Seimpi Lesson 13

17 Oct 2010 (Sun):

Today, we had our lesson 13. Weird but Rachel was the only student this afternoon. Nonetheless, there were no distractions from others (insert wicked laughter).

Rachel did very well today, I must say. Even teacher Marcia said her performance & attention span was excellent.

So today, we did the usual Hello song, Hockey Pokey & we learned a new piece called " 5 Peas in a Pod " (Is there such a song or did i hear wrongly?) Hehe.

We went thru Dynamics too - f for forte (loud), mf for mezzo forte (moderately loud), mp for mezzo piano (moderately soft) & p for piano (soft). Rachel was good in both f & p. When she said f, she said it very loudly. When its p, she whispered. Haha.

Rachel did this activity last night - Space & Line Notes. Colour the stars with line notes yellow & space notes red.
For this one, we did it in class. We revised STEPS & she has to paste the letter name which is a step higher from the stated keys Eg: the stated letter was F, so a step higher would mean G, therefore Rachel has to know what note is a step higher than F & paste the corresponding letter name. Bottom part: Paste the letter name which is a step lower from the stated keys.

This is a new piece of music score which we played today. You need to use both hands to play - trebel clef & bass clef. Teacher Marcia went very slow with Rachel as this requires coordination from both hands. So for homework, this is an extra piece to practice.

We also revised the previous pieces & Rachel remembered to hold the notes when she played the dotted minim notes. Bravo! Teacher Marcia praised & commented that Rachel really improved alot & she can also better grasped the speed needed already. " Continue to practise & keep up the good work!", she told Rachel.

I bought the flash-cards from Seimpi for our daily use. Teacher Marcia asked if i would like to purchase & i was surprised that they actually have it ready-made & for sale over the counter. It was not displayed so i did not think of asking.

She helped me to decide what to buy & i bought almost everything except for some sets. I figured might as well purchased it so that i can refresh Rachels' memory every now & then. So in total, I spent S$56 for a total of 8 sets. This receipt is proof of my purchase from Seimpi.

Pitch in C Major. The notes with the corresponding letter. Full set.

Note Values. Semi Breve, Dotted Minim, etc.

Pitch in Bass Clef. Corresponding notes & letter name.

Major & Minor Sounds. Though i'm not sure what this is all about but teacher Marcia did mentioned that we would learn abt it in future so i may want to consider buying it first. So i bought it.

Time Signatures. Remember i wrote about those 2/4 & 3/4 counts where we used the rhythm sticks & hit accordingly, such as ' ta ta ta or te te ta ta or ta te te ta ', etc.

Then, this is about Steps- from line to space or from space to line.

Skips - from line to line or space to space.

I found this on the internet, with compliments of http://susanparadis.wordpress.com/category/steps-and-skips/

I love this piece when u have both treble & bass clef (staff) on 1 piece. I can use this exercise to test Rachel to see whether she knows her notes, space & lines. Cool.

I bought the coloured stones especially, in order to let Rachel place the notes accordingly. Although there is no letter name on the stone but i'm sure this can help her too.

Eg: maybe i will ask her to place a stone on note D, so she can then put on where she thinks is correct. In this way, i can tell her whtr its right or wrong. We can also learn more about lines & space. The size of the stone fits perfectly within each space.

Due to work constraint, we may not be able to attend next week's lessons. But i will see if i can pull myself away cos i dun see the big deal if there is 1 less person working. Here's hoping..