Anybody Can Play
Worksheet Lessons

Overview of  Lessons
Setting up a piano/keyboard center in a preschool or kindergarten
Using lessons in the piano studio
Free Sample Lessons
Available Lesson Sets
To Order

OVERVIEW
FORMAT ONE:
The Level One Worksheet Piano Lessons are comprised of 100 daily worksheets for children. These can be done with a group of children in a school setting or by a parent at home. Any teacher or parent can guide the children through these worksheets. It is not necessary that the teachers or parents have a prior piano background.

Each worksheet takes only a few minutes to complete and covers one small step toward learning to play the piano. By taking one small step each day, the children are able to master what they have learned and remember it. (Too many steps at once and the children will forget what they have learned.) Built-in redundancy also aids retention.

The short daily routine makes learning to play the piano seem easy and the children will know what to practice independently at the piano or keyboard.

To insure that each child feels successful, but challenged, (particularly in the school setting) the songs are presented in multiple skill levels.  For instance, some of the children may readily learn to read musical notation while others are not even beginning to grasp the concept.  However, color coding and finger numbers remain so everyone can still happily participate.   Some children may be able to play in contrary motion while others are still struggling to play with one hand.  However they can all play the "same" song - just different versions! - and the way they play it is their choice.

Included with these lessons are full-sized Answer Sheets and Lesson Plans (with suggestions for presentation, additional activities and manipulatives as well as a list of materials needed for each lesson.)

It is recommended that these lessons be done at least 3 times a week - of course daily is greatly to be desired. 

The children also learn music theory, giving them a broad music background in addition to learning to play songs.

Cost of these lessons is $14.95 for the one hundred daily lessons. 

FORMAT TWO:  The Sprinkling Format
These lessons are set  up in a weekly steps and rely heavily on little chants sung by the teacher/parent and the children many times during the day.  This format very closely parallels language development, building the new skill on previously well-learned skills.

Manipulatives allow the children to practice independently.   Again, the cost to access both these and the 100  daily worksheet lessons is $14.95.

Back to top

SETTING UP A PIANO/KEYBOARD CENTER
No matter how elaborate or simple the piano/keyboard center, rules must apply.  Children need to learn to respect the instrument(s).  They are not toys.  The children are working in the center.  They need to feel the responsibility of being careful, taking turns, using the materials with care, putting materials away where they belong.  Whatever rules the school applies to the piano/keyboard center, these rules must be kept.  This will ensure that each child can work and learn in a pleasant environment and experience the joy of learning to play the piano - a real and valid esteem builder!

"Need to have" - A piano/keyboard center can be as basic as having one keyboard on a stand or table for the children to use.  I would suggest that the keyboard be at a height high enough for the children to stand - at least during the beginning  months of lessons.  The typical standing 4-year-old is at the right height for playing on a piano.  Chairs and benches seem to get in the way. 

Laminated manipulatives are a must in the keyboard center for the children's use.  Both formats are designed so children can practice independently.

"Nice to have" - Besides the keyboard or piano it would be nice to have a bulletin or peg board in order to display posters, flashcards,etc.

"Great to have" - Some schools will have the luxury to having multiple keyboards or a piano lab.  This makes it possible for several children at a time to work on their piano/keyboard skills.

SAMPLE LESSONS
To try FREE SAMPLE LESSONS, click here.

Lessons with this aged child (as young as 3, but 4's and 5's are easier) can be done in a small group (two or three children) or private lesson setting.  The parent should be  present at the lesson (or at least come back during the last five or ten minutes) and involved in the "practice" during the week.  There are cases, however, when you will not have the luxury of an involved parent.

During the lesson try to do two, maximum 3, lesson sheets.  Involve the parent if you wish.

At the end of the lesson you need to speak with the parent.  Establish a routine so the children know they are to  put things away, finish their class lesson sheet by themselves, play a game together, etc. during this time that you talk with their parents.  Hand out the lesson sheets and plans to the parents and briefly go over them.  These sheets are "homework" and need to be done before the next lesson - and not in one cram session with the child right before the next lesson!  If you have totally uninvolved parents (It happens!) don't send any additional work home and skip this part of the lesson.  Just do what you are able to do in the lesson time and make sure the children know what they are to do by themselves when at home and encourage them to "remember" to practice.

At the end of the lesson time ask the children to show you or tell you what they are to do at home all by themselves (based on the lesson sheets you did together at the lesson or a lesson sheet they are to finish at home).   Even if you have involved parents, encourage the children to do many "practice" activities all by themselves.  If this is not established early on, it will be difficult to wean the children away from totally supervised practice later - when parents tire of "practicing" with their children.

At the next lesson review what was learned at the last lesson, go over the "homework:" sheets and do another sheet or two together. 

NOTE:  You probably noticed that I said "hand out the lessons sheets" .  I would strongly suggest that you order the lessons for each child and charge the parent a "materials charge" for the cost of the lessons, copies, supplies, etc. rather than having the parents responsible for ordering, copying and bringing the proper sheets to the lesson.  You may even want to make the manipulatives for the children (such as laminating "key cards" for each child) and include charges for making them in your "materials charge".  I would also have a plastic "string" envelope as part of each child's materials pack so their lesson sheets are always kept together. 

Back to top

AVAILABLE LESSON SETS
Level One is currently available with the two formats:  100 worksheet lessons and the 32 weeks of the "Sprinkling" format.   Those of you who have ordered before will note that the 40 lessons at a time are no longer available.  If you have previously ordered the first or second set of these they are included in this new set of 100.  If you Email Anybody Can Play we can manually order these with a credit so you won't be paying for lessons you have paid for before.  info@anybodycanplay.com should work for this, or call 512-892-0640.

When you are finished  with your order, click onto "Shipping Information".    For schools that are ordering, please enter the contact person for the school under "name".  Under "Business" enter the name of the school.  All other information is quite straight forward.

A copy of your order will be automatically Emailed to Anybody Can Play.   You will receive an Email within minutes verifying your order.   You will receive another Email with a link  to the lessons you have ordered in order to download them.  The second Email has to be sent manually, so it can take up to a couple days to receive the links.  (Fortunately it usually doesn't take that long, but please don't wait until the last minute to order just to be on the safe side.)  In addition you will receive a document giving you permission to copy the purchased amount of lessons.  These lessons are all copyrighted, so keep the "Permission to Copy"  Document for your files.