How to Teach Elementary Music Class Through Purposeful Play
Planning the perfect lesson for elementary music class can be a challenge. Trying to strike the balance between fun and content-filled music lessons is a never ending battle for all music teachers! You want your students to learn musical standards, but you don’t want lessons so dry that they resemble the droning teacher from Ferris […]
National Standards in Music: A State By State Breakdown
The National Standards in Music provide a framework for what should be taught in music classrooms across the country. You may notice that your state benchmarks closely mirror many of the concepts outlined in the National Music Standards. The National Music Standards serve as a starting point, but then each state must create their own […]
Lesson Plans for Elementary Music: 10 Crucial Things You’ve Been Forgetting
Hey, music teachers – let’s talk about lesson plans for elementary music. Lesson plans are something we all have to do. But for many it can be a struggle. If your music lesson plans are contributing to anxiety in your life, then you have come to the right place! This blog post is here to […]
How To Use a Lesson Plan Template for Quick and Simple Lesson Plans for Music
Are you a music teacher (or other teacher) looking for a lesson plan template that can help to streamline your lesson planning and save you time? Teachers have enough on their plates. Spending time writing out detailed lesson plans is just not on the menu. And yet many of us are required to have posted […]
How To Use The Same Elementary Music Songs Year After Year and Keep It Fresh
Are you drawing a blank on elementary music songs to use in your lessons? Have a favorite elementary music song that you want to use, but you already used it last year? Is it kosher to use a song in more than one grade level? Will students get bored of it or call you out […]
Lesson Planning Simplified: Plan Next Year This Year
Hello Readers! So now that I am a working mom, I’ve been trying to find ways to work smarter, not harder. One area where I know that I was spending too much time was getting my lessons planned for the year. I’d spend hours during the summer planning out what I was going to do […]
Save Time and Stay Organized With PowerPoint Lessons
This pandemic has caused many challenges for teachers, myself included, this year. But it has brought me one positive – PowerPoint Lessons! When we were teaching digitally, I created PowerPoint slides to upload into our web meeting. Then we were teaching hybrid and I kept it going. And suddenly I realized how helpful PowerPoint lessons […]
Awesome Instruments of the Orchestra Lesson Plans Your Students Will Love
Are you struggling to come up with engaging instruments of the orchestra lesson plans? Put down your planner. I’ve done all the work for you. From the movement activity about the strings family to the worksheets on sorting percussion. Need a ready-to-go set of lesson plans for your maternity leave? Whatever your situation, these lesson […]
How To Create Long-Term Sub Plans for Elementary Music
Trying to plan for a sub when you are out is already notorious for the amount of work you have to put in. Now think about how much work goes into planning for a long-term sub! It’s a lot. Whether you have a scheduled surgery or a family member that needs care or (like me) […]
DO, RE, MI is the New “SO-MI”
Last winter during our annual state conference, I wandered in to a workshop done by a guy named Andrew Ellingsen. And he shook my world around – my solfege world to be exact. Around the music world, a large portion start teaching note-reading with SO and MI. Makes sense – high and low pitches. But […]