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I'm thinking about starting to keep a record of my practice sessions.

Does anyone do this?

If you do; What sort of things do you note down/keep track of?

Do you find it useful?


At the moment I'm a little (ok, very) disorganised...so I'm trying to add some routine/structure to what I'm doing.

I suppose it would be nice as well to have a written record that I can look back at months...or even years down the line and see how far I've come (unless of course, a few months/years down the line, I'm still in the same place )


*tryingtoworkoutthispracticethingHidden*

Piano World Practice log

I have created an Excel workbook. I’m doing Dave Frank’s Joy of Improvisation course.
Each lesson is a separate spreadsheet within the workbook. I log what I’ve done each day for Hanon, chords and Dave’s tunes. I also log what I do each month for Bill Evan’s tunes, my compositions and my harmonisations.
It’s pretty hard to explain in words, PM me if you want to see it.

If you are doing a demanding course, it does help for you to see what you've accomplished.

December's been a bad month for me so far, and I, too, need to get some motivation going. A practice log is not a bad idea! I tried starting one about a year ago, and failed miserably.

I know...that's one of the trials and tribulations of a teacherless self-directed player. "We" can do whatever we want. ...which is sometimes a bad thing.

I was thinking of a small day planner/calendar to keep on top of the piano.

I keep a 3-ring binder. I log the amount of time I spend each day, and which pieces I practised. Then I have a separate sheet for each tune/song, and I note what I practised for that tune/song.

Mostly it just keeps me working each day, and sometimes it's interesting to see what/how long I've been working on a piece.

But I go back to old pieces a lot, and find they've gotten better, or find new things to work on that makes them better.

Cathy

As a self-learning player I don't have a "scientific" log of what I'm doing every time I play. As most of us, I have a busy live (kids, family, work, and son on) so I can't antecipate with precision how much time I can spend practicing.

So I have a major objective in my mind: learn one new piece evey month. In this way I can learn about 10 pieces at the end of the year (btw: I start playing one year ago, and I can play about 11 pieces by memory). Sometimes, I spend 2 weeks learning a new piece, sometimes it takes more time, but the main goal is there.

You may ask how do I choose the new pieces. Well, I try to choose pieces a litle bit more dificult that the previous. The good part is that I can choose what I like and the pieces I believe I'll learn in one month. I use to listen with carefull the piece before starting practicing, because I can figure how dificult the piece is.
And that's it, each pice is a new challenge. And it's an incredible feeling when you finally feel "I did it!"

A practice log of what you do is very useful, a plan of what you hope to achieve is essential. You should be thinking in terms of daily practice tasks, but also goals for the week, month and year etc.

I use a combination of Windows application (a list of practice tasks and durations: sort of a multi-task count down timer) and a blog (the former uploads to the latter). It very useful to be able to track how time has been spent. I've probably been a bit OTT in this regard - but hec I'm a geek!

I still don't know what to do next year... Pencil and paper? Or just a Word doc?
The PW practice Log seems to be only for the current year, and I don't want to lose everything at the end of the year.
I think pencil and paper are still a good option, so I don't even have to turn on my computer and it is always available... I am not sure about the best format of the exercise book (the most convenient for a practice log), I will have to have a look...

I use a pencil / paper, then on the weekend I transfer it onto a spreadsheet on my comp. Make graphs and the like... I just do the time I practice vs the time I play for fun. I play for fun twice as much. I've begun to tally individual songs, but I often forget.

I used to write my log on a ROUGH piece of paper, with all sorts of abbreviations etc., then I transferred it to the piano log online every 2 to 4 days, but I would like something permanent, not only for the current year.
Actually, even something like a diary would do, so I don't have to write the date...

A few further thoughts. I use pianoteq, so the laptop is always next to the piano. It was therefore natural to use an IT approach. You could do something similar in Excel or Access.... the log file is populated when tasks are completed (a countdown timer event).


<<If you do; What sort of things do you note down/keep track of?>>

A) Practice Task:
Category.........: e.g warmup, sightread, scales&arps, pieces, exercise
Task.............: e.g "Scales 3 - Emaj, C#min,(4#),Bmaj,G#min,(5#)"
Duration.........: e.g time to study task (mins)
Metronome........: target tempo

B) Log
Date.............:
Time completed...:
Duration.........:
Task name........:

<<Do you find it useful?>>
Yes, I can run searches on how much time I've invested on say sight-reading, or learning a piece or practicing a set of scales.

You start to see patterns emerging such as how much work it takes to learn a piece (at a particular level) or memorise a phrase.

You can track progress increasing tempo of scales and arps.

On a difficult piece, I can identify how much time it took to learn the hard bars and phrases. I then have a record of these for the next review cycle.

I've learnt I don't practice enough. But I've also learnt that I ought to be doing 2-3hours daily (a target I find impossible). I also skip too many days for a variety of reasons

Current summary of all my tasks to date:


Start date: 19/03/2009
End date: 11/12/2010
Number of tasks: 4337
Time(mins): 27852
Time(hrs): 464
Days in period: 633
Days of Practice: 384
Avg pract time: 73
Avg daily time: 44etc etc

lol Elwyn so you are 1.75 hours short of your daily target - you sound even more OTT than Cathy, Elizabeth and myself !

Cebukid
Maybe it will help you to schedule a gig with some buddies so that you have a goal.

Hi Custard apple,

Nope, I just checked and since 01/06/2010 I'm averaging 58 minutes daily which represents a 31.8% increase over the full running average :

Start date: 01/06/2010
End date: 11/12/2010
Time(mins): 11235
Time(hrs): 187
Days in period: 194
Days of Practice: 157
Avg pract time: 72
Avg daily time: 58

See how useful it is

A few screen shots

wow Elwyn, reminds me of those classic time and motion studies for identifying areas for productivity improvement

Mine is nowhere near as detailed although I do log my tempo for everything.

One advantage of using a spreadsheet is easily being able to count down from 10,000 hours of practice.

At one point I calculated how long it would take to achieve 10,000 hours (but found it too depressing). I tend to stick with the 1500 hours target to achieve "competance" (but can't remember where I read that).

I think I'm up to about 700 hours (in 2+ years). But sometimes I think the time between practices, though uncountable, is valuable too. Gives your brain time to classify & file what you've learned into long-term memory or something.