece or genre can make all the difference.

 Learning to practice

Many of the hours spent learning to play the flute are spent in individual practice.  This is not a skill that always comes naturally, and private flute instruction can help your child devise systematic ways to overcome musical challenges. Learning how to practice is like developing any new skill and lessons provide the time to learn how.  Creating step-by-step plans for tackling obstacles is of course an excellent skill to have throughout life! 

A complete flute education

When a child enrolls in beginner band, the goal of the teacher is typically to help the student successfully perform in his/her first band concert. This is a great goal and we encourage group music making and community performing whole heartedly!  However, this goal is only one aspect of being a musician. The student might learn only a fraction of flute fundamentals in a beginning band program. It all depends on the program. Private lessons with a dedicated teacher will encompass all aspects of playing the flute, including solo & duet playing, music history, customized music theory, and the ability to hear, see and emulate an experienced flute performer week after week.  Modeling is one of the most successful ways students learn.

Other benefits include steady motivation, faster progress and increased musical opportunities.  My private flute instruction throughout elementary, middle, and high school allowed me to meet and perform for (and with!) Pittsburgh Symphony musicians, learn about all kinds of chamber music, and create relationships with other flutists who, like me, had a real passion for flute. 

With the right teacher, enrolling in private flute instruction can only add more value to your child’s musical studies.

What is the best age to start flute lessons?

Written by Pam Murchison, flute teacher with Kathy's Music, LLC

When I was six years old, my best friend’s mother was a flute teacher and my mother was (and still is!) an excellent painter. Mrs. Booth was very interested in painting and proposed a trade with my mom: she would receive painting lessons and, in exchange, I would begin private flute lessons. I had just seen James Galway perform on Sesame Street and was already hooked on the beautiful sound of the flute. I couldn’t wait to begin! The rest, as they say, is history!

The question of the “right” age to begin flute lessons has long been up for debate, and, as with most aspects of child development, there is no hard and fast rule concerning the best time for your child to begin.  Many children begin wind instrument instruction in the 4^th or 5^th grade, when their school allows them to sign up for beginner band.  If a child begins music instruction before then, it is typically on the piano or violin or even guitar. While common wisdom is that it is easier to produce sound on those instruments because all sound production happens outside of the body with the hands and fingers, innovative teachers have expertly demonstrated that young children can successfully produce a beautiful sound on the flute and begin to learn how to play at age 4, 5, 6 years of age depending on the child's level of interest and ability to focus for short periods of time.

In addition, there are several options for flutes with curved head joints, which reduce the overall length of the instrument. This makes the keys easier to reach, and the weight is more evenly distributed so that the flute is easier to hold.  Tools such as the Pneumo Pro Wind Director are very effective tools to helping students of all ages understand air production, and are particularly useful for beginning students.  Watch this short video to see what a private flute lesson for a young child (4-7) might look like.  Kinderflute group classes provide an introduction to flute specifically designed for this age group (look for one coming to a Kathy’s Music near you in 2014!)

So, if your child:

•  Shows enthusiasm for the flute
• Is comfortable with one-on-one settings with an adult outside of the immediate family
• Is able to focus on an activity for 20-30 minutes at a time

the right time to start flute lessons may be now!

SELF-AWARENESS

Is there any parent alive who would not wish for their 3-5 year-old preschooler to be aware when they are getting frustrated so they could come for help verses acting out?  How about a child being conscious and aware of what he/she is looking like, sounding like or what behaviors he/she tends to engage in when unhappy or frustrated?   Mirroring is an activity used by parents to teach their children how to become aware or conscious.  The concept of mirroring and imitation is at work in much of your child’s learning.  Our children are highly aware of our actions and they imitate us in movement and speech and other physical activities (that’s scary to think about sometimes), but “mirroring” as we used it today in class is an intentional, conscious act by both the grown-up and child.  As you will read in your family activity guide, Carla Hannaford’s research shows that children gain self-awareness when they participate in movement activities such as the mirror games we played today in class and those you will be playing at home this week.

I’m excited by the home activities this week for our preschool families, because these games played regularly with your child will provide such great learning for your child as relates to the awareness of his/her emotions, movements, and expressions.   There’s only so much we can do in class, but the warm and bonding time you spend at home with these wonderful developmental activities will reap rewards that last a lifetime, as it is through self-awareness that children learn self-control and the ability to make positive choices regarding their emotional and physical state. 

Rick Hanson, Ph.D., is a psychologist who works with couples, individual adults, and children. He has written and lectured extensively on parental stress and depletion, ways to nurture mothers and fathers, and how a couple can be both strong teammates and intimate friends while raising a family. A summa cum laude graduate of UCLA, Dr. Hanson did management consulting before earning his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the Wright Institute.  He lists additional information on ways to engage your child in self-awareness development on his website www.nurturemom.com (great for dads too – has a “FOR DADS” tab) and the following links are to articles specific to self-awareness development in both ourselves and our children:  Self-Awareness for Kids and Grown-ups - http://www.nurturemom.com/Web_store/News/0105coulmn.shtml and  Being Skillful with Your Inner World Too! - http://www.wisebrain.org/WhyInnerSkills.pdf.  For those of our families that love brain neuroscience articles, www.wisebrain.org/science has articles and Brain FAQ’s as well.  FUN FACTS to consider!

“Mirror, mirror…my reflection can move like this….”  P.12

• Continue mirror dancing with each other and/or in front of a mirror.  Home Cd 2, Track 7 Barcarolle
• Can you find all of the surfaces that reflect your mirror image in your home?   How do you look different from one surface to the next?
• Explore “emotion faces” in your mirrors together at home.  
• Can you describe your child’s “sad, happy or angry” face?
• Can you imitate your child’s face while describing what you see (e.g. lip out and turned down, sparkling eyes, etc.)?
• Do you have a full-length mirror for full body fun, or how about a hand-mirror for emotion play?

Follow this link to additional Self-Awareness activities for Children & Grownups.

http://www.nurturemom.com/Web_store/News/0105coulmn.shtml