Neil Moore is the founder of Simply Music, [1] an international music education organization with over 700 locations worldwide. [2] He also created the Simply Music piano method and composed much of the music used in the organization's piano programs. [2]
Moore was born in 1957 in Melbourne, Australia [2] to parents who loved music and listened with their children to a wide variety of styles. From about age 3 or 4, Moore would hear music and naturally visualize it as shapes and patterns. At age 7, when his piano teacher would play the songs he was to learn, Moore recognized those same shapes and patterns across the keyboard. By age twelve Moore was playing a large repertoire of music, and continued playing piano through adolescence and into adulthood, never realizing that his unusual relationship with music would later shape his career. [1]
Through early adulthood, Moore continued with piano while establishing a successful career in the restaurant and wine industries. He hoped to do well enough to retire from business and pursue music. A series of poor business decisions, compounded by the national economic crisis in the late 1990s, resulted in Moore losing everything. Facing this crisis brought clarity and a new direction. Moore decided to put his love of music first. Moore began taking open-enrollment music classes at the Australian music institution, The Victorian College of the Arts. During this time, he was recruited to teach a new music reading program to both students and instructors. He later relocated to California to bring that reading program to the United States. [1]
The idea for Simply Music came when Moore was asked to teach an eight-year-old blind child how to play piano. Since Moore was unsure how to apply traditional methods of reading music, he wondered if an approach, based on his own childhood relationship to music, might work. Moore described his approach in a way that allowed the boy to feel those same shapes and patterns on the instrument. Moore continued this process, and within a few months his new student was playing a range of blues, popular, and classical pieces. When Moore asked the boy's father if he was happy with his son's progress, the father responded, "Not only are we happy with it, but he’s teaching his four-year-old sister how to play this way, and she’s blind too." [3]
In this key moment, Moore realized this approach might work more universally. He began designing materials and introducing the program to other young children and found that they quickly learned sophisticated music and gained a natural connection with it. He started testing his program more widely, with a range of ages, abilities, and teachers. He then expanded to reach older adults, students with developmental disabilities, and troubled youth. In every case, students found success. Not only did everyone learn to play piano, but they could also teach others how to play. [1]
The Simply Music organization was founded as a way to formalize the method and organize a system for sharing it, [1] eventually with teachers throughout the world. Simply Music is now presented by licensed educators in over 700 locations worldwide, as well as self-study students in 124 countries. It has broadened to support programs from birth through old age, including early childhood music and movement classes, piano lessons, audio production tutorials, and quality of life care for the elderly. [4]
Music lessons are a type of formal instruction in playing a musical instrument or singing. Typically, a student taking music lessons meets a music teacher for one-to-one training sessions ranging from 30 minutes to one hour in length over a period of weeks or years. Depending on lessons to be taught, students learn different skills relevant to the instruments used. Music teachers also assign technical exercises, musical pieces, and other activities to help the students improve their musical skills. While most music lessons are one-on-one (private), some teachers also teach groups of two to four students, and, for very basic instruction, some instruments are taught in large group lessons, such as piano and acoustic guitar. Since the widespread availability of high speed. low latency Internet, private lessons can also take place through live video chat using webcams, microphones and videotelephony online.
Whole language is a philosophy of reading and a discredited educational method originally developed for teaching literacy in English to young children. The method became a major model for education in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, and Great Britain in the 1980s and 1990s, despite there being no scientific support for the method's effectiveness. It is based on the premise that learning to read English comes naturally to humans, especially young children, in the same way that learning to speak develops naturally.
Phonics is a method for teaching people how to read and write an alphabetic language. It is done by demonstrating the relationship between the sounds of the spoken language (phonemes), and the letters or groups of letters (graphemes) or syllables of the written language. In English, this is also known as the alphabetic principle or the alphabetic code.
Language education – the process and practice of teaching a second or foreign language – is primarily a branch of applied linguistics, but can be an interdisciplinary field. There are four main learning categories for language education: communicative competencies, proficiencies, cross-cultural experiences, and multiple literacies.
In music, sight-reading, also called a prima vista, is the practice of reading and performing of a piece in a music notation that the performer has not seen or learned before. Sight-singing is used to describe a singer who is sight-reading. Both activities require the musician to play or sing the notated rhythms and pitches.
The Suzuki method is a music curriculum and teaching philosophy dating from the mid-20th century, created by Japanese violinist and pedagogue Shinichi Suzuki (1898–1998). The method aims to create an environment for learning music which parallels the linguistic environment of acquiring a native language. Suzuki believed that this environment would also help to foster good moral character.
Experiential education is a philosophy of education that describes the process that occurs between a teacher and student that infuses direct experience with the learning environment and content. The term is not interchangeable with experiential learning; however experiential learning is a sub-field and operates under the methodologies of experiential education. The Association for Experiential Education regards experiential education as "a philosophy that informs many methodologies in which educators purposefully engage with learners in direct experience and focused reflection in order to increase knowledge, develop skills, clarify values, and develop people's capacity to contribute to their communities". Experiential education is the term for the philosophy and educational progressivism is the movement which it informed. The Journal of Experiential Education publishes peer-reviewed empirical and theoretical academic research within the field.
Music education is a field of practice in which educators are trained for careers as elementary or secondary music teachers, school or music conservatory ensemble directors. Music education is also a research area in which scholars do original research on ways of teaching and learning music. Music education scholars publish their findings in peer-reviewed journals, and teach undergraduate and graduate education students at university education or music schools, who are training to become music teachers.
Study skills or study strategies are approaches applied to learning. Study skills are an array of skills which tackle the process of organizing and taking in new information, retaining information, or dealing with assessments. They are discrete techniques that can be learned, usually in a short time, and applied to all or most fields of study. More broadly, any skill which boosts a person's ability to study, retain and recall information which assists in and passing exams can be termed a study skill, and this could include time management and motivational techniques.
This glossary of education-related terms is based on how they commonly are used in Wikipedia articles. This article contains terms starting with P – R. Select a letter from the table of contents to find terms on other articles.
The audio-lingual method or Army Method is a method used in teaching foreign languages. It is based on behaviorist theory, which postulates that certain traits of living things, and in this case humans, could be trained through a system of reinforcement. The correct use of a trait would receive positive feedback while incorrect use of that trait would receive negative feedback.
Inquiry-based learning is a form of active learning that starts by posing questions, problems or scenarios. It contrasts with traditional education, which generally relies on the teacher presenting facts and their knowledge about the subject. Inquiry-based learning is often assisted by a facilitator rather than a lecturer. Inquirers will identify and research issues and questions to develop knowledge or solutions. Inquiry-based learning includes problem-based learning, and is generally used in small-scale investigations and projects, as well as research. The inquiry-based instruction is principally very closely related to the development and practice of thinking and problem-solving skills.
The direct method of teaching, which is sometimes called the natural method, and is often used in teaching foreign languages, refrains from using the learners' native language and uses only the target language. It was established in England around 1900 and contrasts with the grammar–translation method and other traditional approaches, as well as with C.J. Dodson's bilingual method. It was adopted by key international language schools such as Berlitz, Alliance Française and Inlingua in the 1970s and many of the language departments of the Foreign Service Institute of the U.S. State Department in 2012.
Balanced literacy is a theory of teaching reading and writing that arose in the 1990s and has a variety of interpretations. For some, balanced literacy strikes a balance between whole language and phonics and puts an end to the so called reading wars. Others say balanced literacy, in practice, usually means the whole language approach to reading.
Simply Music is a music education organization licensing teachers at over 700 locations in twelve countries and serving an online self-study student community in 128 countries. Australian music educator Neil Moore founded it on the core belief that all humans are naturally musical. Simply Music offers programs for students from birth through old age, with the stated goal that "students acquire and retain music as a lifelong companion." Simply Music patterns its approach after primary language acquisition, where speaking comes first. In this it shares some philosophical ground with other developmental approaches like Kodály, Orff Schulwerk, and the Suzuki Method.
Music Wizard Group is a software development firm that develops and publishes software products to teach students to play various musical instruments through MIDI software and a Guitar Hero-like interface. Unlike Guitar Hero, it uses real instruments and teaches to read sheet music as well.
Piano pedagogy is the study of the teaching of piano playing. Whereas the professional field of music education pertains to the teaching of music in school classrooms or group settings, piano pedagogy focuses on the teaching of musical skills to individual piano students. This is often done via private or semiprivate instructions, commonly referred to as piano lessons. The practitioners of piano pedagogy are called piano pedagogues, or simply, piano teachers.
Language pedagogy is the discipline concerned with the theories and techniques of teaching language. It has been described as a type of teaching wherein the teacher draws from his prior knowledge and actual experience in teaching language. The approach is distinguished from research-based methodologies.
Emergent literacy is a term that is used to explain a child's knowledge of reading and writing skills before they learn how to read and write words. It signals a belief that, in literate society, young children—even one- and two-year-olds—are in the process of becoming literate. Through the support of parents, caregivers, and educators, a child can successfully progress from emergent to conventional reading.
Group piano is the study of how to play the piano in a group setting. This contrasts with the more common individual/private lesson. Group piano originated at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and continues to be a widely-used method of piano instruction. Group lesson formats include master classes, university classes, and pre-college music lessons. These classes typically have between 3 and 16 students. Benefits of the group lesson format include the development of independent learning, ensemble playing, critical listening skills, and exposure to a wide range of repertoire. Group piano instruction may require more space and equipment, increased preparation per class, and more attention to scheduling and group interaction than when teaching individual/private lessons.
