TEACHING PIANO SCALES: NOTATION, ROTE OR WRITING?
Learning music is all about learning patterns, sound patterns, harmonies, rhythm alignment, black and white keys on the keyboard, and visual patterns for musical notation. Well-structured live piano lessons encourage students to develop the ability to understand all of these. However, the method you use to teach scales to one student may not work well for every student. As teachers, we need a variety of tools in our belts. Let us consider three of the most common ways to teach piano scales in which we can apply this scenario. # 1: Teaching Piano Scales By Rote Rote teaching is the simplest way to teach piano scales. Learning by rote has many benefits, including ear training, pattern recognition, and memorization. Teaching scales by rote also provides an additional opportunity to explore the theory, technique and creative playing as we do not focus on reading notation simultaneously. Teaching Scales by Rote with Piano Key Shapes When teaching by rote, try to explore th...