How To Teach Piano Lessons At Home With Free Piano Lesson Plans

First I need to start this post with a disclaimer. Piano lessons from a paid teacher are very valuable! The following are suggestions for doing piano lessons at home if you are willing to take it seriously. I’d also suggest only attempting to teach your children piano if you have a good understanding of music and play the piano yourself. There is more to it than just opening the piano book to the right page! However, doing lessons ourselves at home saves me at least $45 a week! The going rate is at least $15 per lesson and I have 3 girls that want to learn to play the piano! If it ever stopped working to do the lessons at home, I would definitely pay for the lessons because they are very important to us, which keeps me motivated to make our at-home lessons work.

We take at-home piano lessons really seriously and we are loving it! I taught piano lessons for 2 years for other children, and though I loved those kids, teaching my own kids is a lot more fun for me! It is great one-on-one time with my girls and we start and end each lesson with a hug. Here are my tips on how I’ve made at-home piano lessons work for us, including MY PERSONAL LESSON PLAN PRINTABLES:

• Set a regular weekly schedule and put it on the calendar. Take this time as seriously as you would if you had an appointment with a separate teacher. That means don’t schedule play dates and dentist appointments during piano lesson time. I set aside approximately 30 minutes per lesson, though I don’t use a timer during lesson to try to stick to a time limit.
• Give each student respect and block distractions. When one of my children is having a lesson, the other kids know they are not supposed to bother us. I also keep my phone off and just focus on my little pupil.
   
• Use a small notebook for each child to write down practice expectations and individualized notes for each child. My kids pull out their notebooks when they practice to remember what they are supposed to do.
• For young children, use stickers to reward for every single page completed well. This is not only happy for a little student, but it breaks up the pace of the lesson to be more child friendly. The result is an overall longer attention span and happier lesson.
   
• Plan a goal and a celebration! When everyone finishes their current level of books, we are going to have a piano recital and party. I’ll have the girls dress up fancy like a real recital and then we will Skype in grandparents. We will have treats and an after-party. My girls already talk about our piano party we will have!
• Remind students to practice during the week. I’m all about teaching children accountability, but my kids are still a little young to remember everything on their own. I remind the girls each day to practice their piano before they have free-play after school. Children will not progress without practice. When I was teaching, I was most frustrated when kids wouldn’t practice week after week and lessons got to a stand-still … and then some parents wonder why they are paying all this money for lessons and their kids don’t seem to be learning. Practice is a crucial! Practice, practice, practice!!
   

• Alfred Prep Course Leval A Lesson Plans
• Piano Adventures Course, Pre-Reading 
• It took me a long time to collaborate all of the different books, so please respect that these PDF files are only for personal, non-commercial use and should not be distributed by anyone for any reason unless my permission is specifically granted for each individual case. (copyright 2012 by Mary Johanson of MaryOrganizes.com)