These curvy piggies are a fun way to remind students of correct hand shape, and their little pig faces make the lesson a lot more memorable than just saying “Curve your fingers!” or “Imagine an orange underneath your hands!”.
I especially like to use these with transfer students who have already reached a certain standard, but have poor hand shape and technique.
How to Make the Piggies
- Cut out 2 circles in cotton or other stable, tightly woven fabric. I just used the a cup face down to mark the circles, remember they will get smaller when you’ve sewn and stuffed them.
- Cut a length of elastic. I measured mine around my own hand, but made it a little tight for my hand size so it would fit students’ hands of about age 10 up.
- Overlap the ends of the elastic and sew (either on a sewing machine or using a hand back-stitch). Make an ‘x’ shape and surround this with a box, to make it extra strong.
- Then sew the elastic to the centre of one of the circles.
- Attach the circles together. Put the circles together so the elastic is on enclosed by them and sew around the 1cm in from the circle edges, leaving a gap of about 3 cm so you can turn the circles right side out.
- Turn out the circles and stuff with whatever you have around, fabric scraps, wadding, stuffing etc.
- Turn under the seam allowance at the opening of the circle and stitch close from the outside, either flat on the machine or using a hand slip stitch for a neater finish.
- Draw your pig face (or whatever cute animal face you prefer!) in pencil or vanishing fabric marker.
- Colour in your face with permanent markers or fabric markers, and you’re done!
How to Use the Piggies
First, and most important, take out the piggies and have a good giggle together at their silly faces!
Then fit them onto the student’s hands and ask them to do either scales or technical exercises, something where they don’t need to read music is best. If the piggy hits a wrong note, they need to start again.
If I have a student that is having a lot of trouble with their hand shape, or has really ingrained bad habits, I sometimes lend them the piggies for the week so they can use them everyday.
Do you struggle to rid kids of those flat fingers?
What do you think? What methods have you tried? Let us know what works in your studio in the comments below.