Curated OER
Ballet and Classical Music
Fourth graders explore ballet. In this dance and music humanities instructional activity, 4th graders practice ballet positions and play a card game using French ballet vocabulary. Students count beats in rhythm patterns and listen to...
Curated OER
Music in Words
Your class can build strong, well-represented opinions about the music they hear. They listen to, and share thoughts about, a piece of classical music. Then they write a piece of music or a poem, and analyze their peers' work and their...
Curated OER
GCSE Notes 2000: Classical Music
Classical period music is defined by its characteristics and distinctive sound. A set of notes assists upper graders in recalling and analyzing music from the classical period based on musical terminology. An example analysis of Eine...
Classics for Kids
Listen to the Music
Different pieces of music can elicit different emotions from audience members. A quick tempo can make you feel happy, while a largo piece may bring out a melancholy temperament. Elementary musicians learn more about the instruments and...
Classics for Kids
Fun With Musical Words
Is concertmaster another term for conductor, or is he or she another person entirely? Learn the specifics of the role of concertmaster with an activity focused on classical music. After learners define the term, they select a piece of...
Curated OER
Classical Music Connection-Popular Music - Connecting Pachelbel, Beethoven, and Mussorgsky to Disco and Rap
Students examine classical music and the "Art Rock" of 1967. They review classical themes in their original genre and discuss/analyze how pop musicians incorporate theses themes into a variety of pop music genres.
Boston Symphony Orchestra
The Elements of Music—How do Composers Plan?
The introduction to Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake and the finale of his Symphony No. 4 provide young musicians with an opportunity to investigate the music elements composers employ to develop the themes they want to create. They compare the...
Curated OER
Peter and the Wolf
Peter and the Wolf is a wonderful piece that introduces learners to classical music, builds listening skills, and creates a bridge from song to imagination. Each slide shows a picture of one of the characters from the story and a group...
Curated OER
Romantic and 20th Century Period Music
Upper graders explore the similarities, differences, and depth of pop music from the Romantic era and the 20th century. They listen to selections that exemplify the Baroque, Romantic, and 20th century periods, then create presentations...
Classics for Kids
Hurry Up – Slow Down
Is your music appreciation class feeling a bit adagio this afternoon? Pick up the pace and get them feeling andante with a straightforward music theory activity. After defining several terms for musical dynamics and musical tempos,...
Curated OER
Danse Macabre: Saint-Saëns
Assist your youngsters as they learn to visualize the story music can tell us. They listen to the piece "Danse Macabre" while viewing this slideshow. Each slide describes the key instrument and what creature of the dark it represents. A...
Classics for Kids
Musical Time Travel
Young musicians learn more about the greats with a straightforward activity on historical composers. As they click through a navigation guide, they choose a musical time period and a composer from that period before taking a short quiz.
Curated OER
The Sorcerer's Apprentice: 200 Greatest Pop Culture Icons
Upper graders view the animated short, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" and analyze how the music score was chosen to express the scene. They create an animation as they listen to a classical recording to experience the connection between...
Curated OER
Critical Listening: Music Vocabulary
The school band or orchestra analyzes their own performance after exploring musical terminology. They listen to a classical piece and describe it using only words. They look up musical terminology and then use those words to compare and...
Classics for Kids
A Composer Leads the Way
What song is playing? A music activity focuses on composers throughout history, their famous works, and the instruments in each piece. As pupils complete the worksheet they play a short game to review music theory terms.
Curated OER
Not Your Grandma's Music: A Lesson in Music History
Students experience and discuss the different musical periods such as Baroque, Classical and Romantic. In this music lesson, students discover musical theory and apply it to the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods. Students will...
Curated OER
Music and Animation: 200 Greatest Pop Culture Icons
Music has been used to convey thoughts, feelings, and the human condition for thousands of years. Your class will analyze several songs hear in the animated classic, "Charlie Brown." They will listen to several jazz pieces from the show,...
Curated OER
Who Wants To Be A Mini Maestro?
Students are introduced to classical music. They listen to Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. They interview each other in regards to their feelings about the music and the paintings they produced while listening to the piece.
Film English
Music
Some emotions are indescribable, but sometimes you have to try! After brainstorming adjectives that describe emotions, pupils watch a quick film, at first with no sound. Partners share their adjectives and come up with descriptions for...
Classics for Kids
Instruments Have a Family
Are the instruments in Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in the same family as those in George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue? Elementary musicians work on their music theory and their instrumental ear as they listen to clips of famous...
Leading Learner
Using Music to Tell a Story or Describe a Scene
Young composers demonstrate their understanding of the stylistic features of descriptive music, including pitch, tempo, dynamics, rhythm, and timbre, by developing a melody and countermelody for a main character in a story. As part of...
Curated OER
A Musical Textures Activity
Students identify textures in music. In this music appreciation lesson, students listen to a variety of classical music pieces and identify components of musical textures including monophony, homophony, polyphony, and heterophony.
Curated OER
A Picture's Worth a Thousand Notes
Students listen to classical music and create a listening map for each piece. In this classical music lesson, students select a piece of classical music and create a visual map for the piece. Students set their pictures to music in a...
Curated OER
Moving with Music
Second graders explore and experience the basic concepts of crescendo, decrescendo, andante and allegro by moving with the appropriate signal in accordance to the music being sung. They study the words to the songs "Old McDonald,"...