Bridge Welcome!

Parent Note

Hello Bridge Parents!!!

I’ve missed all your children’s bright, shining faces this summer! I can’t wait for classes to start! Classes start Tuesday August 30th, and below I have the assigned day/times for each class. There is little flexibility, but if you absolutely can’t make your time work, let me know. I have to coordinate with other families to make sure it works for everyone, but there’s a chance we can work something out.

Classes are 1 hour long. When you signed your child up for Bridge you agreed to have them doing piano assignments for 30 minutes a day, 5 days a week. That time can be used for piano practice, audio track listening, workbook pages, or fun piano playing (if the other stuff is done). I know things have been crazy this past several months, but a return to routine and predictability will be SO GOOD for these kids. Please be consistent in practice. Some practice each day is better than a bunch of practice once a week. These kids need your help and encouragement to be successful.

Now would be a good time to start re-establishing the practice routine.

The most important things to review:

All cadences and scales – C major, F major, G major, A minor, C minor, etc. These are the “Red, Blue, Red, Yellow, Red” chords in those keys. Be sure they are using the correct fingering – especially the 2nd and 3rd fingers.

Review everything in their Connections workbooks. Review all the songs they learned last semester. Listen to their Purple Magic and Orange Roots audio tracks and review the theory content in the lyrics. (Particularly “Treble, Bass, Line and Space”, and “Magic Keys”).

You may find it helpful to review the skills demonstrated in this quick video from 3rd year with your child:

IMPORTANT

Parent Orientation will be held Saturday August 27th at 1:30PM at my home. It is important that the parent helping with practice attends the parent orientation. You will receive your student’s materials, and I will explain our elaborate, but AWESOME rewards system this year. I will also explain the practice charts and give some troubleshooting ideas. It will be difficult to get up-to-speed on this information if you miss this meeting. As always, I will try to keep it brief.

Timeline

If you’re wondering about the timeline for classes – Bridge is a 35(ish) week course, split into two semesters. Your children start with a week or two of review using their Connections books. This will get them back up to speed and ready to succeed in Bridge. If the students are struggling with the material, I may choose to add lessons to catch everyone up at a rate of $15/student/lesson.

Bridge has 2 “Special Saturday Sessions” per semester, private lesson format. This is to be a one-on-one check in to help prevent frustration. The cost is included in your tuition. This semester’s Special Saturday Sessions will be on October 22nd and December 10th. A signup will be passed around at parent orientation to reserve a specific time on those days.

Piano Suggestions

• If you own an acoustic piano, you really should get it tuned ASAP. You may think it is close enough, but we spend the majority of class training your child to develop perfect pitch and to recognize melodic patterns, intervals, and chords. It would be counterproductive and damaging for them to be hearing out-of-tune patterns, intervals, and chords at home all week long. I can refer a very inexpensive piano tuner if you need.
• If you own an electric keyboard, please consider purchasing a stand. They are very inexpensive used, or new on Amazon. Just placing the keyboard on a table will not place it at the proper height to reinforce the posture and flexibility habits we teach in class. Bad habits are hard to break!
• If your piano is broken in anyway (missing keys, glitchy sound) please get it repaired or replaced. Their fingers need the repetitive practice to develop muscle memory, but it is impossible if they are navigating missing keys.

Classes

Tuesday 3:30

• Arinya “Ellie” Sittinatesakul
• Kate Compton
• Caitlin Branson

Tuesday 4:45

• Brooks Compton
• Gideon Wright
• Adelyn Bunzell

Please let me know if you have a scheduling conflict – the sooner the better.

Be sure to bring Connections books to class. I will distribute all other materials at the parent orientation.

Text me if you have any questions or concerns.

-Judie Hall

P.S. I would be extremely grateful if you could share a post about my music classes on social media. If you shared your vote of confidence in my music classes it would really mean a lot. I do give a $25 tuition credit for every referral that registers.