Making Practice Videos for Your Students
I have a few sections within my orchestras where students need some extra help, so I’ve decided to make a few “play along” videos for them to view (and listen) that may help them practice at home. I recorded these in class, during rehearsal with a metronome at a slower-than-performance tempo.
For these videos, I used a Zoom Q8 Handy Video Recorder and an inexpensive ($50) Marantz external XLR microphone to help isolate my instrument’s sound. By playing through the parts, it also helps me help them
My youngest ensemble is performing Richard Meyer’s Spring Breezes and Night Shift along with Brian Balmages’ Forever Joyful! for our upcoming Large Group Performance Evaluation (LGPE) in February, so here are a few of the videos that I created for the 2nd violin and bass sections. They were done with one take, so there may be some minor mistakes. By the way — I LOVE it when my students tell me where I made mistakes because it means that they are listening and assessing! Also, sometimes during the recording, I will shout out rehearsal numbers or directions for students to help them with finding their spot or fingerings.
I will be interested to see how many students use these videos for listening and practice!
Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below!
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I used to do practice videos. I stopped making them when I got the sense that students didn’t refer to them often. I love that you did it live with the orchestra playing! It gives more context to the parts.
Hi Justin,
Thanks for your comment. I’ve found that students are willing to use them, but don’t necessarily seek them out. So I
“push” the videos to them in a text message using Remind. This may help kids have an easier time remembering to watch them. I should have discussed this! (I may go back in and edit the post.) I create a YouTube playlist of the videos for the class and section then send that to the students in the section. My younger classes aren’t giant, so it’s pretty simple to do. A show of hands today let me know that over half of the kids have referenced them. And both bass players in my class watched them as well.
I’ve used practice videos for many of my groups and have found that they do work as long as you make them readily accessible. I post on Youtube, on my website, within our classroom canvas/google classroom page, put links on social media, and refer back to them almost daily in class. The only issue I have found is finding the time to actually sit down and record them!!