Where I live, most of the trees have lost their leaves, the sun only makes an appearance once every five days, and the nights are closing in. It’s most definitely fall, and I know that once the excitement of Halloween is over, the “pre-winter” blahs are just around the corner. November can be a long month.
November is also a month when I really want my students to practice the piano. With holiday recitals on the horizon, it’s important that my kids kick it up a notch this time of year.
I’m already deep into planning for November to keep my students motivated, excited, and practicing. My plans include a lot of interactive play-based learning, heaps of inspiring music, and plenty of motivating practice materials.
In today’s post, we’re sharing one of these motivating practice materials so you too can have happy, practicing piano students during the month of November!
Our “Save The Turkey” practice pegs are the perfect pre-Thanksgiving treat for your piano students. If you’re not from the USA and aren’t prepping for Thanksgiving, they also work as a cute “pre-Christmas dinner” printable. Plus, stay tuned for a “winter version” coming soon!
Thanksgiving-Themed Piano Practice Pegs
In the past, we shared a set of two “Piano Practice Pegs” that inspired piano students everywhere to happily dive into their daily practice routine. We still see last spring’s practice pegs popping up on piano teachers’ social media pages.
However, it’s a new season, and time for a new theme. With today’s set, your piano students will have a blast helping the turkey “hide” from the dinner plate as they engage in daily practice.
Here’s how to use our “Save The Turkey Practice Pegs”:
- Download our Save The Turkey Piano Practice Pegs and print them on cardstock.
- Cut out the rectangular turkey cards and the round circles.
- Glue a round circle to the top of a clothespin.
- Attach the Practice Peg Card to your piano students’ current pieces using their new clothespin markers.
- Instruct your students to move the clothespin one space (turkey) for each day they practice. When they pass a turkey, it means the turkey has been saved. Can they “save” all five turkeys before their next lesson?
These Practice Pegs provide an excellent way to quickly check in on home practice (if the marker hasn’t moved, you likely need to have a conversation!). They also offer a fun method to mark a page in your student’s book for easy access.
Do Your Students Need Note Reading Practice?
Today’s adorable printable is designed to track home practice. But what are your students practicing at home? Repertoire? Rhythm drills? Note reading?
If you want to make note reading a part of daily practice, check out Andrea and Trevor Dow’s Timed Note Reading Tests For Piano.
With over 90 days of note reading exercises, these VERY affordable books are quickly becoming a must-have resource for all primer and level 1 piano students.
While they get rave reviews from teachers, parents love them too! Seeing their children doing daily activities in a piano homework book is a visual reminder that piano lessons are well worth the money.
Click on a cover below to buy these books for your students:
Jennifer says
How funny! Great minds think alike! I just created a similar idea a couple weeks ago for my practice workshop I do for my students! Though I love the idea of the turkeys! 🙂
We are having the opposite problem here in AZ right now. We just broke a 100 degree record yesterday! Yikes! It’s never been this warm this late in October. Crazy!
Beth Yantz says
Again, thanks for sharing your creative genius with folks like me who love creativity, and have little of our own. I will offer this to my parents who plead with their little ones to practice. It’s cute enough to work!
Bev says
Please continue with your very creative ideas and activities.
Beth says
Thank you so much! The previous set of pegs has been so helpful, and hopefully these Thanksgiving ones will help renew students’ enthusiasm. To me, it seems like the large clothespins are rather hard to use, but today I saw some Clip-Rite Clip-Tabs on OfficeDepot.com. Haven’t tried them yet, but they might be a good alternative.
Sarah says
This is so cute! I have a couple students who are reluctant practicers, so I think I want to try this. 🙂
Maureen McNamee says
This is a great idea and I will try it – especially with my very young students who haven’t yet understood why practicing is at all necessary! I am wondering though, if it’s helpful or not to give a reward for completing the row or just to have it be a challenge and so the finishing in itself would be the reward. I am hesitant to get into a “bribing” situation. Just wondering what others think about this?
Dawn says
I really love this idea!! I have a laser printer so only can do black and white. Anyway I could persuade you to do more activities in black and white? I have many younger students who love to color as do I!
Andrea says
Hi Dawn – by selecting “greyscale” during your printing process you can print anything in black and white. We always design our free printables in color as most teachers and children prefer that option and because greyscale printing is an option then there is the possibility of both. Have you considered sending printing in to somewhere like Staples? For this activity, putting it on card stock at Staples is about $0.80 and you get 4 students’ worth out of that one page so for 20 cents per student they have something colorful and engaging to use. I find it’s really worth it 🙂