I think everyone knows by now that there is a studio-wide challenge to practice every day for 100 consecutive days. This may sound like a lot at first, but I think it's a completely manageable amount of time. My main goal in issuing this challenge is to get all of the students in the habit of picking up the guitar every day. Some days this may just be to play one review song while other days will be more productive practice sessions. In any case, getting the guitars in hand is the big goal. I've handed out guidelines for making this work and charts for keeping track. Make it fun with stickers, coloring, and maybe some extra rewards throughout the process. Let me know how it's going and if you need extra tips. At the end of the 100 days, we'll have a party (pizza party and bowling party were mentioned). Hope to see everyone there!

PS: Leave comments below if you come up with a great way to make this even more successful. So far I've heard of quite a few students who have made it past 10 days!

We have a big performance coming up to celebrate the accomplishment of polishing all of the Twinkle Variations.  We will also include some of the other repertoire in this recital.  But the main focus will be Twinkle, which we will play as a group.  You should always be reviewing Twinkle (even after this recital), but to make sure they are extra polished, I made a practice sheet of the variations.  Keep up your other review as well.  During lessons, I'll decide what other pieces everyone will also contribute (as solos or as a group).  Then, after the recital, we'll have a little party.  I'm hoping to hear back soon from Ian's Pizza right next door to Overture...more later.

Download the PDF of the practice sheet below.  Decorate the sheets however you want.  Keep track of practice with stickers, drawing smiley faces (for happy practicing), or mark an 'x' or 'check'.  We now have 45 days to the recital.  Parents, please tally up the total number of variations practiced by August 26 (thoughtfully practiced...not just once through as fast as possible!).  The student with the highest number of variations practiced will get recognition at the recital for his or her hard work.  That means 45 (days) x 6 (variations)=270 possible points.  Happy practicing only!  Unhappy practicing is never as productive--and there will be plenty of recognition for all students regardless of how many times these variations were practiced!  Let me know if you have any questions.

Recently, several students have been starting to work on reading.  One of the first elements of learning to read music is being able to identify the names of notes on the page.  For this, we have flash cards, note hunter (picking out certain notes from a repertoire piece), sight reading with a limited number of notes, and other games that we do in lessons and group class.  I encourage this as a regular part of practice.  There are also a couple of games that I found online. 
Eek!Shark!: Set up the note range on the treble clef (one on left) and select the range depending on what we're working on in lessons (most of you are working on notes from g on the staff to g right above the staff).  You can select a smaller range to start with.  The game is straight forward from there, other than it took me a while to figure out that in order to catch a note "coin" in your bag you have to press the SPACE BAR.  It moves pretty quickly.  Identify the note on the staff in the upper left corner and catch the coin that matches the note name.

Note Name Drill: Not so much a game as a drill...but still pretty fun. To set up,  click 'Select None' then enter the range: On the "Middle C" line, select G, A, B, then on the line labelled "1" you can select up to G (that's our range, G-G).  There is no goal, but to try to beat your own personal best.  There is no time limit, so try to set a limit for yourself, maybe 90 seconds.  For those students who are very keyboard proficient, you can use the keyboard to enter note names...otherwise clicking the buttons below the staff works well.

Hope these games are useful.  Let me know if you have any questions or if you find anything

This topic is being addressed, in some way, at every lesson meeting.  There are ideas for how to practice, new pieces to practice, and games for repetition.  We also REVIEW many of our old pieces and make time to learn something new or focus on a specific element of one of the newer pieces.  This is how home lessons should be run: review old pieces, play new ones and focus on a specific thing to work on.  I'll often assign a number of repetitions to do for a certain passage in home lessons.  We'll often use games in class to make this seem less like a chore and more of a game.  You should use games at home too.  Here are some suggestions; please post other games that work at your home.

Most importantly, establish what the goal is (ex: eliminate buzz tone on A in "Going Home", or keep i and m fingers resting gently on 1st string through the whole piece).  Then do the repetitions:

-Silly Cards: Fast becoming a studio favorite.  Make your own "Silly Cards".  Have a silly thing to do while playing the passage.  Draw a new card for each repetition (stick out your tongue, close your eyes, make a fish face, make a monkey face).
-Spell a name: after every repetition, the child earns another letter toward spelling his or her name.  Put the letters on index cards and give them in order or out of order for an extra challenge.
-Pennies/marbles/beans in a jar: for every repetition, put another one in the jar.  Try to get to a certain number or place on the jar. 
-Review Notebook: Write down the names of all of the review songs, put a tally mark next to every successful repetition of the song.  Have a reward after a certain number of repetitions (100, 1000).
-Dominoes: every repetition gets new domino lined up (parent lines up the dominoes so students is up and down too much).  After the number of repetitions, student gets to start the chain reaction of knocking down dominoes.
-Practice Candle: Burn a candle every time you practice. Once the candle has reached its end, have a reward for the student (pick out a book from the bookstore).

These are just a few suggestions.  Let me know any ideas you have that work at home and I'll add them to the list.