Hi everyone,

Here are your practice assignments for this week:

Aidan

Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day

What to practice: Syncopated drum beats that I wrote down in your book.

How to practice it most effectively: Just like with everything else, going slowly and counting are the most helpful ways to approach this. With the drum beats, identify the rhythm of the bass drum and snare drum parts and make sure you can count it in time before you try to play it. Be sure that your right-hand stick on the hi-hat is your time keeper. This part should always be steady eighth notes and everything else fits in around that.

How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.

Sam

Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day

What to practice: Your drum and xylophone/bell parts for your music class at school as well as the new drum beats we have worked on recently.

How to practice it most effectively: Your school music is good. The xylophone/bell parts are really the only thing that still need work. Practice reading the music and naming the notes on the staff. This is something you can do even when you’re not in front of a xylophone. With the drum beats, practice playing each one with consistency. This means playing each one at least 8-12 times in a row without stopping and not speeding up when you play. Use a metronome or a backing track from Youtube to help you with this.

How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.

Harrison

Recommended minutes to practice: 10-15 minutes per day

What to practice: The rhythms and drum fills that we have been working on.

How to practice it most effectively: The most important thing with playing rhythm is to make sure you can count it before you try to play it. This ensures that you’re not just guessing at the rhythm, but that you have an idea in your head of what it should sound like. When you play drum fills, the same idea applies – you need to know what you’re going to play before you play it. Experiment with moving the rhythms around the drums in different ways to come up with creative fills.

How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.

Alejandro

Recommended minutes to practice: 15-20 minutes per day

What to practice: New drum beats from your book.

How to practice it most effectively: It is important to always play everything with a steady feeling of pulse and beat. This means that you shouldn’t pause in between beats or slow down through the rhythm. Keep everything as steady and even as possible. Count the rhythm of each beat out loud first and then try to match the sound of your playing to the sound of your counting.

How parents can support practice: Encouraging your child to practice regularly and helping them develop a routine is the best way to be supportive.