Teaching In-Tune Singing

Many of the activities in Let's Play Music and Sound Beginnings are meant to teach children to match pitch and sing in tune.  Singing in tune is a foundational skill for complete musicianship, and one that can bring enjoyment for a lifetime.  This skill usually develops naturally in children, but occasionally there are kids who struggle to match pitch, to enhance their vocal range, and to carry a tune.  What then?

In my experience, it is often boys who take more time to learn to sing in tune, and I have a couple of my own children who have had a hard time with this as well.  Their instinct as boys is sometimes to sing it lower than the "mommy model" that sounds higher than they think their range should be.  I've noticed with one of my sons, that he does better when he's not on the spot (like in the shower and he thinks no one is listening) or when he's being silly (singing opera or silly camp songs in a boisterous voice).  When he overthinks it, trying to get it right, that's when it goes downhill.  The main thing he needs is confidence that he's doing fine, and then he does fine.  I honestly feel like his dad and I may have spent too much time pointing out the times when his singing was off in a somewhat misguided effort to help him get it right, and that backfired.  The more often you can just spend happy time singing together, the better.  

Carpools and road trips are great 'captive audience' moments to sing silly songs, improvise questions and answers, or  practice harmony!

Rather than drawing attention or focusing on sounds that are a little off, there are ways of helping them sing in tune that are less harmful:

• Spend just a second (meaning one or two attempts) asking, "Hmm...did what you just sang match what I just sang?" then sing again and let your child self-correct to match you.
• Audibly "scoot" your voice to match his pitch, then re-sing in the range that he chose, and may be more comfortable with.  Once he can carry a tune in that range, you can adjust and try starting higher.
• Vocal play and "sirens" will help break children out of a narrow range and get them using their head voices.  Repeat nursery rhymes using both low and high, silly voices.  Make sounds like a ghost, an owl, a fire truck, etc.  Have a quick conversation using "Mickey Mouse" voices!  Then come back to what you were singing and see if their range is less restricted.
• Sing in an opera voice!  Or use an echo mic and be a rock star!  You'll be amazed by how adding a silly element - especially if it encourages loud, full-voice, confident singing will get them singing in tune.

Any time you are doing these kinds of activities, you will not want to spend too much time or focus on correcting mistakes.  Give it a try (maybe two, but probably not more!) then move on with what you were doing, whether or not they are singing exactly in tune.

Another of my sons gravitates towards singing harmony, and has a hard time singing melody along with other voices.  Probably partly because of the same idea that masculine voices should be lower.  Or maybe even because his smart little brain is searching for a better challenge than just "singing it straight."  Sometimes we just want them to know how to sing it the way we think it should sound!  BUT singing harmony is also an awesome skill to have, so another tactic to promote in-tune singing would be to teach the lower harmony on a few songs.  

For Red and Blue semesters, try singing "Mi-Re-Do" along with the entire Three Blind Mice song, or "Sol-Sol-Do-Do" along with all of Scotland's Burning.  You can also do "Do-Sol-Do" during Are You Sleeping?.  These short, repeated melodies are called ostinato and are a great way to promote early harmony skills.  They give kids a short, simple melody to learn while at the same time providing an extra challenge by having them sing against another melody.  All of these songs mentioned here can also be sung in a round, as well as El Gallo from Blue semester.  Try these too!

For Green and Yellow semesters, start with Solfege Seafriends.  (Is your child's favorite the Alligator or the Whale?  Maybe see if he wants to try one of the higher friends once he has a lower one figured out.)  Also try the lower harmony "Oh Sally's" on Pick a Bale of Cotton.  We don't work on those in class really at all, but they are fun to pick out by listening to the CD.  Again, this is better if it's something you casually point out while listening to the song, "Do you hear the lower part they're singing on 'Oh, Sally'?...I wonder if we could sing those same notes and make harmony...Let's try it!"  (Or you sing higher while your child sings lower, then it's more of an individual challenge instead of always following mom's lead - appeal to his independent nature.)  Some other rounds from this year are Horsey, Horsey and Row, Row, Row Your Boat, or you can sing the "down, down, down" ostinato with Snowflakes are Falling or "tick-tock" with Hickory Dickory Dock.

In Orange semester, we introduce Echo Edison, who asks musical questions and gets improvised musical answers in return.  You could expand on this idea with your children by having them sing you a question (or you sing them one) - the only rule here is that question melodies go up at the end, and answers come down, or if you're ready for a bigger challenge, have your melodies end on Do.  Sometimes on the way home from school, I ask my kids how their day was and have them tell me three things about their day.  Adding the singing element makes it silly and fun, and with improvised melodies you can't get it wrong!  Another fun tradition is to sing "Do is home," when you pull into your driveway, then run in and check it on the piano.  Singing together is so much fun!

In any semester, you can go back and review solfege hand signs, which help give physical placement to pitch and aid in in-tune singing.  We focus on learning hand signs during the first year, then in second and third years we use them mostly with our melodic cadence patterns.  If your child is rusty, re-learning the major scale of hand signs would be great as long as you are able to make it fun and keep them on board.  Remember all the "solfege high-fives"?  That's a great place to start.  Sing the Do-Re-Mi song and see if you can get fast enough on hand signs to do the "do-mi-mi" part with hand signs - kids usually love a good challenge like this when you're going back to review something that's already been taught.  

I just want to emphasize once more that with all of these tricks and activities, you do not want to make it feel like, "We are going to really WORK HARD on this stuff until you can match pitch and sing in tune!" or give your child the idea that he's just not getting it.  Rather, try for playful singing time that is FUN, spontaneous, natural (not forced) and make it a game as often as possible.  Then you will have some good strategies to build his confidence, have him enjoy singing, and feel good about the attempts he makes.  In the end, it is more important to have a kid that loves to sing than to have a child who can sing in tune, but who chooses not to.  Hopefully these ideas will help you to continue making music with your family in a natural, positive, ongoing way!