What is a warm up?

 A warm up is a series of hand motions for the given task that will prep your muscles for the coming practice

What is the purpose of a warm up?

 Warm ups not only help the initial overall dexterity of the hands, they also can prevent injuries by easing into the practice

What are the benefits of warming up?

* Easy start

* Hand mobilization

* Injury prevention

* Precision focused 

* Adds routine to your practice 

While sitting at the piano, the bench should be high enough so that your arms will rest comfortably on the keys.

Adjust the bench so that when you sit with your hands resting on the keys the elbows should be slightly in front of the stomach. The arms should not be fully extend or be beyond the back.

While sitting at the piano you should have a straight back with relaxed shoulders. This allows the you to keep your head straight so that you can easily see the sheet music.

Source

Shake out any stress that you may have in your arms, hands, and fingers. Sit at the piano and place your right hand on middle C to start. The ideal result should be that the fingertips are in contact with the lid, the knuckles of the hand should be fairly even with one another, and they should be slightly higher than the wrist. The first knuckle closest to the fingertips should be flexed and both hands should be in moderately cupped positions. 

A piano should be tuned by a professional only. Here's a guide to attempting it yourself: http://piano.detwiler.us/

Dexterity is the flexibility, strength, and reach of your hands while playing your instrument. By increasing the dexterity of your hands, you allow for many more stylistic options as well as a decreased risk of injury.

Strengths within the warm up:

 It's tough to see strengths due to the frequency of my class time however, I do see a slight improvement within my hand movements and sight reading

A, B, G, H

Areas of needed improvement:

 I need to work on doing this warm up at home and definitely more time to get used to the feel of a piano 

C, D, E, F

A.  The location and physical set up; chair, music stand, lighting, free of distractions

B.  Proper posture; sitting, standing, alignment

C.  Creating a good tone; volume, long tones, rolls, reduction of buzz, finger placement, breath

D.  Logical sequence; mind, posture, body, physical

E.  Appropriate length of time; 5-10 minutes

F.  Consistent routine; everyday

G.  Remain on task; focused

H.  Clear overarching goals motivate the warm-up session