David is thirteen years old and diagnosed as developmentally delayed. He can complete simple tasks but does not understand abstract chains of thought and behaviour in his everyday world. He loves to sing and can match pitch and remember many folk tunes, hymns, and pieces that he has heard. Everyday coordinated muscular tasks are difficult for him although he can execute simple rhythm patterns with great accuracy at the piano. David's older brother takes lessons and David knows and can accompany his brother's pieces with the interval of a fifth following the correct rhythm patterns at the keyboard. He can also follow rhythm patterns in an improvisation and accompany me at the piano. At the Crhistmas recital, David accompanied my performance of "Jingle Blls" with perfect rhythm and the right keys in front of an audience in his first public performance. David loves to play keys and sing at the piano and can identify and execute simple rhythm patterns involving quarter notes, half notes, and dotted-half notes. Although he cannot yet perform his own musical improvisations, his rhythmic ability is progressing and he enjoys performaing with other people. He is lucky to have a very loving and supportive family and an older brother who enjoys working with him outside of the lesson. David's brother generally takes his lesson first and then David has a fifteen minute lesson where we identify rhythm patterns and play them at the keyboard, work on motor skills, perform accompaniments to his brother's pieces, and do some improvisation and other games such as "follow the leader". I can usually expect a big hug after the lesson. I consider this my reward for having been allowed to communicate with David in his language.
Scott Price, Assistant Professor of Piano and Piano Pedagogy, University of South Carolina.
I taught piano to a blind student around 60 or 65 years old who had never taken piano lessons before. The student also started taking saxophone lessons at the same time with another teacher. He was well educated in many subjects (doctor in psychology)and he had music knowledge from listening to music.
My teaching approach to him was different from other students because of his disability but the same regarding the age of the student. His goal was to learn something about how to play the piano and how to have fun with it. Considering his goal, my main goal for the semester was for him to be able to play by ear certain melodies and harmonize them.
The first question that flashed in my mind was about which method to use. In fact, I did not need a method just for the goal I chose but I did ask him to purchase a method focused on famous melodies with harmonies appropriate to his beginning level. His wife who also was taking piano lessons from me was willing to help him at home.
Several steps took place to achieve my goal. First of all, I played for him melodies in the right hand register and later I added chords to them. He got familiar with the sound of the piano and he knew what I was going to aim for. Secondly, I asked him to sit down on the bench and to familiarize himself with the distance between the keyboard and himself and the length of the keyboard. Thirdly, I taught him the topography of the keyboard based on the groups of two and three keys and the middle C. I did not mention the term "black keys". After that, I taught him to play melodies in the five finger pattern in C and later to use the left hand to play tonic and V6/5 chords. The main issue was to recognize which notes of the melody are part of tonic chord and dominant chord.
It took a while to go through the steps but he learned how to play certain melodies with the harmony. One difficulty was his confusion of the sound of pitch C and B flat since he learned the note C in the saxophone that sounded B flat. Other than that were difficulties of the rigidity of his arms, hands, and fingers common in students of that age.
This teaching has influenced my philosophy because I had to teach how to play just by ear without reading music notation. The most important thing was not to play exactly what was written in the staff but pick up by ear a melody and harmonize it with any kind of rhythm or dynamic. The most important thing for this type of student is that he was able to enjoy making music.
Cesar Marimon, Doctoral Candidate, University of South Carolina
I am privileged to teach a young boy, age 6, who is mildly autistic. He started taking a few piano lessons last June and has been taking weekly for four months. Lessons are one hour in length: one half hour at the piano and one half hour at the computer using music software.
My student was very shy in the first interview clinging to his parent, however we found a connection when his eyes lit up as I enticed him to try a music program on the computer. We communicated as he played a game, and then he followed me to the piano, and I taught him a piece by rote.
We are communicating well in the lessons now and having fun. He is usually very focused once his mother leaves the studio. He thrives on structure by starting our lessons at the piano and ending at the computer. We begin with reviewing a piece he has memorized, then he plays pieces in his lesson book, etc. Some flexibility is factored in since I encourage creative expression whenever it happens.
He is very intelligent, and handles advanced theory concepts with ease. He can play all the scales around the circle of fifths in tetrachords using both hands. He has a good ear, and his sense of rhythm and pulse is good. His hands are a little awkward, and his speech, though very articulate, is a little stilted. He has a long attention span, however, so we just run out of time to do everything.
Sometimes social skills can be challenging for autistic children. Since he and another 6 year old boy sometimes share computer time, I've noticed that he very politely encourages the other boy and enjoys being "the tutor". He also played a piece in front of 35 other children at our fall costume party, to his mother's surprise.
He has advanced quickly through his pieces. I'm really enjoying him in the lessons and am getting to know his personality. His smile and laughter motivate me. In the Prep C Alfred books, two pieces begin the same: "The Bus Song" and the "Little Green Frog". As he was playing one, he was hearing the other and mixing up the tunes. I told him the little green frog had hopped on the bus. He got the joke, and we both started laughing uncontrollably.
Last week, he started playing half steps up the keyboard. I asked him if he knew the name of the scale that was all half steps. I then talked about the 12 tones. (He listens well, usually has a comment, and he doesn't let me get away with anything.) He immediately announced to me that there are 8 keys in C scale and there are 5 black keys, so there must be 13 tones. His math intellect was at work.
I try to treat him as normally as possible. His mind is usually ahead of his physical co-ordination, however. Sometimes he gets frustrated trying to play a piece absolutely perfectly ... wanting to start over again and again until he doesn't miss a note. To alleviate the tension, I sometimes divert his attention to something else or skip to another piece.
Sometimes I can tell he testing me by making mistakes on purpose to see if I'm listening. His glance and crooked smile tell the tale. Last week, handling a new concept, I was overjoyed to hear him say, "I know I can do it". Those are the words a teacher loves to hear.
Joey Ruddle, Independent Music Teacher, Columbia, SC
Brittany is twelve years old. She was born four months premature and is blind and severely autisitic. She requires round-the-clock care and is only now learning to complete small tasks for herself and to use simple words to communicate her desires.
At age five, she taught herself how to play the piano. Her ability has grown at a frightening rate and it is estimated that she has a repertoire of some 4000-5000 popular songs, classical melodies and show tunes. She can instantly repeat any music she hears in a simplified version at the piano. We believe that her echolalia (a condition in which autistic children repeat immediately what is said to them) manifested itslef through her natural musical talent.
Brittany has been studying formally for two years. She initially played with only the third finger of each hand as she had never seen how the insturment was acutally played. Over the past two years, her technical ability has improved to where she plays correctly with all of her fingers. Her musical memory is so great that she can learn simple pieces by Gurlitt, Turk, and other composers in a single lesson. She also loves Beethoven and has learned the exposition to the Sonata Opus 2, No. 1 and can reproduce it almost exactly as written.
Brittany's lessons must follow a rigid routine for her to be able to function without stress or emotional upset. her mother begins the day be telling her exactly what she will do including coming to her piano lesson. When she arrives, I tell her exactly the order of the tasks she will be asked to do. She remembers them exactly and will often tell me what is next in the lesson.
Like any child, Brittany hates finger exercises unless they are challenging. She often tries to comete with me for clarity and speed. She enjoys a challenge and responds exceptionally well to difficult tasks. She particularly loves the music of Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, and Scriabin and will jump up and down and rock back and forth with the music. She has little interest in the piano music of Mozart, Brahms, or Bach.
Teaching Brittany requires enormous patience, and Herculean organization to maintain routines and sub-routines within the teaching process. A typical session within the lesson consists of me asking her if she wants to do the task, playing the example, asking if I may show her how to play the example, and then working hands seperately and then together to build up small units of the piece. The best results come when the repertoire is well-composed and has routines built into the melodic patterns, form, and harmony.
Through specialized teaching and learning processes, Brittany has learned that she can make her own music and now improvises full length pieces complete with melodic motives, form, and correct harmonic progressions. She remembers these pieces and can replay them with very little variation in content.
Through a fund raising project by local volunteers and the support of a local piano dealer, brittany has been able to purchase a Yamaha Disklavier. The capabilities of this instrument have allowed her to save her improvisaiton to a computer disc, and to expand her technical and performance ability. She is very fortunate to have the complete love and support of her family and community.
She is truly a savant at the piano and her devlopment has been remarkable. She takes great joy in music, performing, and listening to other people perform - often with embarassingly uncompromising standards. She plays the instrument all day long taking breaks only for meals and other daily activities. Her parents have often heard the piano music tapering off in the evening only to find that Brittany has fallen asleep at the instrument.
Scott Price, Assistant Professor of Piano and Piano Pedagogy, University of South Carolina.
Currently I am teaching 1 Down's Syndrome child. Past experiences in this area have included 2 other students with Down's Syndrome and one who received massive brain injuries as a child. Bryann has studied with me for about 6 months now and had just a little previous study that was very sporadic. She is a home-schooled 7th grader who has exceptional verbal skills! She brought the Alfred's Prep Course Level A books to her first lesson, so this is where we started (along with some flash cards). In those 6 months, she has completed Level A and has a good start on Level B. She participated in the Christmas and Classics Festival with 2 memorized pieces (very short, but she did it) and received a blue ribbon - much to the delight of her parents who were both there to be her cheerleaders! She also played at the studio Christmas recital. Ê Bryann has done very well, but her handicap has been most apparent when working with numbers (rhythmic values particularly) and with spacial concepts (finding the basic "hand position" and seeing directional changes in the music). Her note naming skills are that of the average beginner. She has an exceptional ear for music and sings along - in tune! We are using a theory book, but her enthusiasm for this resource is shown by the fact that she frequently leaves it at home. I think it mystifies her, and things she feels unsure of get left undone. She memorizes her pieces almost instantly. Bryann questions the starting position of every piece. She can easily tell me the name of a key from the picture on the flash card, but when she looks down at all those keys on the piano, she becomes confused and keeps asking "is this right?" I can see further challenges ahead when the music moves out of a basic five finger pattern. However, Bryann is bolstered by her sense of accomplishment, and she loves to perform, so I anticipate that she will triumph over most of these challenges if we take things slowly. As I mentioned before, Bryann is exceptional.
My first experience working with a student with a severe learning disability was during my graduate school years. Jimmy, a 21 year old gentleman who had suffered severe brain injury as a child, enthusiastically entered my home with keyboard in hand to take lessons. He had been plunking around on his own for some time and could play a basic melody or two and was really excited about knowing more. His brain injury left him with the mental skills of a child of about 7 or 8, palsy that made his hands shake, and violent epileptic seizures. He, too, had an exceptional ear for music. He studied with me for about 3 years (until I moved out of state) and learned quite a lot. During our lessons, Jimmy was a challenge to stay focused on the activity at hand. His excitement about being at the lesson was sometimes overwhelming, and his interest in me and my family often took him away from his focus on the music (constant questions about me or endearing compliments). When he accomplished any goal, he shook with delight. Jimmy learned to read music in the C and G five-finger positions. He learned to add chords to simple melodies that he picked out by ear. Although Jimmy had palsy in his hands, when he played the piano, the shaking stopped! Our biggest frustration occurred after periods of epileptic seizures. It seemed that after he had a rough bout of seizures, his brain was wiped clean of what he had learned in the previous month. So a lot of reteaching occurred, and I could not assume that Jimmy remembered anything. He played for several student recitals and he loved to play at his church.
Working with Bryann and others with learning challenges has strongly influenced my teaching methods. One of my pedagogy teachers in college always said "arrange for success." When teaching students with extra challenges, one has constantly to be creative in finding ways to make success happen. Sometimes this has led me to do things like color coding every note in a piece and putting matching stickers on the keyboard. I think that each of us has strengths and weaknesses when it comes to any learning situation, and finding and building on the strengths is the challenge of the teacher.
Each of these special students has been SO loving and a joy to work with. Because each step forward is such a big accomplishment, the excitement in the students and in the eyes of their families is worth every bit of frustration when finding a strength to build on is elusive. It is worth the effort, and at times I have thought that I should be paying them for the lesson instead of their paying me. After all, what I learn from teaching them I can use everyday! I have also had several geriatric students and my husband & I have both taught ADHD children as well. These students require a variety of special teaching skills (and EXTREME patience sometimes) to address physical and mental obstacles.
Sharon Witherell, Independent Music Teacher, Columbia, SC
Margaret is ten years old and is both blind and autistic. She has a small amount of sight in her left eye. Our lessons consist of a regimented routine that is the same for evey lesson. The internal content of each activity may change, but the actual order and routine must remain the same for autisic students to function well in the lesson. Margaret knows many folk tunes and loves to figure out how to play them on the piano. Because of her blindness, we choose folk tunes that are easily executed on either the black or the white keys in an attempt to acculturate her to the different planes of the keyboard. We have recently begun transposing her tunes into patterns that combine both the black and white keys and Margaret is learning to do this with a small amount of resistance. Acitivities usually start with her left hand as she favors it due to the small amount of sight in her left eye. She is able to play "Jolly Old St. Nicholas", "Mary Had a Little Lamb" beginning on six different keys, and is learning to play "Row, Row, Row Your Boat". Her rhythmic ability and aural discrimination ability are very strong and she works avidly to correct her wrong notes. Margaret is learning five-finger patterns and we are beginning to work with steps and skips to build her improvisation skills. She is a remarkable child and I am privileged to be challenged as a teacher.
Scott Price, Assistant Professor of Piano and Piano Pedagogy, University of South Carolina.
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