I treat the holiday season like my own personal practice challenge. That is… I like the challenge of inspiring my kids to practice during the busiest time of the year.
It’s not an easy task. I have to pull out all the stops to encourage my piano students to continue with their home practice routines through our winter break. And I am most successful when I inspire my students with a bit of fun.
Today that inspirational fun is coming to you with winter-themed Piano Practice Pegs. These practice tools are the perfect combination of usefulness and fun (as many of you will know from using our “Save The Turkey” Thanksgiving Practice Peg set) and will help you achieve holiday practice success.
Winter-Themed Piano Practice Pegs
To ensure your students return to your studio in January all practiced and polished up, before the break, send home one of the two practice peg sets below. Your students can choose between our “add a gift to Santa’s sleigh” Christmas version and an “add a carrot to the Snowman” version for those who prefer a winter theme. Here’s how to use our practice pegs:
- Download and print out our Holiday Practice Pegs on card stock.
- Cut out the circles and rectangles.
- Tape the circles to the bottom of a clothes peg (the kind you would use to hang laundry on a clothes line)
- Clip the peg and the rectangle to the top of your student’s music book.
- Instruct your students to move the peg one circle following daily practice. Over the holiday they can keep a tally of how many times they completed the set.
Here’s a practice peg in action:
And here’s what our two winter-themed sets look like:
These pegs serve as a great “Hey! Open your book to this page and practice it!” reminder and also as an easy way for you to check-in on home practice (has the peg moved or is it still on circle one?!)
Be sure to tag us @teachpianotoday across all social media platforms in any pictures you take of your students using our practice pegs (or any of our other printables or resources). We LOVE to see them!
Now For Something FUN To Practice!
The key ingredient to successful holiday practice is motivating material that is easily accessible to students who will be practicing on their own. And the best way to keep your studio stocked with motivating music is to become a subscriber to Teach Piano Today’s PianoBookClub. For just $8 a month subscribers receive an “out of this world” digital music book with 7 to 9 pieces that they can print until their printers explode 😉
Linda H. says
December 13, 2016 at 8:06 amOf COURSE, I love these! My students (I only have a few young ones at the moment) loved the turkeys and it did the trick with practicing! There was great empathy for the turkeys. Thanks for the cute new winter ones!
Andrea says
December 13, 2016 at 9:08 amSo glad to hear it Linda. Maybe they’ll feel the same sympathy for the poor “nose-less” snowmen too 😉 Happy holidays!
Mindy says
December 13, 2016 at 8:49 amThank you SO much! My kiddos will be thrilled to see winter versions! They started asking for snowmen the minute we finished with the turkeys. 🙂
Andrea says
December 14, 2016 at 10:31 amSo glad we chose to do snowmen then Mindy!! Enjoy 🙂
Anna says
December 13, 2016 at 9:13 amPerfectly created for this joyful season. Thank you so much. I’ve used your other peg post in the past (say that 5 times fast) but this is a nice fresh theme to rejuvenate their home practices. Yay. Thanks!
Andrea says
December 14, 2016 at 10:31 amThrilled you can use then Anna! Thanks for commenting 🙂
Beth says
December 13, 2016 at 1:32 pmSo cute! Thanks! My students and I have been looking forward to these!
Andrea says
December 14, 2016 at 10:31 amGlad to hear it Beth! Hope they inspire lots of practice hours at home 🙂
Megan says
December 17, 2016 at 3:06 pmI have loved using the Turkeys. I am from Australia so I had to explain Thanksgiving to my kids. They have really enjoyed the challenge of saving the turkeys and parents have liked the control of moving the peg!
Andrea says
December 19, 2016 at 11:36 amGlad to hear it Megan! 🙂
Chris says
December 3, 2017 at 2:27 pmAwesome idea! Just wanted to check how to clip it without wrecking the flimsy pages. It looks like you clip the page to the back binding of the book as well? If the student is working on multiple songs, would you attach multiple strips to each one?
Andrea says
December 4, 2017 at 10:52 amYes, you can use it as a bookmark so clip it to multiple pages and then your student can easily open their book to the right spot. Others have attached it to a paperclip if you prefer it to be flatter. I usually just choose one piece to attach it to but you could certainly do multiple ones!