Reinforce

There is one final step left to explore in “The Four Rs of Effective Practice.” When you establish your resolve, resolve on a plan of action, repeat that plan of action, and refine that plan of action, the final step is to reinforce. This is where you really start to strengthen, bolster, and shore up your skills. 

Initially, this may involve rote repetition, allowing your body and brain to experience a successful pattern enough times for it to become familiar. As the skill begins to take hold, reinforcement can progress to include variability. In a way, that process is similar to the “refine” step but in reverse—taking a successful strategy and introducing confounding or interfering elements to see if the success can be maintained. This may come in the form of singing an exercise with different vowels or words, with a more complicated melodic pattern, or with varying dynamics.

You can also introduce physical movements as ways to reinforce, maybe seeing if you can execute the skill while walking backward just as well as when standing still (or maybe while doing the worm breakdancing move). You may try interspersing other vocal exercises between iterations of the exercise you're trying to reinforce. You may start to change your surroundings or circumstances by singing in different rooms, singing at different times of day, or singing in front of audiences of different sizes. This variability will reinforce the skill and start to solidify it within your capabilities, moving it into the 3rd stage of learning (the automatic stage). 

To reiterate some of what I said when I started this series of "The Four Rs of Effective Practice," practice is a crucial component for improving vocal skills, but it can also be challenging and difficult to find the motivation to do. To once again quote author Joanie Brittingham in Practicing for Singers: A Guide to Solid Practice Habits, “While practice habits are only a small part of what is required for a successful singing career, they can be some of the easiest things to correct.” (viii)

Rosenberg and LeBorgne offer some final pertinent advice in The Vocal Athlete: Application and Technique for the Hybrid Singer:  

"Vocal pedagogy is not about learning a broad recipe of exercises to use systematically across all students. Voice pedagogy is about choosing exercises that are appropriate not only for the moment but also for the long-term development of the student. It is about recognizing when a student requires modification or adaptation, knowing when to push a student, and when to pause." (xiii)

“The Four Rs of Effective Practice” is not a “recipe of exercises” or a checklist. It's a process of exploration. By keeping them in mind, you probably won't ever have to wonder what you should be doing in the practice room. Just start by committing to your resolve, resolve upon a plan of action for the skill you want to address, repeat the decided-upon strategy, refine either the implementation of that strategy or the strategy itself, and reinforce what leads you to success. 

Now go practice.