I don't have an exercise for this in our daily drill.


For fp, I have had success doing some version of the following:
1. Play the note as a whole note, at the "top volume" for that note.
2. stop.
3. Play the note, as a whole note, as the "minimum volume" for that note. (address tone, intonation, etc.)
4. stop.
5. Play the two whole notes, in succession, and make them sound the same in volume as the previous two examples.
6. stop.
7. Play the forte note as an eighth note, and the piano as the remainder of a whole note.
8. Further adapt to the context of the actual music.


I do the same thing for crescendi, etc.
1. play the passage at the starting dynamic
2. play the passage at the ending dynamic
3. start at the starting dynamic, and end at the ending dynamic.
4. "cheat" by always playing a little softer at the beginning of a crescendo.


Having numbers for your dynamic levels is helpful but from your description it sounds more like you just need to find a way to get the kids to actually play at those levels. My kids always know "what" to do, but always feel they did more than they actually did.