Morning Coffee: Better Talking Points

This is a screenshot of a student book from "Essential Musicianship for Band."

This is a warm up/fundamentals series that I use almost exclusively with my Ninth Grade Band for the first half of the year. Eventually, I journey into "Foundations for a Superior Performance."

The exercises in the musicianship book lists great talking points under its exercises. The majority of the actual exercises are fairly basic: remingtons, long tones, pass the F, etc. This book's secret is not in the material but in the "how".

I have really valued using these talking points across all areas of my teaching (and with all of my ensembles too). The way I interpret: by reminding students to play with these talking points in the warm ups, you can do the same in the rehearsal process. I typically just reinforce these reminders EVERY day. So simple and so prolific.

The internal "how" that comes with these talking points helped to inform my diagnosis. It has also been pretty consistent in using the same points to my students consistently. The older students almost can finish my sentences now.