If you're the parent of a busy child who's struggling to find the motivation to practice right now, you're not alone.
By the middle of the school year, many parents find that music practice is a struggle for their kids as the cumulative fatigue of the school year sets in.
While practice motivation may pick up as spring concert or recital dates approach, how do you get them to practice before there's an urgency to do so?
These three tools have helped me motivate my students to learn music faster and could help your kids, too.
TOOL #1: Practice rubric
Students are more likely to practice if they have step-by-step guidance regarding how to do it. I developed practice rubrics that break each piece down into manageable practice steps students can master one at a time.
These rubrics have worked like a charm! They've motivated my students to learn their music faster by making practice easier. How? Because the rubric makes what and how they need to practice more clearly defined.
I developed a wind instrument rubric and a piano rubric which address the slightly different practice approaches necessary for each instrument. For a limited time, these rubrics are available to you for FREE at The Music Shop on my website. Check them out and see if they work for your child.
TOOL #2: The "How to Practice a Work Place" guide
Students can also stop practicing because they feel stuck and don't know what to do. Perhaps they keep messing up the same sections over and over no matter how hard they try, so they get frustrated and give up altogether.
In this situation, your child need help getting over this stumbling block.
I call these hard sections "work places" with my students. And I developed a guide called How to Practice a Work Place that gives step-by-step instructions for making hard sections feel easier and sound better. Get the guide here.
TOOL #3: Tapping Into Your Child's Core Motivators
We're all motivated by different things. One person might be motivated to go to work by the steady paycheck, while another finds the comradery of the office or the work they're engaged in motivating.
Similarly, one child may be motivated to practice by the pure joy they experience when making music, while another child may find preparing for an upcoming recital or praise from their teacher to be the galvanizing practice force.
Because each child is motivated by different things, it's worth taking some time to identify your child's unique core motivators. Once identified, you can tap into what they find most rewarding about playing their instrument to make learning music faster and easier. Read this blog to learn how to identify your child's core motivators.
The silver lining of any practice slump is the opportunity it provides to try new practice ideas and techniques. If your child is struggling right now, try one or two of the strategies I've shared above so your child can tap into a whole new resource for practice motivation and satisfaction.
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