Rhythm is foundational to everything else. It’s my number one priority for all new students, especially preschoolers.
Young beginners might take a while to develop finger dexterity and might not be the quickest to catch on to reading, but with appropriate rhythm activities for preschoolers their rhythm can be rock solid.
You’ll notice we repeat the vocalisation two times, before transferring to a drum, and then finally back to the piano. These steps along the way help students to be more confident once we add the challenge of also reading finger numbers or notes at the same time.
If you haven’t used Kodály syllables with your preschoolers, try it out! It makes such a difference to have something that’s easy to say and can’t be confused with finger numbers.
What are quick clips?
Colourful Keys Quick Clips are all about giving you a taste of what my lessons are actually like – in action.
I certainly don’t claim to be an expert, and I don’t have all the answers. I just know how much seeing real teaching with real students has helped me to grow and improve as a teacher.
Let me know what you think!
I hope you had fun watching this Colourful Keys Quick Clip. If you have any thoughts or questions, be sure to ask them in the Vibrant Music Studio Teachers group on Facebook or in the comments here, and do make sure to subscribe to my emails and YouTube channel to get notified when a new quick clip is published.
If you want more and extended clips of my teaching, be sure to check out the Vibrant Music Teaching library. There’s tons more like this as well as a whole library of teaching games to boot.
Hi Nicola! We use Kodály rhythms too! It’s a great way to learn rhythm and much easier to understand. My sight-reading rhythm reading has improved after learning this system too! Benefits all round. We use ta-a for minims, that way you can use ta-a-a for dotted minims and it all connects and makes sense. I’m a piano teacher but am trained by The DaCapo Music Foundation – a great proponent of Kodály both rhythmically and pitch solfa. check us out! http://www.dacapo.co.uk Lucy
Yes ta-a is what I was taught too. However I do like the counting version that Piano Safari uses for this since I always found it a bit awkward to say ta-a-a-a. Both achieve the same result in the end anyway. 🙂
Super helpful video – thanks! I’m definitely going to use this with my kids in Piano Safari. I know one student who loves the drums will love drumming while vocalizing the ta, ta-2’s out!
Oh good! Do let me know how it goes it you try it. 🙂