Parental expectations of reading
Found in: Reading
Joanne C., Australia
I received this email from a parent. Does anyone have any advice I can share with her? This student has completed Time for More Music and plays beautifully. She is just finishing Level 8. This mother is of the opinion that traditionally trained students can sight sing and is wondering how they can help her at home so she is able to as well.
“I wonder if I could ask you for some advice? My daughter feels very under-confident with her reading of music, and she has recently joined the school choir, where they expect her to know how to read music, as most of the kids in this choir have been music students for some time.”
Mark M., New York
Sight reading and sight singing are very specific skills that are absolutely not automatic for those traditionally trained. If your student has completed TFMM, then she does know how to read music. I can’t generalize with certainty, but when I was in chorus in high school, and in musicals in high school, they always taught everyone’s parts through doing — the teacher/leader would sing/play through the parts, and we certainly did also have the music. If that’s what will happen for this student, I have to imagine she’ll be fine, and that whatever she can’t do now she is likely to develop with practice.
Joanne C., Australia
I’ve asked for a sample of the music that she is supposedly expected to read, and invited her to come and have a chat about it so I have some more understanding of what is actually going on. I think there are some fairly broad assumptions being made here and I’ll certainly be questioning the parents’ view of what is happening.
Jeff O., Massachusetts
In every choir I have sung in or directed, from 5th graders to adults, there is a wide range of reading ability. Your student will probably be above average at reading, and will get better at singing what she reads.
Maureen K., California
Your student is ahead of the game for sure because she can bring the music home and play her part on the piano to help learn to sing it. With a different instrument, for example the clarinet, the student can’t play and sing at the same time, and plus many other instruments will play it in the wrong key.
Mandy H., Virginia
I’m a high school choral director and in my area, kids know solfege and are generally expected to be able to read basic level 3 pieces at sight. Sight singing isn’t the same as sight reading. There are no keys or valves. I can sight read anything on piano, but I have to work to learn the voice parts for most of the level 4-5 choral pieces I program. It’s similar in theory, but different in application.
Kerry V., Australia
Remind her that she only needs to know the intervals, especially when singing.