Dogs and Birds Teachers’ Course to be Held in Bakewell, UK on 23 August 2024
Elza and Chris Lusher (creators of the Dogs and Birds Piano Method) will be giving a Teachers’ Course in Bakewell, UK on Friday 23 August 2024. This will be our first face-to-face course since the pandemic. This course will include two live lessons with Elza, with students below 5 years old, as well as guided discussion on our online Dogs and Birds Teachers’ Course (described below) and our Puppet Video Piano Lessons entitled “Dorian and Miss Bell: Piano Lessons in the Forest”. One year’s access to both these online courses is included in the course fee, and will be available on registration, together constituting over 20 hours of material including our most recent pedagogy.
This course is aimed at piano and music teachers. The cost is £130, if the application is received by 2nd August 2024, and £140 after that.
Early booking is advisable, the course being limited to 20 delegates.
Comments from earlier face-to-face course attendees:
I would just like to say a big thank you for such a lovely day yesterday. I found watching the lessons being taught 'live' was a huge benefit and I am so looking forward to introducing this system more effectively and thoroughly now that I have seen it in action. Sue Atkinson
I already knew “Dogs and Birds” was great for little ones. But the workshop really gave me new ideas, especially watching Elza teach some of her students – it was amazing to see how “Dogs and Birds” worked in practice and gave even very young pupils solid musicianship skills. Sue Martin
Download more information and an application form here, or submit your application via Google Forms. The early bird deadline for this course is 2nd August 2024.
Online Dogs and Birds Teachers’ Course: Teaching Piano to Children Aged 3 Onwards (Elza and Chris Lusher)
At the request of many teachers, we made a recording of our last Dogs and Birds Teachers’ Course held on Zoom. Adding to it more recent material we formed a new online course for piano and music teachers:
The Dogs and Birds Piano Method – Teaching Children from 3 Years Onwards, by Elza and Chris Lusher.
In this course, lasting over 6 hours in total, we give key suggestions on how to incorporate the elements of the Dogs and Birds approach into Book 1, the Nursery Rhyme Book and Book 2 to achieve a seamless transition to using conventional music. The course covers note recognition, finger positions, rhythm exercises and all the necessary musical building blocks which make for a solid foundation. We use videos of Elza’s students, from her online teaching, to demonstrate the approach.
This course is broken up into 16 sections for ease of viewing and contains our most recent pedagogy. Since it is streamable, it can be viewed completely at your own convenience and can be watched as often as you like. In addition, it will be updated when new developments occur. Access to the course is for 12 months, and it includes 12 months free trial access to all 91 puppet videos in the series "Dorian and Miss Bell - Piano Lessons in the Forest".
Feedback from teachers who attended earlier Zoom Courses:
It was a great course packed with tons of fantastic tips and information, and a thorough explanation of how you can best teach Dogs and Birds … It just makes learning so effortless and so much fun, and nurtures full-rounded musicianship and a love of piano playing without the children even realising they are soaking it all in and just enjoying themselves. Vici Hoban Read (Jiggle & Jam)
As I’d been teaching the method for a number of years, I was reasonably happy with the way I was doing things. However, I found I was missing out some really good activities within it which I then looked forward to implementing afterwards. Sarah Leong
Very many thanks for such an enjoyable training day … Thank you also for the sight-reading attachment which looks excellent. Pippa Harrison
Thank you so much Elza and Chris for the online Dogs and Birds course … I have so many additional ideas now, to further improve my teaching through the Dogs and Birds approach. Lynne Davis
The course has transformed my teaching of the Dogs and Birds method … there were so many tips and tricks included that got me so excited … I've since implemented lots of these methods into existing and new students' lessons … the students are building great foundations, and most importantly they are having SO much fun! I already loved the Dogs and Birds method but doing the course has brought my teaching of it up another level. Lucy Porter (Redditch Music School)
See contents of the course and short sample videos here.
Click here for access to the course.
We are offering a 65% discount on this course for piano and music teachers until 30 June 2024.
Or obtain access as part of our face-to-face course to be held in Bakewell, UK 23 August 2024. Download more information and an application form here.