When motivation for playing piano was waning for one of my students after a busy day, I pulled out these variation cards and it was definitely a game changer! Not only did he have a new excitement about learning his new piece, but I was able to assess his knowledge and teach some theory and technique skills in a lively engaging way that drew him in asking for more. He wanted to complete the entire set of cards!
Instead of playing the "What Changed" game, that I blogged about on this previous post, I instead used the variation cards as a springboard of ideas for the Variation Practice Challenge.
Piano Variation Cards
My variation cards simply include a basic idea for varying the song with an image to represent the change.
Melody Variations
Scrambled Eggs- Mix up the Melody
drawkcaB - Play part of the melody backward