Checklist for Parents of Music Students
- Ensure your student has the proper uniform (white no-logo shirt, black pants, black socks, black shoes)
- Bookmark https://opus.ndcfinearts.ca and https://music.ndcfinearts.ca on your devices for your student to have access to.
- Bookmark https://music.ndcfinearts.ca/musicker which will include every communication Mr. Windsor sends home
- Like the NDC Fine Arts Facebook Page at https://www.facebook.com/NDCFineArts
How to Best Set Your Band Student Up for Success
Students will use Opus to manage their music-making activity, including practice logs. The intention is to help communicate home the work that students are completing in class, as well as to remind students and give them direction on their practice and at-home work. Although this method of communication may help, it is only the communication piece; the rest of it is up to your student and their practice environment at home. Here are some strategies for helping them practice efficiently at home.
- Give them space to practice. This space should be designated specifically for your child’s instrument. When your student comes home and empties their backpack, they should also empty their instrument case and set up their instrument. It takes less effort to practice if the instrument is already put together.
- Give them time to practice. Learning a musical instrument is noisy. Your student needs to know that you are okay with them making potentially distracting sounds.
- Let them make mistakes. They are responsible for their own practicing. Part of their learning includes developing their own strategies to self-assess and improve. The only way that works is if they make mistakes. Only then will they be familiar with what mistakes sound like, and then work to improve it. However, if you hear them making the same mistake more than twice, feel free to mention it.
- Be an audience infrequently. Students are not performing for you every day they practice. In fact, they are purposefully taking that time to not perform. You are welcome to listen from afar and in an inobtrusive way, but save your audienceship for concert times and the occasional “are you willing to play for me”.
- Come to concerts ready to listen. Students perform a minimum of four times, and a maximum of five times all year. Those performances are just as important as a final round of a basketball tournament; everything they’ve worked for comes to that point. Students will continue to develop their identity in music if you are there to witness it.