Strong Advice for music teachers of all grades:

I would HIGHLY recommend teaching your students to read music. In my school’s music program this semester, there was a vocal student in Music Theory I who, as well as learning basic theory, had to learn how to read music. This was highly disappointing that a music teacher did not take the time to teach his or her students to read music.
Also, please teach the students that a quarter note is not always the beat. Students tend to have this mindset that a quarter note is always constant. For example, if a student sees a rhythm with quarter notes as the beat, they usually can sight-read it without much difficulty. If the student sees the same rhythm with the 8th note as the beat, the student will usually either take the passage twice as fast or will tap their foot to what they believe the quarter note to be. Either way, the student usually has a very difficult time with the latter scenario.
There are many methods out there for teaching music reading and rhythm, each with their pros and cons, but please: teach them to you students.

Improving Tone for Instrumentalists

Two very good ways to improve tone efficiently and in a shorter amount of time:

1.          Sing: If you as a teacher have your students sing their parts, they are more likely to produce a better tone. Singing and playing instruments use the same muscles, and in consequence, produces a similar tone. If the students do not have good tone while singing, chances are they will not have good tone while playing. If the students question why they are singing when they are instrumentalists (as teens and pre-teens are famous for asking), tell them that singing and playing are directly related. Then if able, give them an anatomy lesson on how the muscles in the lower abdomen, the larynx and the oral cavity produce sound and transfer air.

If you are a soloist, sing your solo. If some pitches are out of tune when you sing them, or if you can’t sing your part, continue working on this. This will teach you how to have good air support and to hear “tendency” pitches (pitches that are constantly sharp or flat). Make sure to have a well-tuned piano near you!

2.     Record: Record yourself. You don’t know how you really sound until you record yourself! As a soloist, this should be done at least twice a week (every day at the beginning and ending of a practice time to compare improvement is ideal) and you should record what improved, what didn’t and how to fix it for next time. As a teacher, record your students at least two weeks before a performance and at least twice a week. Have them compare the recordings of themselves to professionals if a recording of the song exists. This will do wonders to your players!

If you can record your students singing, that’s a real eye opener to them. It can fix tone in a very short amount of time and with little effort on the teacher’s part. The  students will take charge when they actually know how they sound, trust me!