I teach along side another singing teacher at a prep school. The children are aged between 8 - 13. She makes them sing an exercise to ravioli. She takes them up to and well above top C, sometimes to the F above. Alot of the children sound like strangled animals and it doesn't seem right or necessary to me. Is this right for small children who are just learning.

Hiya! Welcome to the forums!
I'm no expert in all this, in fact I don't know very much at all. But this sounds really bad to me. I'm probably wrong, but it sound as if the poor kids are hurting their voices! Eep! I sure hope they're not straining too much!
Luv charl xx

When you say top C do you actually mean C two leger lines above the treble stave and then the F above that? If so then shoot her and claim that it was self defence. If you mean the C in the third space of the treble stave and the F above that then I cannot see much harm coming to them in using that range. Some will drop out before they hit the top E and F but many will sing easily at that pitch. I have pupils of eleven who have top G and A above the stave with ease. Ravioli on the other hand is a dismal thing to sing.

how do you sing stuffed pasta

Yes to it being two ledger lines above the treble stave.


I hope I'm replying correctly
She is a, not sure if this will be spelt correctly, colatura and classes everyone she teaches as a high soprano

In that case she is being very foolish indeed and needs to rethink the teaching methods quite a lot. There is so much to do in singing lessons that does not and should not involve squeaking as high as humanly possible and beyond. Rounds and part singing and some Kodaly work would be so much better.

Welcome to the Forum by the way. I am not sure what I would do in your situation though but I would do something.

Wow ! I agree totally with Petrat.

Children need to stay in a relatively middle-range.

There's loads of stuff that doesn't go much over an octave that can be used to help them progress.

This makes me think the teacher doesn't really know anything about singing or the human voice. If they did, they wouldn't be part of the 'look how high I can sing' brigade.

There's so much more to singing than high C. Sheesh.

Allan

I would have thought most would give up around the E, possibly F at the top of the treble stave. Maybe one or two can get up there, but I don't think it can be much good for the rest.

IIRC our choir warmup exercises went from G below middle C to B just below the top C mentioned, at about 10-11. Leaving a usable range of about Bb below to about G an octave and a bit above (plus the _occasional_ use of a note outside that range).

Its quite an age range to be covered there some 8 year olds only just starting singing and some 13 year old boys having their voices starting to change.