TOS Review: Kinderbach

Kinderbach is touted as online video piano lessons for ages 3-7.  When you sign up for Kinderbach you are given access to 60 weekly lessons-with each week containing 4 lessons for the week (and they are working on adding more lessons.)  Of course, with 60 weekly lessons, that is over one year of lessons.

Each group of 10 lessons include an online activity book you can print out to use with the lessons.  These activities are used during the lessons to assist in teaching.  There are coloring pages, activity pages designed to help your child remember certain concepts, memory playing cards, matching games and other activities.  You need not print the whole book out however.  You can print each day's lesson as it comes and print out only what you think will benefit your child. 

Kinderbach also uses cute characters consistently throughout the lessons to assist in teaching.  You are first introduced to Dodi the donkey who "lives" above the two black keys on the keyboard.

My two children and I watched the first two weeks of lessons together and then I had them continue to watch some on their own.  Over the next few weeks, the kids and I watched some of the videos together.  As there are over 200 videos in the program, we didn't get to watch them all but I skipped ahead and looked at some of the later videos too.  My children are 9 and 11 years old-above the recommended age for this program.  They had a hard time putting themselves in the shoes of a preschooler.  They found the videos too slow for their taste.  However, I do think that Creative Princess would have enjoyed this website when she was a preschooler.  She would have enjoyed the activities too. 

The instructor definitely talks to a preschool audience. I personally found her a bit too perky but putting myself in the shoes of a young child, I can see the appeal of these videos and I think most preschoolers will like the instructor.  The videos are slow moving-you are introduced to one concept at a time, often reviewing it with the next few videos.  This is a good thing for very young children.  For my children, they wanted things to move quicker.




That said, I really think this program is geared towards preschool age and would put age 5 at the top of the ages I would start this program with.  I think most 7 year olds starting this program would feel as my children did-it's too slow paced and simplistic.

I do think this program is more a music program than just a how to learn piano.  Children are learning rhythm and key music information. It actually takes quite a few lessons before the child is playing on the keyboard. You can access the first two weeks for free.  Go to the front page and click on the free section.

You need high speed internet to access the online program. The cost for one year of these lessons is $95.88 (which is equivalent to $7.99 per month) or you can go monthly for $19.99 per month.  Another good option is to purchase the DVD's. There are several options so go here to see what would best fit your family.

Go here to see what my fellow crewmates had to say about kinderbach.


(I received a free online subscription in exchange for my honest opinion.  No other compensation was received.)