Category: music games

First Piano Lesson Activity: Piano Keyboard Pattern Cards

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Young children often get confused at the piano and can’t remember where the notes are because they get lost in the sea of white keys. Of course as piano teachers we always direct them to look for the black key patterns of 2 and 3, so while reading a post from Sheryl Welles at Notable Music Studio I got an idea for this simple keyboard patterning game. It is great to use at a first piano lesson.

What you need:

Foam Sheets in 2 different colors (purchase at a craft store or a dollar store)

Piano Keyboard Printable (enough for 3-4 octaves)

Glue

Timer

The cards will look like this:

      

To Play:

After introducing the student to the 2 and 3 black key groups on the piano, use this quick game to test their understanding. Have them line up the cards in a keyboard pattern. Time them and see how fast they can do it!

To extend the learning, have them make a set to take home. At home they can teach younger siblings or parents the keyboard pattern!

Activities for Waiting Students and Siblings

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One of the most distracting things that can happen during a music lesson is for a waiting student or a little sister or brother to interrupt and ask, “What can I do now?” To eliminate this problem, or at least minimize it I set up a Waiting Activity Area in my piano studio. Here is a mini tour of it:

For those who like to color, Hello Kitty music coloring pages. Kids can look inside the bag for more coloring activities.

Kids who like puzzles and challenges can choose this.

Great practice on staff notation. Color by Note sheets!

For those who love to build things, LEGOS! Of course they must build something related to music!

A game to practice the music alphabet. Kids can stack the cups in order or build chords!

Each of the activities in the center have something for the kids to show me when they have completed it, so they do get it done. I’ve also made my ipad or iphone available with music apps to play in the waiting center.

I’d love to hear what kinds of things you keep in your studio for waiting students and siblings. Make a comment below!

…Oh and come back tomorrow for the post about the music store field trip that I promised!

Rhythm Toss Game

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 Summer is a great time to play even more games in the music studio. If you teach piano during the summer, you know that the absence of a set daily routine such as the one kids have during the school year makes it a little more difficult for them to focus during lessons. That doesn’t mean that the music learning has to suffer! This Rhythm Toss game is perfect to get them up and moving in the name of music!

What You Need:

A toss set (I purchased mine from Oriental Trading Company. You can also find these at Party stores)

Numbers that can be taped to the toss set to represent beats. (1,2,3,4)

Candy or other trinket for prizes.

Cutout notes: Quarter notes, whole notes, half notes, quarter rests

To play the game:

Have the student toss a bean bag into one of the holes. If they make it into the hole, they must “pay” for the prize inside the hole using the appropriate notes or rests to match the number of beats indicated. Students may use any combination of notes as long as it equals the desired number of beats.

 

A Piano Activity Kids Can’t Resist

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Transitioning between piano lessons can be a bit hectic at times, BUT –

A simple activity can make all the difference! With a small refrigerator or magnetic board and a keyboard graphic you can squeeze in that extra precious 5 minutes that sometimes gets lost in the transition between lessons.

One of my favorite transitional activities is the Magnetic Piano Puzzle I made using a 1 octave keyboard printable from Wendy Stevens at ComposeCreate.com.

Print the keyboard, attach  colorful letter stickers for the key names, then laminate.

Next you will cut out each of the white keys. This will leave you with a set of 2 black keys and a set of 3 black keys in addition to the white keys. Put magnetic tape on the back of each and arrange on the refrigerator.

Your student will then put the puzzle together. My refrigerator faces the studio door so it is the first thing kids see when they come in. Usually the younger ones will rush straight to the puzzle to put it together without me even asking. If they don’t and I am transitioning from another lesson, I ask them to see how fast they can put the puzzle together.

For those just learning the keys, I sometimes just put up the 2 black key puzzle or the 3 black key puzzle for them to assemble.

  

Extend the learning by removing certain keys from the completed puzzle so students can practice quickly recognizing which key is missing.

There are tons of ways to use this puzzle. Can you think of any? Share them in a comment below!

Music Alphabet Manipulatives

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   Yet another use for Play Doh!

I wrote out all the music alphabet (including sharps and flats) on the tops from empty Play Doh containers. I can think of so many ways to use these in music teaching.

   A colorful representation of keyboard topography

Sometimes it’s hard for students to grasp that there are 12 individual tones in music. This way they can see it in full color!

 

  Younger ones can have races to see how fast they can put the music notes in order

-This can be done starting on ANY note so students get fluent at stepping up and down on the staff.

-Notes can be left out also so that students can name the missing note to complete the pattern.

-Students can stack the notes to build colorful chords

– If you are using a color code for piano notes/keys such as with Yellow Cat Music Education (great for students with dyslexia or who have trouble reading music notation), you can also use it when putting your own letters on the play doh caps. What fun!

More Fun Practice: Silly 6 Pins

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Ever wondered how to get a kid to play the same passage more than once – let alone 6 times? Of course you have if  you are trying to help a child learn to play piano! Here is a repurposed game that works extremely well for solving this problem. If you’ve downloaded my Weekly Practice Games Printable, you may have seen this game listed as one of the practice assignments. It’s the classic Silly 6 Pins Game. I tell my students to bowl to see how many pins they can knock down. They try really hard to get a strike which usually results in lots of pins getting knocked down. They get to play whatever passage or piece they need to practice one time for each pin they knocked down. I get really silly with it and take the pins they knocked down to the piano. Each time they play the piece, I ask them which pin they want me to throw away. And, yes, I throw the pin across the room (carefully, of course). Depending on the kids’ personality I might even let him or her throw the pin. Of course I only do that if I’m pretty sure the kid won’t tear up my studio with the pin! Warning: This practice game could take up a large portion of the lesson because kids want to play it over and over again. However, this results in songs well learned, and tricky passages terminated! In case you missed it, you can check out Fun Practice for even more sneaky ways to get kids to “Play It Again”.

What tricks do you use to get your piano player to practice?

Songwriting Game

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Yesterday I came across a set of balls in my studio like the ones you see at places like Chuck E Cheese where the kids can get in a pit and just have a good time. I had purchased them a while ago knowing that eventually I’d get an idea about how to use them to teach music. Well yesterday was the day the idea finally arrived! SONGWRITING BALLS!

This is an activity that can be done with any instrument, not just piano!

The balls conveniently come in 5 colors. I purchased mine at Wal Mart. Of course in my mind the number 5 screams PENTATONIC SCALE. So, I chose one note of the pentatonic scale for each color. C – red, D – orange, E- blue, G- green, and A-yellow and wrote these one the balls. I made 5 sets of each color.

To play the game (which is really writing a song), place all the balls in a large hat or bag.

Then, using a composing worksheet such as the ones you can find on Susan Paradis’ site, determine how many balls to draw from the bag. You will need one for each note of the song.

Each time a ball is drawn from the bag, write the note name in the appropriate space on the composing worksheet.

Since we are only using the pentatonic scale for this song, any combination should sound nice. You could also specify that the first ball drawn will be the first and last not of the song.

Once you’ve got all the notes written on the worksheet, it’s time to play your new masterpiece!

Extensions – Add lyrics!

Use the G and C balls to demonstrate V-I progression. Add this to the end of your song to show how lots of songs end this way. Have your student play G-C up and               down the chosen instrument.

Don’t Practice, Play A Game!

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I know very few kids (if any) that get excited to practice, but I know a lot of kids (almost all) that get excited about playing games. That gave me the idea to change my assignment sheet from piano homework to My Weekly Practice Games. Using this sheet the student gets to choose which game or games they’d like to play during the week and circles them. The teacher can also choose specific games as well. All that’s left to do is to write the name of the song you want them to use for the game. There is also a space where the student / parent can check off each day. You can download a copy by clicking here or clicking the image above.

Easter Egg Surprises

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Here is a quick activity that can be used in the piano lesson or as a piano assignment to be done at home! To use it in the piano lesson, you will need 12 plastic eggs, a sharpie or other permanent marker, and some candy. On each egg draw a staff, add a treble clef or bass clef and draw a note. I used treble clef space notes since my students have been working on these lately. I also made one egg for each space note as a quarter note, half note, and whole note since some kids struggle to grasp the concept that ANY note can be a quarter note, half note, or whole note. You can have students hunt for the eggs around your studio or randomly pick one from an egg carton or Easter basket. If they can correctly identify the note and its value, they get to open the egg and keep the prize inside!

As an at home assignment, kids can draw the notes themselves and write the letter name on the back. A special prize can be given for completing this assignment.

NBC’s The Voice – Preschool Style!

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Today my 3 year old music class was in a singing mood. Two of the boys in particular wanted to sing. After the first boy sang, the second boy said I can do it! And the next thing I knew the two of them were in a singing battle and critiquing each other in between. This has NEVER happened in my class before and it gave me the idea to abandon the planned activity for the day and convert the class into an episode of The Voice. We have a large mat in our classroom where the children usually sit for circle time. We used this for the boxing ring like the one from the TV Show. Kids volunteered two at a time to step into the ring and sing. The rest of the class played the audience and showered the singers with applause after every round. Everybody was eager for their turn. I captured video of each performance and the kids looked forward to watching the videos afterwards. To top it off, one kid gave out pretend trophies to each performer!

What and awesome day!