When You Learn With Piano Wizard Academy You Make Music Learning Child's Play!

How to get started with Piano Wizard Academy

1. Introduction

Welcome, and thanks for joining the Piano Wizard Academy program!

We have built you a lifetime of music learning and joy into this program. It will require some setup, and some basic orientation, but once you have done that, it is orders of magnitude easier, cheaper, “funner” and more effective than traditional music lessons. In fact, you will be playing and reading real music on real instruments in minutes, not months.

Piano Wizard is an amazingly simple video game with a "hidden agenda". That agenda is real music learning that is subconsciously revealed. Yes, the game is easy to use but in order to get the most out of it, we strongly recommend that you follow these instructions to learn how to use your Piano Wizard music learning system.

Our Academy Courses consist of 100 lessons, equilvalent to 2 years of children's level music curriculum.  Each course is divided into 10 lessons (songs).  The default time frame for each course is 10 weeks (assuming one lesson per week).  Many do 2 lessons per week, many complete in course in a month.  Don't rush it, allow the student to control the pace.  Please keep in mind that in order to get a course compeletion, each course must be completed within 10 weeks from when you enroll.

2. Recommended Progression

• Though each person will eventually develop their own styles and methods, the most popular and effective way to learn through our system is by following the method outlined below.
• Choose a song you want to learn.  Enable RIGHT HAND only, LEVEL 1.
• Set an acceptable points goal for yourself.  Once you meet this goal, switch to the next level, staying only with your right hand.
• Once you have mastered the song through Levels 1-4, with your right hand, switch to your left hand and repeat the process.
• Once you have mastered the song through Levels 1-4, with your left hand, switch to left and right hands together and again, repeat the process.
• Step  5 is NOT in the game. It's when you take it to a real piano with your sheet music. If you don't have a piano, you can always use the game in free-play mode.
• Once you master your first song with both left and right hands, it's time to move on to the next song.

It's really that simple!

3. Who is this for?

FOR YOU (adults, older teens) - Patience.  Our course starts off very easy. While Don and Delayna are engaging in the videos, you might find the early lessons too easy and think "how a I going to learn from this?"  Well, we start off slow for a reason - for you to get a hang of the system and feel comfortable moving ahead.  The lessons will get more challenging as you progress through the course.

Despite the ease, important musical concepts are introduced in every lesson and we progress upon them through the course.  Be patient, have fun and watch the magic that happens.   The backgrounds can be changed if you find the appearance too kiddy-like.  Or you can remove them completely, it's up to you.  Most people like the colorful backgrounds so it's just a personal preference.

FOR YOUR CHILDREN - Piano Wizard is not "Candy Crunch Saga" or "Pac-man".  We don't lock the kids up in their rooms and say go do your lesson.  Parental involvement is important to our children's success.  Without, they will just tend to noodle around and eventually get bored with it.

The videos are actually meant for the adults so they can "coach" their children.  The game does the heavy lifting, i.e., they learn by doing, and the game keeps them focused and moving through the song without effort on your part. You do need to set it up, and then set them up with the process, so that they know they are to not just stay in the game, but graduate to playing the piano. This happens in minutes with the game, literally if you follow the guidelines carefully they are reading sheet music on a song they did not know 15 minutes ago.  With kids these days though, they figure out the software faster than we do, and then race ahead. You mainly need to slow them down so that they go through each level and song or they quickly load songs they like that are still beyond them.

The key is like anything else, they will pay attention to what you pay attention to. If you reward their successes with star stickers on every level, they will move through the levels to get the star stickers. If you make a big deal about them playing from the sheet music (level 5) they will strive to please you and perform from the sheet music at the piano. If you praise every completed song, they will move through the curriculum with pride.

The surprise is that this involvement is not onerous or burdensome, it is joyful and bonding. We suggest you celebrate everything, and they will too. They will remember having fun learning piano together for many years to come, and so will you. Our goal is that the game acts like "training wheels" for the piano, that they blossom, move off the game, onto other teachers, instruments etc, with a deep love of music and an intrinsic natural understanding of how music "works" from the inside out. Any new song can be loaded into the game, a forgotten one remembered, it is a music learning program for life, but kids naturally progress to other levels in and out of the game from it.

4. How important is proper fingering?

At Piano Wizard Academy, we introduce good piano technique from day one. Hand shape is important. Fingers can be neither too curved nor too flat. If we hang hands at our sides and keep that shape, we're off to a good start. Based on the teachings of Beethoven, Chopin and Liszt, we do not play piano well or have good technique by relying only on the fingers. We really play more with hands and arms. It is the hand's responsibility, not the fingers, for the descent of each key.

All of this is so important to playing both piano and the game well. In the Academy lessons, we move quickly from the game to the piano and are thrilled to see the impact of the game on the overall learning experience. Of course, all of this is yet in it's infancy, but the future is so promising.

After your child is comfortable with the game, you may want to turn on fingering. The objects will now show which finger should be used for each note. (please refer to step 3 above). You will also find these lessons in the Advanced Mode in the folder "Easy Mode". The advanced mode will allow you to enter your own fingering.

Actually the first question to ask is what is "proper fingering"?

Fingering is not an absolute -it's just a technique. When entering your own fingering, make it comfortable for yourself or your child. Remember, their fingers are smaller than yours! While the Academy lessons within the Piano Wizard game have fingering information, most WizardTunes - or other MIDI files you load into the game do NOT. However, once you have learned the basics after completing your Academy lessons, you can easily incorporate what you've learned into each new song. Remember, good technique is more important than proper fingering. That being said, once the student learns the basics of fingering (by actually DOING) they will learn to play smoother - and faster.

When the student is playing on step 3, introduce fingering, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, sing the fingerings WITH him/her. I have demoed this game thousands of times over the years, but when I have the children SING the fingering, they learn it the FIRST time through. This for me will be emphasized more and more in future lessons, because apparently there is something amazing about singing and memory that makes this feel effortless.

Once he/she has sung through the fingerings in Step 3, THEN take away the colors (I also take away the guidelines, they are a bit distracting with the staff lines) and have him/her sing (quality of singing not important, but singing is) and make sure he/she can play on level 4 quite well.

Then go to the book and point out the fingering in the book, and SING the fingering along with your child. They should do much better. Now you are ready to watch the video lessons and use the accompanying Academy material.

Congratulations - you are now a real Piano Wizard!

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