Practice Notes: A notebook for fostering independent learning in beginning musicians

Learning an instrument requires a growth mindset focused towards experimentation, problem solving and discovery. Our aim is to make your practicing easier and more effective each week.

This notebook is designed to facilitate your note taking, information gathering, planning, problem solving and reflections. Week by week, day by day, parents and children will find a space to record:

• information and assignments from their teacher,
• their own thoughts and discoveries,
• their accomplishments, and
• their goals.

Our goals are:
(1) to make notetaking easier and more effective each week, and
(2) to encourage your child to participate in notetaking, even if he or she is not quite ready to write notes on his or her own yet.

During your weekly lesson, use the left page to record your overall practice goal and individual practice assignments, including how to work on each item and what to look and listen for.

Then, as the week progresses, make note of your and your child’s discoveries during practices, i.e. things that went well, questions you have for your teacher, challenges you encountered and the ways you managed them, etc.

During the week, your child can use the page on the right to track her progress each day by colouring in practice items as she completes them.

This 36 week notebook is also an important tool for communication with your teacher along your journey and a starting point for conversations about your and your child’s reflections, questions and challenges. Our hope is that they will bring harmony and thoughtfulness in your musical journey.