In my time lurking through voice teacher facebook forums, I often see the same question repeated. “I’m about to start a new job teaching voice lessons to children–where do I start?”. There seems to be such an influx of people asking the same questions that I wanted to compile a comprehensive list of resources to easily link. Here is part one–where do I even start?
Join the Voice Teachers for Young Singers group on Facebook!
Finding a professional community of people who are doing the same thing is one of the best ways to get your feet wet! My recommendation is to join and lurk for a little while. If you have a specific question, you might try using the “search the group” feature.
Get to Know the “Full Voice” Website
OK– so if you’ve put in any research into this topic, you already have heard of the Full Voice. I personally have all of my students above the age of seven using these workbooks. BUT– You need to know about ALL that is offered by this expansive resource!
- The Full Voice Podcast: I cannot recommend this enough! Go through the huge backlog of episodes and listen to the ones with topics that catch your eye.
- The Workbooks–I’m going to touch more on these in a future post!
- Free Resources: That’s right! FREE stuff! Pretty itty bitty kitty unicorn is my particular favorite.
- Vocal Studies for Kids: One of my favorite purchases. It’s a PDF which has endless uses.
- Single Song Downloads: Songs written specifically for kids by composer Donna Rhodenizer
- And more!
Read “Teaching the Child Singer” by Dana Lentini!
When I finished reading this book, I immediately started keeping it next to my piano to reference while teaching. Dana Lentini gives a wonderful and accessible overview of different developmental stages and what lessons with a child singer need to actually cover. She also has wonderful suggestions for using different props such as pinwheels and kazoos in lessons. When I’m feeling stuck, I try out a new exercise from this book.
In conclusion…
This is by no means a comprehensive list, just my list of what resources have been the most helpful to me! Please sign up for emails from my blog or follow me on my socials for more information and ideas!
Natalie Baker, soprano 