I hope you enjoy this series of fictional scenarios about teaching music, and find it at times thought-provoking, familiar, and even humorous. We look forward to reading comments by yourself and other teachers at the end, about “what would you do?”
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Philip is playing some music for you and although all the notes are correct, he has added a beat by the time he’s half way through, and then starts to rush. By the time he finishes, he is half a beat off.
You ask him to play it again, and you notice that his foot is lightly tapping along with notes, but not with the beat. Sometimes his foot taps off beat entirely.
Many times you have found that by noticing how students move their foot or another part of their body, you can learn a lot about the rhythm they’re feeling, and sometimes it’s not quite the same as what they’re playing. Playing one rhythm while moving their body to another can be something of a disconnect and can pull apart the student’s long-term sense of the music. By coordinating the student’s instrument and body to work together, timing problems can often be resolved.
With this in mind, you ask Philip to tap his foot slowly in time without playing, and then have him play only the beat notes in time with his foot. You then add in some of the other notes, which are not on the beat, all the while keeping his foot steady with the beats.
He’s getting this okay, but he’s frustrated with the process. As he sits there, you notice his knee practically fluttering as he bounces his heel nervously.
You go back to the original music and have him play it again.
This time the timing is good. But his foot is going every which way, regardless of the beat.
What would you do?
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Please add your comments below; if you have any hesitations about it, please see the earlier post about “Adding Your Two Bits! How It Works“.
Have him stop tapping his foot.
I would have him get up and move around and get some of that nervous energy out. Clearly he’s tense at some level. Perhaps have him move in time with the music of the piece, but the important thing is to “reset”.
Then I would have him play it either without tapping his foot, or tapping his foot loudly and audibly. Maybe have a metronome going and try to get him to tap loudly in synch with the metronome. I would prioritize getting his internal rhythm to be correct over getting him to stop tapping his foot.
I would immediately stop playing, back away from the piano, and do some kinesthetic learning. Phillip needs to learn to speak the language of the music and hear it in his head, feel it with his body.
Attempts to ‘correct’ his behavior will only associate ‘music’ with ‘mistakes’ for him.
Try having him just bang on the keyboard to clear the switches, maybe find some sounds he likes, and go from there. When he’s feeling the reason behind the music, it’ll line up with tempo effortlessly. Trying to force something vaguely music-like through tapping one’s foot only turn music into a thought-based activity instead of an effortless, holistic one.
I would have him close the lid and have him tap the rhythm with both hands on the lid, then I would have him play the fingering on the lid perhaps slower why I softly tapped the down beat on his shoulder. Try to “wean” him off of the need to tap his foot.