What an invention! A place where you can post video and audio of just about anything in the world. I find myself using it with increasing frequency with my students. Gone are the days when our students' ability to listen to good examples of their instruments or voice are limited by proximity and cost. I wore out the few tapes and CD’s I had growing up. I eventually learned every song on them and would play along. But I wasn’t rich, and lived in the boonies, so getting new quality recordings wasn't easy. How great is it to have a tool on the internet where you can find examples of just about anything you or your students would want to play? Here are some ways I’ve found to use YouTube in lessons.
· Practice – I think it’s really important for my students to listen to examples of good players, especially examples of things they are working on. As many good performances as there are, there are also some that aren’t great, so it’s important to screen the videos you recommend. I post recommended links in their online lesson notes for that day.
· Confidence – I have found that when a student runs up against a mental block about playing a piece, finding a video of someone like them who was able to accomplish the same piece shows them they can too. For those of you that aren’t Suzuki teachers, it is customary to have a student perform a graduation recital after mastering each book. There are many YouTube videos of these graduations, children and adults. I think it’s helpful for my students to see others their own age succeeding at the same things they are working on, especially when they become discouraged.
· Inspiration – I encourage my students to look around and try out new things. If they find a composer they like, they can find examples on YouTube of pieces they’ve written. Perhaps there is a style of music they want to learn. Once they have some ideas, we can order music, work on skills and learn pieces that the students are excited to learn.
· Performance – I invite my students whenever I perform somewhere they can go, and I recommend the free concerts of the ensembles and the junior and senior solo recitals at Moravian so they can see “music in action.” And some go, but often it doesn’t work with schedules or other siblings’ activities, or just family downtime. YouTube is the next best alternative to live performances. You can review do’s and don’ts. You can show good examples and bad examples. Knowing what to expect on stage can help with stage fright for recitals or other performances, and can help them feel polished in their own performance.
I know others that use YouTube tutorials for some of their students. I’ll be honest, I feel like it’s my responsibility to do the teaching. I’ve had students try out tutorials on their own, and learn bad habits. It isn’t even that the videos they watched were bad, but because the learning was one-way they thought they were doing what was instructed when they weren’t. That said, if I found something that was really worthwhile, I wouldn’t rule out using it.
All that said, I think YouTube is a great tool in support of lessons. I use it myself to find examples of pieces I’m working on or identify new pieces I might want to do. I think it's great that students today have such a resource that can help them learn and help keep them excited to learn more. They can be exposed to so many good and bad examples and with guidance, they can learn from what they find there.
No comments:
Post a Comment