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Why Kids Dislike Playing With Their Left Hand
Why kids dislike playing with the left hand is not a mystery. It has to do with brain hemispheres. Right brain controls left hand, left brain controls right hand. Kids brains are growing and they don’t yet have control of the transfer between sides of the brain.
Many kids hate playing piano with their left hand (and thus with both hands.) I often have to issue a mock-note from their doctor, saying that they are allergic to left hand. You must be patient while their brain grows.
The Left Hand Is Rarely Dominant
All this comes about because one day, I asked a child why she didn’t want to play with her left hand. She said, “I’m allergic.” So after that I ask if they are allergic, and then we write out a funny note from the doctor. I began to study kids and their reaction to the weaker, less dominant hand.
Even if their left hand is their “dominant” pencil hand, they have to start playing the piano with the right hand. So, the left hand becomes the “wrong” hand in terms of the piano. Even right handed kids sometimes inexplicably start playing with their left hand. Their brains haven’t sorted it out yet. That’s why we take piano lessons.
Piano Is Easy
Allowing Kids To Avoid Left Hand
I discovered that if I did not insist on left hand, the child developed many skills very well with the right hand alone, and felt very secure. Giving the child this bastion of skill and security in the right hand for a long while turned out to be a very wise move. The difficulty with embracing the left hand (and the act of using both hands) is partly due to the two hemispheres of the brain being still separate for many functions in many children, especially those who are younger.
Playing the piano may be, for many children, the first time their two brain hemispheres are really called upon to interact. Since playing with two hands requires both hemispheres, kids who have more separate hemisphere functions (younger kids or kids with other issues) are physically and mentally uncomfortable trying to put the two together. But, like riding a bike, it’s very easy once you have tried it for a moment.
First Try The Hands Not Simultaneous
The solution is to first find arrangements and songs that have both hands playing, but not at the same time. This way the child has to call upon the hemispheres sequentially, not simultaneously. This practice accustoms the child to the sensation of two-brained thinking and acting, as it were. I often simplify left hand parts drastically, on the theory that any skill with both hands is better than none.
Instead of playing the entire left hand, we select a few left hand notes that they will attempt to include. Just keep casually insisting on that first left hand note. After a while the child does not feel so awkward with the left hand and begins to grudgingly adopt it equally. But let them set the pace in the adoption process.
This Works With Reading Music, Too
All of the above refers to purely physical actions, not to the act of reading music. But a similar regimen works wonders with reading music, too.
Here’s how: Teach the child to read the first five right hand notes from Middle C to G, in Piano by Number that is 1,2,3,4,5. That alone could take months. Then allow the child to add the left hand in a very leisurely fashion. Simplify the left hand, and require them to only play a few significant notes.
The child will resist reading left hand like a trip to the dentist, so make it short. Later, when you have done the introductory left hand games many times, the child will see that it is really quite easy. They may never be as comfortable with left hand music reading as they are with the right.
If you are gently persistent, you can at least break the “curse” of left hand difficulty. Make the child realize that left hand music reading is annoying at first, for everyone and not just them. But it is not impossible!
REFERENCES:
PIANO BY NUMBER AND DOWN'S SYNDROME
PIANO BOOKS FOR SPECIAL NEEDS CHILDREN
PIANO BY NUMBER FOR A SEVERELY DISABLED CHILD
HYPERACTIVE CHILDREN AND THE PIANO
BRAIN HEMISPHERE COORDINATION AND CHILDREN’S PIANO
BRAIN CHEMISTRY AND EMOTIONS IN CHILDREN’S PIANO
BRAINS, CHILDREN AND PIANO
THE PIANIST WITH TWO BRAINS
ENDORPHINS, CHILDREN AND PIANO
WHY KIDS DISLIKE PLAYING WITH THEIR LEFT HAND
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CHILDREN, PIANO, MUSIC AND MATH
EINSTEIN’S PIANO
EINSTEIN’S VIOLIN IMPROVISATIONS IN GYPSY STYLE
PIANO BRAIN CHEMISTRY FOR KIDS
BRAIN HEMISPHERES AND KID’S PIANO
MATH, PIANO AND KIDS
NEUROTRANSMITTERS, CHILDREN AND PIANO
BRAIN STRUCTURE AND KID’S PIANO
