With my short and sweet, fun-filled summer term being just three months long I actually have more students in the summer than during the school year.  The kids aren't overwhelmed with school, homework, and all the after school activities so I like to keep their brains active with fun lessons and theory games and assignments.

The question is, how do I keep all of their papers, homework, payments, little encouraging notes, and goodies separate?  I thought about a shoe organizer, but can't figure out how to hang it where I want it.  I thought about making something and using paperclips, but afraid they might not hold.  I'm tempted to use file separators with a nice basket, but I just can't decide...

Suggestions??? 

Needing something different and with a bit of challenge for my older beginner students I decided to make a music puzzle.  Their first puzzle is a simple song cut into measures.  The directions remind them of what to look for in music:

Wanting to incorporate more math into my lessons, I planned to use pizza fractions during a week I was reviewing basic notes, measures, and 4/4 time.  With little to no ink left in my printer, using the wonderful examples online were without question.  Luckily, I was able to borrow a set of Learning Resources' "Pizza Fractions" and came up with a .pdf for my students to slice up their own yummy fun!

To download the .pdf worksheet for measure review click here.

Two great resources for printable MUSIC NOTE pizza fractions online are:
- Mrs. Swedberg's "Music Composing with Pizza Fractions" on her Made for Music Teachers blog and
- Susan Paradis's "Rhythm Pizza"

Today my beginner class learned about the black & white pattern of the keyboard.  To supplement this with materials for them to use to build that pattern I gave them each a handful of Oreos to take apart and create with.  It was a very yummy way to add to the lesson and their understanding!

My older beginners are also using Oreos this week as a bonus "test tasting" (then taste testing)
activity.  They first complete a page about creating pentascales with the WWHW pattern and their root chords.  Page two is the surprise!  They are to figure out the E Major OCTAVE scale with WHWWWH and its root chord.  They then get to color in a stack of "Oreos" with the root chord at the bottom (black crayon for black keys).  Once that is done I hand them four real Oreos to separate and build it with.  Once they show it to me they get to eat it up!

Click here for the .pdf for this activity.

As a fun end to the school-year term and to celebrate the coming of summer vacation I had a baseball themed lesson for all of my students the first week in June.

Running the Bases Scales Warm-Up - students could walk, run (fast legato), or sneak (quiet staccato) their fingers up a scale and then slide (fastest legato they can) back to home (tonic note).  It really gave them a chance to be free and just play on the piano without too much structure and many came back the next week showing me just how smooth they got their slides!

Baseball Site Reading - Students site read simple pieces like "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," "Base-ball Days" from John Thompson's Teaching Little Fingers to Play, and "School's Out!" from Tune Time by Frances Clark.

Theory Games - We played Bass Clef Baseball at www.musictechteacher.com and utilized Susan Paradis' "Let's Play Ball" worksheet.

Thank You- I sent them each home with a box of Cracker Jacks with a little personalized "You're A Hit!" note.