Games For Music Education

Have you ever thought of adapting traditional games that children already love to music?
The benefits of learning through playing games are enormous. Games help to inspire,motivate and learn much quicker and with much more fun.

In order to become sucessful at music, most people think that you need to sit at the piano every time you practice for a half an hour each day. This is a myth and is simply not true.

If you want your children to be great at music and therefore able to receive the full benefits of music at a young age, then it is important to mix up music practice at home and make it just as fun as any other fun activity you do at home.

Here are three examples of traditional well known games and instructions, you could play in your next home practice session with your children to help make practice more inspiring, varied and fun!

Musical Go Fish

Materials To make: 1) You will need to make 8 cards of the same size with different musical symbols or notation on each.

2) A printer or photocopier - print out two copies of the cards so you have 16 cards in total.

Objective: The rules are based on the classic version of "Go Fish".

To match same cards to make a pair. Pairs are placed in front of each player until there are none remaining in their hand. The first player to match all of their own cards and place them in front of them is the winner!

Preparation: Deal five cards to each player (can use more or less if desired to make game shorter or longer). Extra cards go in the middle face down on a pile.

Directions: Player 1 asks player 2 of their choice if they have one of their cards. Player 2 either passes over the card or if they don't have it says "GO FISH!". If the result is "GO Fish!" then player 1 picks up a card from middle pile. Every player has a turn until someone matches all cards in their hand and "Goes Out".

Musical Snakes and Ladders

Object: To get to the top before anyone else.

Preparation: 1)Make musical dice for the level you require.

2) Find a traditional snakes and ladders game board, or make up your own based on the traditional version. Place the game board in the middle of the playing area.

Each player needs a counter or button.

Directions: All counters are to be placed at the start. Each player in turn rolls dice, add the number of beats together and moves accordingly.

You can play the game with more than one dice if you would prefer the game to move faster.

There will be ladders to climb and snakes to fall down in the process of playing the game. This is a fun game of luck and skill!

Musical Snap

Preparation: 1)You will need to make a deck of 48 cards. Make 12 cards using musical pitches and / or notation and photocopy the four times.

Object: Two matching cards in a row wins the snap.The player with the most cards wins!

How To Play: Divide the playing cards up equally between players have two cards face up to start off two piles in the middle. Each player takes in turn to place their card on top of one of the two piles in the middle, until the two piles match. When a match is spotted, the first player to put their hand over the entire pile and call out snap, wins the card deck. The player with the most cards in the end wins!



About the Author
Janice Tuck is a mother, Music Teacher and joint owner of The Fun Music Company. She is committed in providing educators and parents with fun, relevant and inspiring educational resources and materials. To download a free collection of music resources, just visit http://www.funmusiccompany.info