What piano lessons have shown me about readiness

Madison took piano lessons during her kindergarten year. She really loved the lessons. She approached the piano like a mathematician; I can tell that (like her mother) she grasps math spatially, and this was very useful for piano. She liked the challenge of matching up the notes on the staff to the notes on the keyboard, and she liked the reward of the tune she made.

But getting her to practice was like pulling teeth. It was horrible for both of us. (In fact, I was so frustrated that I had her teacher write an article for KidsOutAndAbout.com, tips for getting kids to practice music. You'll see some really cute photos of Madison if you click on that link.) She liked being taught by Mrs. B, and she liked to show off, but doing so in the absence of an adult's bottom right there on the piano bench next to her was not rewarding for her. She learned, of course, but not as much as she would have had she been motivated to practice each day.

At the same time, I was fascinated to discover that when I sat down at the piano, I was instantly better than I was at any point in my youth. I took piano lessons from age 7-10, at which point I gave it up. I just couldn't get both hands to work together at the same time. But I have always considered myself to have learned music from the piano. In high school, I approached choral sight reading by visualizing the piano keys in the treble clef; somehow, I translated that spatial relationship into what my vocal chords were doing. Even as an adult, visualizing the piano keys while I'm singing is the only way I stay moderately in tune.

When we moved to Virginia last year, I decided to stop Madison's piano lessons for a while, because it had turned into something stressful for both of us. I figured we'd settle into life here first. I set up the keyboard, though, for anyone to play whenever she wanted. Well, as soon as we were settled enough for me to consider whether she was ready to resume lessons, there we were, making plans to leave again. So I decided to put it off again, until we are settled back in Rochester in December.

But interestingly enough, just recently Madison started sitting down at the keyboard for long stretches, picking out her own little tunes and just fooling around with the keys. (She has been doing this, I discovered, partly as a way of remembering the multiplication table, of all things -- she has made up little tiny tunes to help her remember certain equations.)

And today, she picked up her old American songbook, and actively started looking at the notes (well, she looks at the written-out letter-note below the staff to figure out what note it is, not actually at the staff itself, she never got far enough to know what a note was from sight), and picking out the songs.

I sat next to her and realized something remarkable: Even after not practicing for 16 months (other than "Happy Birthday"), her playing is dramatically superior to what it used to be. There are two dimensions on which she is better:

1) She hears the song in her head that she is playing, and is using her knowledge of the song -- whether the next note is higher in pitch or lower in pitch -- to guide whether the next keyboard note is to the left or to the right.

2) Hearing the song in her head guides her to how long to hold down the note. Before, there was no way to explain a quarter note or a whole note to her; actually, she understood it intellectually but she just couldn't translate that into holding down the note.

Before, I now realize, she wasn't playing a song, she was following the letters written on the page and figuring out how that translated into finger movement, and then hearing the song *after* the notes were played. Now, in her mind's ear, she is hearing what the note should be *before* she strikes the key, and this helps her know which one to strike. She is able to hold in her mind the overriding purpose of playing a song. It is, I think, an entirely new experience for her.

This provides marvelous evidence about how important it is to be sensitive to what kids are ready for, and not pushing or having expectations in advance of when they're ready.

Before, the exercise of learning piano was somewhat valuable as an intellectual exercise, and (moderately) as a lesson in how working hard at something can get results. But I can see that now, she's really ready. I honestly think that she would have been at this same point had she started just a month ago rather than two years ago.

There are several lessons to be learned from this:

1) There really are sensitive periods when a particular child's brain is ready for a certain kind of activity. There is nothing that we did, between when Madison stopped taking lessons and now, that can account for her dramatic advance. It is slightly possible that we primed her for this by having the lessons in the first place, but I attribute her readiness much more to how her brain has developed in the intervening 16 months.

2) More mundanely, I am certain that Ella, who is 5 1/2, is not ready for piano. A better way of saying it is that she'll get far more value out of lessons in a year or two rather than immediately upon our return to Rochester. I'm going to wait until she positively asks for lessons and shows that she's ready. I think she will.

3) This strengthens my conviction that there are certain times that kids are ready for certain academic pursuits, and that pushing them when they aren't ready or positively disinterested is time and energy better spent teaching them something else.

4) Interest follows ability. Madison is FAR more interested in working on the piano now, when she has this new, natural, more conceptually mature approach to music. So strong interest in something probably indicates a readiness for it.

5) Although figuring out when kids are ready for certain things does rely, to a large extent, on the child's self-report of their own interests and desires, it can't substitute for the parent's careful observation of the child. It's so important that we consider who she is, and where she is intellectually, before we push.

6) Even if a child rejects something early or says it's not for her, try it again later on if you think she'll find it valuable. She just may have developed enough, or have gathered enough information in the meantime, to be ready for it.

7) This has serious implications for teaching math, which should be obvious.