Hey I took a video of my student today for you to watch and help us. It's been slow going and we're having rhythm, note reading and possibly technique problems. Unevenness is an issue in most pieces he learns.
He's 11 yrs old, been learning since 2008. It's slow going with only about 4 days per week practice. He's keen and sweet though as you can see.
Working on rotation and playing into the keys helped but i'm a bit stumped on the unevenness of his arpeggios - it looks like his fingers aren't managing to play evenly. But i'm not experienced enough to know what's going on.

Please watch the whole video before commenting because there's important stuff at the end. Thanks in advance!

http://youtu.be/PwyVJXWpJ0U

Hi Kylie,

I'm definitely not as experienced as others on this board, but hopefully I can help. For starters, you seem like a really caring teacher to work with. I have a feeling most of your students really like you!

Here's are my ideas, and I really hope some other teachers here can offer some suggestions. I personally learn a lot from threads like this.

Measures 1-4: I would have him play those much slower. Those were about twice as fast as measures 9-12. Perhaps he should practice measure 1-12 very slow with exaggerated dynamics, so he can feel the piece at one tempo. I would also perform with him at the same time during the lessons, and use the metronome.

I have found that when you do "exaggerated practice," such as playing very slow, exaggerating the dynamics, the hand movements, etc., it tends to drive the point home.

This is not mentioned a lot, but I believe there also comes a point for some where students lose interest in the piece, and do not have the capacity to practice in a focused manner. I've had this happen with students, and I usually move on, and supplement, to ensure they develop the proper skills and techniques.

Yeah I knew his first section was way faster than the second. I hadn't gone there yet. You can see that after we worked on measures 2 - 4 he's playing them slower.

He hasn't lost interest in this piece. I don't usually keep a piece longer than 2-3 weeks. And every week whatever we work on in the lesson doesn't seem to stick at home practice. With many of his songs. We can get it steady and working in the lesson and the next week it's a mess again.

You're right though, playing alongside him slowly and getting him to practice with a metronome at home are a couple of tricks i've only just started trying with pieces. I tried the metronome on gumdrop factory and it worked quite well.

Thanks for your lovely comments about me being caring

I think he needs to slow it down much more... super slow motion! I would slow down to the tempo at which he can play it evenly, and then bit-by-bit work it up to speed.

Before he plays in learning speed have him take a minute and actually think ahead of what the speed will be. He should have the tempo firmly established in his mind before he begins. Perhaps he could sing a bit of the melody at the chosen tempo to see what it actually sounds like. Then he can count himself in. And I would continue to have him play with the metronome and/or with you.

I hope you got his parent's permission to videotape him and post it on Youtube.

I think his right hand fingers are less developed than his left and his right wrist is lower and less flexible, too. Have him do uneven rhythm practice with it. I can hear what you're doing at the end of the video -- do this with uneven rhythms (long-short, short-long). Then back to even and see if that doesn't strengthen his fingers and improve his ear!

Well I do have parental permission to post videos of him on my studio website, my studio facebook page and Youtube. And this video of him is only accessible if I give you the link, not a search.
Thanks for that uneven practising tip - would never have thought of that myself!

Kylie, I would suggest that he practice the arpeggio sections in blocked style with firm fingertips into the keys. Is he using arm weight? Are his arms relaxed? Tension in the arm, fingers can cause uneven playing. Does he practice chords, scales? (I like Dozen a Day books for beginners -- fun little technical exercises that help strengthen fingers.) Trying alternate rhythms for those challenging sections. Play triplets, or swing rhythm, dotted eighth notes, etc. It's a great piece, with some great technical challenges.