Week 17

Week 17

 

12-6-06

 

After such a disappointing week last week, Riley and I were both determined to help The Maestro have an enjoyable and productive lesson today. During a fit of insomnia a few nights ago I came up with a game idea ("I'm silly" to fit with the 4 ^th Twinkle Variation rhythm) and a song (A-D ostinato pattern to accompany me playing "Go Tell Aunt Rhody"). The Maestro was especially fidgety today, but we managed through Love & Logic and a lot of incentives to keep him on task and on his chair. Licking things is still an issue. Riley clarified for him that the lesson rule meant no licking wooden things or people. I agreed. So, The Maestro very "obediently" avoided licking people, cellos, and anything else wooden, and instead repeatedly licked his vinyl chair and the carpet floor. We'll have to specify that more in the future. We were both quite devastated last week when he abruptly gave the closing bow in the middle of the lesson, demonstrating that he was finished for the day. For that reason, I think both Riley and I were so concerned about having him enjoy the lesson today that we gave in to a few more discipline issues than we would have really liked.

 

I told The Maestro I had a game to teach him if he could show me five things he had learned in his past lessons. This took some doing to keep him motivated, but he did it. I gave him a strip of paper for each thing he showed me. Not the greatest incentive, but I was desperate and grabbed whatever I could see. After receiving [three?] pieces of paper he said, "I don't like pieces of paper." As I started to get discouraged, Riley said, "Oh, but you like games. And this is how you get to play a game." That worked.

 

The "I'm silly" game went considerably well. We moved the slider on his rhythm stick (a.k.a. the "tucka bow" and now the "silly stick") in rhythm while saying "I'm silly," then stopped and did something silly. This included me making chicken noises, Riley balancing the rhythm stick on her nose, and The Maestro falling on the floor. The plan was to get him to move the rhythm stick 3 times and then stop. The silly activity was enough motivation to get him to stop. Hooray!

 

Typically I will show The Maestro something new in a lesson and he will do it once only, until Riley comes up with various practice strategies at home to get him to make it routine. We managed a few rounds of "I'm silly," so I felt good about it. I asked him a couple of times if he wanted to keep playing or learn a new song. Finally he expressed a desire to learn the song. I had hoped that he would pluck along, but he didn't. However, thinking this might be the case, I had asked Riley to bring her cello along and play with The Maestro. She and I played a duet of "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" with her plucking the ostinato pattern, while The Maestro "jammed" with random pizzicato using both hands. I could be wrong, but I think out of the corner of my eye I saw Riley get slightly weepy during the song. I'll have to ask her about that.

 

12-8-06

 

Today I went over to the Elwood's for a while. The Maestro and Riley had just finished their cello practice, which went "OK," according to Riley. They had practiced the Silly rhythm with Toobers & Zots & Oobles. Riley demonstrated what they had done, and I suggested that they add a "What?" to the "I'm silly," in antiphonal dialogue between child and mother.

 

While The Maestro played I went over to ask him how to do the rhythm with his Toober, and I actually did one rhythm myself. He said to me, "I would like you to go away." I told him I wouldn't play with him then, and went into the kitchen to talk to Riley. I should have told him, "It hurts my feelings when you say…" but it didn't come to mind. He has never expressed that sentiment before – in fact, being able to play with me has been a good incentive for him in the past. I have a feeling that this expression came because I had pushed him too much by trying to get him to do the rhythm again.

 

About an hour later we got back together and played. After I had done something on the silly side, he said, "You're so silly!" I immediately grabbed his rhythm stick and performed "I'm silly!" Riley was there and suggested that, if The Maestro could do the rhythm 3 times [right?], she and I would swing him. The antiphonal dialogue of The Maestro's "I'm silly" and Riley's "What?" went without a hitch, and I watched with elation as The Maestro performed rhythm 4 of 4. Finally!!!!!! The moment just happened so naturally, but in my heart I reflected on the past 17 weeks of lessons, hoping and praying and working so hard to get him to this point. Riley and I shared a quick smile as we took The Maestro up to swing him, she holding his hands and I holding his feet, swinging him to the "I'm silly" rhythm and stopping his body with Riley's body on "what." He performed the rhythm again when Eric arrived home from work. Tomorrow morning he'll come for a mini lesson, and maybe… just maybe… he will go home with a bow.

 

12-09-06

 

One major milestone accomplished! The Maestro went home with his real bow today. I don't know which of the three of us was the most excited about it, but I'll say for myself that it was better than Christmas.

 

Last night, after The Maestro performed his final rhythm, Riley and I made dinner in the kitchen and chatted about our "game plan" for today. It was important for me to have The Maestro connect his receipt of the bow with his performance of rhythms. I wanted to give him some sort of visual representation for each rhythm, such as a card with pictures, but Riley suggested that I play each rhythm on the CD for him. That made sense to me but seemed a little labor-intensive and potentially distracting to The Maestro. After some brainstorming, we decided to have me play each rhythm for him on my cello. Of course.

 

Things went almost completely without a hitch. The Maestro was squirmy at first, but was happy to play the "I'm silly" game. He did the rhythm 6 times (2 separate plus 4 in a row) and got swung 6 times (quite by chance, 4 in a row plus 2 in a row). Afterward, I told him that I would give him 4 guesses to see what I had for him, and I would play my cello to give him hints. I asked him what the first rhythm was that he learned, and he said clearly, "Tucka tucka stop-stop." I played the opening to Twinkle for him, using this rhythm. Afterward I asked him what the next rhythm was. He got squirmy, so I mentioned that he was guessing what his present was. That immediately got him back in his seat. He mentioned next that he had learned "Peanuts," which I pointed out to him was also "I'm silly," and added while I played Twinkle for him that the variation started, " Silly, I'm silly." He guessed "Run doggie" next, and I played it for him. He couldn't think of the remaining rhythm, so I gave him a hint, after which he said, "Riding on my motorcycle."

 

Note: The Maestro learned to perform these rhythms in a different order than is presented in the books and on the CDs, but when he was asked to recall them he did so in the proper order. That speaks to the difference in brain processing and motor skills, but it also reminds me that these activities and songs are sequenced so that often more challenging skills are followed by easier skills in order to push the child a little and then allow the child to celebrate and feel confident by learning something easier. We went out of order from the book but went in the order that seemed to work best for The Maestro as well as his mom.

 

After performing this final rhythm for him, I got out a wrapped present and we unwrapped it together. He opened it up, and held the bow in his hand for a minute without saying anything. I asked him what it was. He beamed, carefully ran his fingers along the stick, and said, "My real bow." We all took in the moment. Then, Riley rubbed his back and said, "You earned it!" at the same second that I patted his shoulders and said, "You did all your rhythms and got your bow." He was one smiling boy.

 

As he stood up to get his cello, he said, "Now I know how to play vibrato with my real bow!" He remembered to tighten the bow without a reminder from us. He has certainly been taking in what we have shown him with my and Riley's bows.

 

The remainder of the lesson was a delight. Every ounce of squirmy energy went right into playing his cello. What a sight – even Carter Brey doesn't emote as much as The Maestro does. I used the Elwood's red timer to keep track of amounts that he could "jam" versus amounts of time that he would receive instruction on how to hold the bow. Two minutes of each was the plan, but The Maestro was actually quite cooperative in learning how to hold the bow and we didn't have to spend much time watching the clock. I think the red timer will come in handy after the honeymoon period has again worn off (dare I even bring that up right now?). As I write this I realize that I've resorted to the clock watching paradigm, something teachers should try and avoid because they should keep the pedagogical strategies interesting and motivational in their own right. However, the question is not about motivating him to play the cello; it is about motivating him to sit and follow instruction before he can play the cello again. Nevertheless, I need to keep those instructions interesting and fun as well.

 

After a particular bouncy bow in his "jam session" I mentioned that he was doing sautillé bowing. He immediately bounced the bow and said, "This is my spidiccato!" He had apparently learned about spiccato from a violin show at the library. As he bounced high and started to whap the strings, I reached for the bow to stop him while Riley calmly asked "the teacher" what such bouncing might do to the cello. I explained that it could hurt the cello, and this was all the motivation The Maestro needed to bounce gently.

 

The Maestro favored the C string because, as I note later, that's how his arm angle was set up. I don't know if Riley noted my attention to spinning strings or a beautiful tone, something that will later become crucial in his instruction. In our particular method of instruction, nothing is more important than creating a beautiful tone, since a performer's tone expresses the character of the player himself, both in a musical and a spiritual way.

 

I played "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" with him while he jammed (he wasn't quite ready to let go of the bow to do the ostinato pizzicato A and D; using the bow will be a good "carrot" for practicing the pizzicato activities and learning to finger).

 

The Maestro's preparatory 100 bow holds on the pretend bow did wonders; he had a soft, bent thumb and placed his fingers quite well. The 2^nd finger goes half on the metal, half on the hair; the first finger on the green treble clef (he chose the sticker); the "moon" (mother of pearl dot) goes between his 3 ^rd and 4^th fingers. Riley suggested that we cut a corn pad in half so he would know how to place his thumb (it has to be cut in half, of course, because the thumb spot narrows and widens with respective loosening and tightening of the bow).

 

Next I taught The Maestro to play jiggle sirens. He really liked this, but struggled to find the D string with his bow and finger. We showed him "Rock and Roll" on the bridge, and I showed Riley how his elbow angle (NOT shoulder) will raise and lower as he changes strings. They will practice both of these things at home.

 

At one point today The Maestro said, "I wanted to wait longer for my bow, but now I got my real bow." I'm not sure what he meant by this... (inside joke to Riley), although I can imagine a lot of different scenarios.

 

I'm so glad for this video camera so I can watch everything again. While I was watching his bow hand, setting it up, and talking to him about his practice routine, I absolutely missed the fact that his first finger was on the first finger sticker, doing a relaxed arm vibrato better than most of my Book 3 students can do. I've had a few students pick up vibrato on their own without any instruction from me, but never before they had played their first song! I'll have to look at that sometime in real life – although I'll have to tread carefully on the subject. Maybe that can be his little secret for a while until he can play Twinkle. We'll see how it goes.

 

At one point in the lesson The Maestro said, "If you stop this I'll be angry." I asked him how he might say that a little more nicely, and helped him to say, "I'm really having fun." Since he was obviously behaviorally ready for more, and since I'll be gone for Christmas and won't be able to teach him for three weeks, I didn't give it a second thought when The Maestro asked for a corn pad to be put on his cello neck so he would know where to put his fingers (he has seen the corn pad on Riley's cello). In addition to the thumb corn pad, I put stickers (of his choice, of course) on each spot for his fingers. The second most exciting moment of the lesson for me was when I looked up and saw all of the fingers on his left hand nicely and strongly curved, placed on each of the stickers.

 

As the lesson came to a close, I asked The Maestro to consider naming his bow. He named it "Gor Gur" (or something like that). The Maestro began to loosen his bow without anyone reminding him to do so. Riley asked if they could borrow a recording of Beethoven's 5 ^th Symphony, which The Maestro wanted to hear. I made the mistake of saying that I didn't like my recording. The Maestro said in a defensive voice, "I like it!" I had to explain that the recording itself was kind of funny because they used gut strings and old instruments, and the sound didn't ring out quite as much.

 

The Maestro and I gave a final bow with our cellos and bows, with the bow tip pointing to the ground. After the lesson he brought in his pretend trombone that he had made last night.

 

 

Holiday Round-up

We are on our second week without Hildegard.  After the semester ended, she flew home for Christmas, leaving us bereft of both her company and organized cello lessons.   The kids miss her terribly.  For the first few days after she left, I would come home from work and Hildr would give me her usual grinning "Daddy Home!"   She would then follow with "'Dard Home?"  No, Honey.  Hildegard isn't coming over today.

 

She had a video that she lent to us to use in lieu of lessons -- Zen and the Art of Cello Teaching, or something like that.   I suppose I should go look it up for the exact title, but my feet are warm where I am.  I would say it's a series of video-taped cello lessons a lady is giving a young girl.   Rather than having his own lesson, The Maestro gets to watch someone else's.  The Maestro has enjoyed it.  The first time he watched some of it, he was amazed that the ski jumps and knuckle knocks (two exercises designed to train his cello hand to move up and down the fingerboard) were legitimate exercises.   From his incredulous reaction, it seems he thought Hildegard had made them up to distract him while he waited for his real bow.  If they are on a video, however, they must be really real.   Funny boy.

 

Riley has gotten organized with a chart to check of what he works on everyday.  She has had vestigial versions of this before, but now that he has his real bow, she needs to keep track of his 500 demonstrated bow holds before Hildegard can check it off.   With keeping track of the 100 holds on the practice bow, she tried several versions of motivating sticker charts, including 100 glow-in-the-dark stars he could put up in his room.   All this was despite his consistent lack of motivation by sticker charts.  Since he has to show 500 this time, there is no way he can keep track of the stickers or stars or coloured-in saxophone cutouts.   She marks them down in her book, and also keeps track of whether he did knuckle knocks, or ski jumps, or slap bass, or whatever.  I think he is somewhere above 50 bow holds this week.

 

Friday we went to a friend's annual Christmas party/Concert.  Everyone invited is supposed to demonstrate a talent.   The first year I did a chemical demonstration (a clock reaction), Riley read a story and the Maestro did an impromptu demonstration of his conducting skills.   A number of people there were taking violin lessons and Riley has always credited their violin performances with starting the Maestro on his musical quest.  I disagree, but that is another post, I suppose.   Last year, I was sick, so I didn't do my own talent, but Riley gave a slide show of portraits she had taken.  I did do a brief trumpet duet with the Maestro so he could show off his "High" and "Low" notes.   A coworker of mine gave the Maestro his trumpet, and he played High notes with the bell up in the air, and low notes with the trumpet pointing down to the floor.   Then he borrowed a toy M-16 assault rifle and turned it into a bassoon for a number of months.  We finally returned it, in time for this year's party.

 

This year I was sick again (my annual holiday tradition, it seems) so I passed off my Gluten-free brownies as my talent.   Hildr skipped around the room while people performed, saying "Dancing… Dancing… Dancing…" and showed off her dress.  I think her talent is acting cute.   The Maestro and Riley played their cellos.  The Maestro showed rest position, some knuckle knocks, and "Rock and Roll", wherein he lifts his elbow to roll his bow to the higher strings.   Then, while Riley played Twinkle, he jammed.  At the conclusion, they both stood with their cellos and bowed together to thunderous applause.

At this point, Hildr had stopped dancing and wanted to explore upstairs.  She turned 18 months last week, and it was past her bedtime, so I was impressed that she had lasted that long.   Besides, she wanted some "Pink! Juice!" from the kitchen.  Apparently, after we left, the youngest performer there did "Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop" on her violin.   This will become relevant momentarily.  The violin performance, I mean, not the juice.  The juice was "Licious!" though.

 

Sunday, Riley tried to get the Maestro excited for a cello practice by having him show me what he had learned.   This has never gone well.  I rarely see him have a cello practice at all, and even then, it is never one the Riley considers a good one.  So I was sitting, waiting for him to get out his cello, then to settle into his chair.  Then he didn't want to get a good bow hold.  Then he was rolling of the floor showing me one of his "tricks".   It occurred to me that he was actually working very hard to avoid showing me anything that he could do, so I went to the bathroom instead.

 

As soon as I left, I started to hear cello sounds from the other room.  From in the bathroom, it's hard to tell who is doing what.   Sometimes Riley plucks or bows on Carolyn and has the Maestro tell her what she is doing.  When it sounded like the practice was over, I came out and Riley told me the he had done "Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop" on Carolyn!   So far, he had only done random sawing, or an occasional long, drawn out note.  He asked me if I had heard him play "Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop", and I had heard someone play it, so I told him I had.  Then I put my hand on his shoulder and told him that I was very happy with his playing, and was really proud of him.   It was just like something out of the last five minutes of a sitcom.  You should have seen his face light up when I told him I was proud of him.

 

Riley thinks that The Maestro was motivated to do a genuine Twinkle Variation rhythm because he saw another kid did one as a performance.   I think it was sort of like a group lesson for him.  There are so many advantages to having Hildegard as the teacher; the fact that he is her only student this year and doesn't have group lessons to go to IS a disadvantage, it seems.

 

I guess it was in the book "Helping Parents Practice" that Edmund Sprunger talks about how kids so really, really don't want to disappoint their parents that it sometimes paralyzes them.   The doi9ssaz9azaa9aaAAZZXZS XSDCSS SQQsAaaqsqqwq q qqhb Maestro has some of that going on, I think, because he never wants to show me anything, but is clearly interested in my opinion of what he does.   (Hildr helped me with that last sentence)  Today, I found a way to kind of short circuit his fear of disappointing me, I think.   What I ended up seeing was the best practice I think I have ever witnessed.

 

The Maestro has been sick since Christmas Eve, and has taken a nap nearly everyday.  This is quite rare for a boy who is usually so driven to do whatever he is doing that he can't stop for meals or bathroom breaks.   You know he is tired when he says things like "I'm tired.  I want to take a nap."  Yesterday I had to wake him up from his nap, and it wasn't going well.   He and Hildr got into an argument about a puppet that they had been playing with earlier, so I got out another puppet, Dog.  In an earlier attempt to get the Maestro's brain waves straightened out, I had turned on his Cello music listening CD, and he started telling Dog about the Cello and the songs that he knew.   Dog asked him if he knew "Run Doggie", which is one of the Twinkle variations, and coincidently Dog's favourite song.  The Maestro said that he did know it, and he knew lots of other songs.

 

After dinner, The Maestro had a Cello practice, and I got Dog out again to be his audience.  I may be somewhat intimidating for him, but he had a great time showing Dog everything on his list, including a rough version of "Run Doggie".  In addition to "Run Doggie" and "Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop", he did knuckle knocks, ski jumps, slap bass, sirens and rock and roll.   For the most part, he kept his feet on the carpet where they were supposed to be, and he did the "Up Like a Rocket…" song with his bow.  I haven't seen that in at least a month.   It was easily the best practice I have ever seen him do, without question. 

 

It will be interesting to see how many times giving a concert to a puppet works for him.  Will he be willing to demonstrate things to other puppets once he decides the Dog knows everything?   We have a whole drawer of puppets…

 

After he was done, he and Dog had a wrestling match.

Bow Day!

After last night’s success, the Maestro went in for a cello lesson this morning. Hildr and I stayed home, ostensibly so she could take a nap, which of course she didn’t. About an hour later, the Maestro walked into the kitchen wearing Carolyn (the cello) as a backpack. He took it off, faced it towards me and said “Guess what is in my cello case, Dad!” I could just see the tip of the bow sticking out of the holder, and he was very excited to show me.

He immediately got out his cello, set up his stool, and sat down to play. He wanted more Rosin, so Riley found some for him, and he carefully slid it up and down the bow-hair. He reminded me a little of a warrior sharpening a sword. It was all concentration and care.

Apparently, the rule is that he gets to play free-form for two minutes after having his bow-hold checked. He learned the hold pretty well on the practice bow, but the real bow is shaped differently, it is heavier, and he is exerting pressure on it. All of that is going to make it quite a different matter to maintain a proper hold.

So, he was sitting there, sawing away with a look of absolute concentration, like he was performing for the world. I asked him if he would play “Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop” for me. He stopped, looked at me and said, “Don’t say that. You don’t like ‘Tuck-a Tuck-a Stop Stop’. It isn’t fun anymore.” Then he went back to Carnegie Hall in his mind. Oh. Right. I forgot.

Aside from the short quick bowing (Tremolo), he was showing good gentle Spiccato, bouncing the bow off the strings, and occasionally he would get the string to spin, pulling on it with a long draw. He did most of his play on the C-string, the one closest to his bow hand, but a few times he lifted his elbow beautifully to play one of the other strings.

One thing that is difficult for me is that I don’t know how to guide him. I found myself wanting to correct him, like telling him to hold Carolyn tighter between his knees when she starts to slip. I am not home most of the time he will play, so this is more of a problem for Riley, and I think she will have a better idea of when to intervene that I do. A couple of times this morning he stopped, looked at me as if to say “Dad, you are cramping my style” and went back to what he was doing.

He needed to stop for a snack briefly; then I went to work. I will be interested in finding out how much time they spend with Carolyn and Pablo out today. I expect he will be interested in giving me a concert when I get home later.

No More Peanuts, That's Just Silly!

Last Friday, we spent some time talking with Hildegard about the bow and the final rhythm the Maestro needs to show. She has some ideas of things to try, and also when to try them. The final rhythm, which we call “Peanuts and Popcorn” is Pea-nuts, and Pop-corn, are stuck in, my f-holes, etc. So, 1,2- rest -1,2,3- rest -1,2,3- rest etc. I guess that should start with 2,3, not 1,2. Anyway, he hasn’t been getting it.

The crew had a lesson on Wednesday, and I think it must have gone better, but no one wanted to tell me about it. Riley took the kids to Nearby Competing University (NCU) to visit some friends for the week-end. They got home Tuesday afternoon, and were pretty tired from the trip and the lesson by the time I got home from work Wednesday.

One interesting thing about the Maestro is that his best ground-breaking work comes when he isn’t at a lesson. He bowed to Hildegard for the first time in a drop-by visit at her apartment, and sang for her for the first time at her office on campus. Yesterday, she came to play in the afternoon. She also brought a new song:

“I’m Sil-ly.” “What?” “I’m Sil-ly.” “What?” This is in conversation-form, with the Maestro being silly, and her asking “What?” It follows the same 1,2,3 pattern as Peanuts and Popcorn, and the place of the rest is taken by the “What?”, so the person singing does rest, while the other person says their part.

Once they could sing it, he could show it on his Tuck-a bow. As a reward, Riley and Hildegard could grab him by the hands and feet and swing him in rhythm. Presto, the fourth rhythm was done.