Music Theory Curriculum: Week Two, Rhythm Pizza, Rhythm Game and more
Music continues to go really well for us. I’m glad I’ve got the general plan and all the printables organized and ready to go at a moment’s notice. It means that music really is getting done about 3 days a week. Hooray!
So this is Week Two following the rough Beginners Music Curriculum that I put together this summer. My write-up here really is geared more for my youngest (ED who is 7). My oldest has a much better grasp of music and I go over all this material, but more quickly (and then venture on to other things as well).
In week two we introduced two new notes A (in the Base Clef) and E (in the Treble Clef). I also introduced the mnemonics for treble clef (Every Good Boy Does Fine… or as LD learned it in choir: Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge). Thus, the E on that first line stands for Every.
We used the worksheet I made quite a bit… going over time signature, how many beats the notes get, etc.
LD was not too impressed with the “music” that I created for this worksheet (that bottom line in the photo below). He said it wasn’t much of a tune!! But hey, it uses the five notes they’ve officially learned! 🙂 I also explained that often the men have to read the base clef line and women are more likely to follow the lines in the treble clef. (So mean Mom that I am, I made him “sing” the base clef while I “sang” the treble clef line.)
We still are using the Fly Swatter Game every time we pull out our music materials. This is *especially* good for ED, who is taking longer to learn the notes by sight than my older two.
This week we’ve spent quite a bit of time identifying the notes both on the staff and on the piano. We’ve gotten good use out of the Lady Bug activity (you’ll find the link for that in the Beginners Music Curriculum packet which is free over at the other post.)
I also spent quite a bit of time pointing out to ED (and the others) how the notes move up (or down) the staff line, space, line, space (etc.)… and that they go in a repeated order… ABCDEFGAB…. Seems so obvious to me, but she really needed that clearly spelled our for her.
So in other words, I had her put the notes in order from lowest to highest below (see the A in the base clef in the lower left? … followed by the B in the base clef, C in the treble clef, etc.) Once she put those in order I had her tell me whether the note sat on the line or in the space.
She also liked the hint… “I C Saturn” for Middle C because it hangs out in space (not on a staff).
We also continued to go over basic rhythms. We’ve now covered whole notes, dotted half notes, quarter notes, half notes, and eighth notes. And, we continue to use the Rhythm Cards from Layton Music. I had intended to use rhythm sticks with these cards, but haven’t yet brought them over to the other room. (Note to self… go get the rhythm sticks!!). I have to say that ED really *loves* working with the rhythm cards. We’re using the Kodaly method of Ta Ta (for 2 quarter notes) and Tiki (for 2 eighth notes).
This week, the kids and I have all played Climb the Mountain. It has *really* helped cement in the names of the notes and the number of beats they (and the rests) get. Now all that is quite “easy” for the kids! That’s definitely a plus!!
Follow our Musical Journey in Pictures this Semester:
- Remember, the links to all of these free printables that you see in the photos above are over in the free Beginners Music Curriculum packet . (I did that to save myself time blogging this semester… and to put it in one convenient spot.)
- Music Curriculum: Week One — See what we actually did during the first week with photos.
- Music Theory Curriculum: Week Two — This post!
- Music Theory Curriculum: Week Three, coming next week
That’s about it for today! See you again soon here or over at our Homeschool Den Facebook Page! ~Liesl
