Student Transfer Guide: Every Graduate Needs One!

Your Orange Roots student is almost finished with Let's Play Music classes. Take a moment to dry your tears—saying goodbye to a beloved teacher can be bittersweet. But don’t worry, we know just what comes next!

Connections: A Transfer Guide

Your child already purchased the Student Transfer Guide (as part of their 3rd Year materials) to use with their new piano teacher. Just ask your LPM teacher for this if you don't receive it by graduation. You may be wondering: What is this book? Why is it useful? Will my child like it? How can I get my new teacher to use it?

The Student Transfer Guide helps connect your student from LPM to the next stage of your child’s musical journey. Here’s how it works:

Use the book for 4-8 weeks only.
It benefits every student and teacher, no exceptions.
It doesn't replace your teacher's chosen method book.
Let your child showcase and reinforce what they've learned.
Use the activities to start a conversation with the teacher about your child’s lesson plan.

How to Use

Here's a 4-minute video of how the Transfer Guide works with your new piano teacher.

What Students Want: A Showcase

Your child has mastered amazing skills—ear training, advanced theory, and even songwriting. When starting with a new teacher, they want to showcase these strengths and impress.

However, Let's Play Music isn’t a traditional piano course. It’s a musicianship program. So, when your child demonstrates their skills, the new teacher might not expect advanced abilities like completing musical phrases, identifying melodic patterns, or filling in chords. The Transfer Guide highlights these unique skills, allowing your child to show off their talents.

To showcase song-playing ability, the best approach is to perform songs they already know well. The Transfer Guide includes duplicates of songs your child has mastered, so they can display their skills confidently.

The Transfer Guide is the perfect way for your child to showcase their true abilities.

What Parents Want: More LPM

As a parent, you’ve appreciated how LPM provided a well-rounded musical education—ear training, composing, music history, theory, classical music, sight-reading, and more, alongside piano technique.

That’s a lot to cover in each lesson! You saw your child develop composition skills, and you’d be disappointed if they didn’t continue. The Transfer Guide offers new teacher examples for composing and ear-training exercises, helping your child keep progressing. It also provides an easy way to discuss these skills with your teacher: "These are important to us—can you include them in lessons?"

In LPM, we use unique terminology like blue bugs and colored chords, which mainstream teachers may not know. However, during the third year, your child was introduced to the I, IV, and V chords the traditional way. The Transfer Guide helps your new teacher incorporate LPM terminology and methods.

Finding a teacher who’s willing to follow the official connection process is invaluable! It’s the best way to communicate your expectations for continued musical growth.

What Teachers Want: Integration

Your teacher is excited but also nervous about taking on a new student. What has the previous teacher been teaching? How skilled is the student? What weaknesses need attention? How will they fit into the method books they prefer? One teacher I spoke with (let's call her Ms. Lemon) was so anxious about transfer students that she made a policy to refuse them! Unfortunately, she’s missing out on some of the best students.

Integrating an LPM student can be tricky, but the Transfer Guide makes it much easier. Because LPM students have strong musicianship skills beyond just playing music, the Transfer Guide helps the new teacher assess and incorporate these skills into lessons.

Each of the sections covers different LPM skills. If only Ms. Lemon had known that these could be the easiest first lessons she'd ever teach! The Transfer Guide includes theory, repertoire, ear training, composing, and a teacher’s guide, with tutorial videos to help her get started. By following the guide step-by-step, success is assured.

Successful integration often means using a beginner-level method for technique while using a higher level for theory, ear-training, repertoire, and composition. It also means finding creative ways to add LPM-style musicianship to simple method books. The right repertoire and technique choices will keep the student motivated while making steady progress.

Teachers who tailor lessons to LPM students’ unique talents (even with beginner-level fingers) find they’re some of the best students! They can hear mistakes, love creating music, know how to practice, and understand music structure. With time, their fingers will catch up to their brains, and they'll make rapid progress.

Using the Transfer Guide is the best way to evaluate and integrate an LPM graduate into a new studio.

What to Expect in Real Life

Here are a few real-life scenarios to help you navigate the transition from LPM to private lessons. Learn from others' experiences and advocate for your child’s success!

Scenario 1: Unfair Evaluation

Philomena’s mom took her to Ms. Apple for a private lesson. Ms. Apple, unfamiliar with LPM, assumed Philomena needed to start from scratch and placed her at the primer level. After eight weeks, Philomena hadn’t used any of the musicianship skills she learned in LPM and was frustrated with the lack of progress.What happened?

Ms. Apple didn’t recognize Philomena’s LPM-developed skills. After using the Transfer Guide had a clearer understanding of what Philomena needed for technique and repertoire.

Scenario 2: Polishing Old Songs

Gertrude’s teacher, Ms. Banana, worked through the Transfer Guide with her, but spent too much time polishing "Cockles and Mussels." Gertrude lost interest as she focused on perfecting a song she had already learned in LPM.What happened? LPM is a musicianship program, not a piano-only program. The goal for Gertrude was to showcase her skills, not rework old songs. Ms. Banana should have used the song to identify areas for improvement and focused on developing those skills with new repertoire.

Scenario 3: Double-Fun Teacher

Benedict’s new private teacher, Ms. Orange, was also his LPM teacher! Even though she already knew the LPM methods, she still used the Transfer Guide for a few weeks. This allowed her to evaluate his progress and fine-tune certain areas, showing that even experienced LPM teachers benefit from using the book during the transition.

The Transfer Guide is a helpful tool in each of these scenarios, ensuring a smoother transition and more successful lessons for your child.

Not By The Book

Clementine’s new teacher, Mr. Grape, embraced the Transfer Guide and used it to assess her skills. He realized she needed a tailored program to continue developing her musicianship.

To keep her excited, he gave her challenging repertoire, like a Bach minuet, paired with theory exercises. For piano technique, he assigned easy pieces from his favorite method book, focusing on wrist position, dynamics, and precision. He also included exercises from his technique book, challenging her to transpose them to other keys.

To enhance her improvisation and chording, Mr. Grape gave her simple pieces to modify with different accompaniments, embellishments, and occasional improvisation or composition time during lessons.

Mr. Grape’s approach wasn’t about following a rigid method book. He tailored assignments to meet Clementine’s needs, creating a well-rounded, personalized experience.

Find a Teacher

When searching for a piano teacher, ask: “Are you willing to use the Transfer Guide to assess my child? Are you open to adapting methods and levels to suit her skills?”

If a teacher is unwilling to try the Transfer Guide or adjust their approach to your child’s needs, it may not be the right match. Explain the benefits of using the book for just a few weeks—it’s not a replacement for their method books but a way to better understand your child’s abilities.

Some teachers, like Mr. Grape, are excited to adapt and will embrace more LPM students. For those who aren’t, it’s crucial to advocate for your child’s education and ensure their needs are met.

For more options for your graduate, watch this short video!