Teaching Music In Elementary Grades Overview
It’s important to remember that music can be anything from a simple melody to a complex orchestral composition. Over time, music instructors have learned to introduce children to a song one format at a time:
Music: In the music format, the teacher shows students how to read notes off a staff, identify the bass and treble clef, identify the key signature, and the time signature.
Beats: In the beat format, the teacher helps the children feel and count of the beats in the music, so they can properly identify when individual notes should start and end.
Rhythm: In the rhythm format, the teacher helps children identify the rhythmic patterns that are created and woven around the basic beat of the song.
Pitch: Identifying pitch is the ability to differentiate the sound of one note from the other. Teachers start out by using a numbering system to help their young students learn notes, then graduate to solfeggio (do, re, me, fa, so, la, ti, do) as students mature.
