Happy 4th of July!

July 3, 2015 Jennifer Boster
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Happy 4th of July!
In honor of Independence Day, I am offering my Forte Fireworks! lesson plan for $4 off the regular price. This fun one-hour lesson plan is from the Mighty Musicians Piano Camp for 5- and 6-year-olds. It is one of my all-time favorite classes I have taught. As we finished off the class listening to the booming “fireworks” at the end of the 1812 Overture, the students were clearly in awe of the grandeur of the beautiful music, and I think it left a lasting impression! Take a listen!

This patriotic lesson plan is a blast, as students explore fireworks, flags and more, and learn that music can be loud or soft! Students will march in a parade, play a matching game, explore dynamics using a variety of instruments, compose their own fireworks song, play a pre-staff notation piece, and go on a memorable musical adventure to “see” a fireworks show! Pieces that students will become familiar with include Handel’s Music For the Royal Fireworks, Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever, and Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture.

 

I am not currently teaching a class of Mighty Musicians, but just typing this up gets me all excited for this lesson plan – I think I’m going to do it with my three children today to get us excited for the holiday!

Get this awesome lesson plan *today and tomorrow only* (July 3rd and 4th) for just $6!


Forte Fireworks! lesson plan
50 pages, digital download. (Download link will be emailed to you immediately after purchase – if you do not receive it, please check your junk mail folder!)
Price: $6

And if you’d prefer to try the entire 5-lesson Mighty Musicians Piano Camp instead of just Forte Fireworks, for *today and tomorrow only* (July 3rd and 4th) you can purchase the piano camp for $4 + an additional 4% off the regular price – for just $40!


Children in our Mighty Musicians music classes (written for ages 5-6) will experience and learn about music through listening, singing, movement and play, and will also use their new found knowledge to work on their basic piano skills. Students will also learn about the great composers and their music, and have the opportunity to do some composing themselves!

Lessons included in this camp:
Night & Day
Traffic Jam
Birds of a Feather
Mountains & Hills
Forte Fireworks



Mighty Musicians Piano Camp
312 pages, digital download.

Mighty Musicians Piano Camp!

July 31, 2014 Jennifer Boster
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Our Mighty Musicians Piano Camp is now available in its entirety to purchase in The Teaching Studio Store! If you’re not familiar with these lesson plans, let me tell you a little bit about it!

Nichole and I wrote this class following the success of our Early Explorers preschool class. We wanted a similarly hands-on, creative class for children who were a little bit older than our preschool crowd, something that could involve a little more time on the actual piano. That is how Mighty Musicians came to be! We took a lot of elements from Early Explorers, added in some basic piano technique and simple pieces the students could play, and added in a composition element that is so, so great. This class is so much fun – it really captures the children’s imaginations and it is so fun to see them singing and moving and playing to all this great classical music. We have found that the music really leaves an impression on them!

This class is an AWESOME way to see if a child is ready for private piano lessons.

Some of my favorite highlights from this class:

  • Dancing with sunrise scarves to Grieg’s Morning Mood in Night and Day
  • Watching the students move like nocturnal animals to Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King as the music gets faster and faster and louder in Night and Day
  • The short and long composition craft that goes with Beethoven’s 5th Symphony in Traffic Jam
  • Clapping traffic rhythms in Traffic Jam
  • Successfully having each child learn some basic piano techniques and be able to go home with songs to play!

 

  • Singing our new lyrics to Simple Gifts and climbing up a mountain to Copland’s Appalachian Spring in Mountains and Hills

 

 
  • Playing our quacking ducks and singing along to Strauss’ The Blue Danube Waltz in Birds of a Feather
  • Seeing the children’s creative compositions!
  • The journey we act out to get to the musical fireworks show to Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture in Forte Fireworks! Seriously that is my favorite part of this class, the music is so, so powerful and the kids get SO into it.
  • Just seeing the joy in the children’s faces as they experienced music!

 

I hope you will try out the Mighty Musicians Piano Camp for your next piano class, camp or event with your young students!

Included in this camp are the following lesson plans: Night and Day, Traffic Jam, Mountains and Hills, Birds of a Feather and Forte Fireworks. It also includes the Mighty Musicians Camp Planner, which includes 20 pages of camp planning forms and materials.

Includes sheet music, craft templates, 5 student take-home books, clipart and printable teaching resources, and much more! More information available here. 312 pages. Digital download. Available in the Shop or here in this post.

Mighty Musicians Piano Camp
Price: $46.00

Birds of a Feather Lesson Plan Now Available!

July 31, 2014 Jennifer Boster
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Now available for purchase in the Shop is the last lesson plan in the Mighty Musicians Piano Camp – Birds of a Feather!

For those not familiar with the Mighty Musicians class, it is written specifically for children ages 5 and 6 – they are a little bit older than the preschoolers, so they have a little bit longer attention spans but oodles of energy and creativity! This class is perfect for them because it is a nice introduction to piano lessons in a fun and active group setting. At each class, students learn to play a simple pre-staff notation piece on the piano. We also focus a lot on creative composition in this class, and at each lesson children will compose their own song! It is tons of fun.

I love this lesson! Using seven feathered friends, students are introduced to the musical alphabet and the names of the white keys on the piano.

Children will enjoy a creative listening activity and movement and dancing to Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake;” will sing a song, and learn a poem all about birds to help remember the notes on the piano; will be introduced to Johann Strauss’s famous “Blue Danube Waltz” and will learn some fun lyrics about our feathered friends; will decorate their own duck craft and have fun making it “quack” to the music; will play a pre-staff notation piece on the piano using the newly-learned notes on the keyboard; will compose their own creative piano piece; and will have fun learning all about the musical alphabet through song, play, movement, listening and art.

As always, it includes a printable take-home book to send home with each student. I love these take-home books! They include full-color graphics, overviews of concepts covered, lyrics to songs learned at class (so parents can sing along at home!), a pre-staff notation piece for the students to play on the piano, and more!

Here are a few little sneak peeks of what is included:

It is a fun class, that’s for sure! I hope you enjoy it! As always, you can purchase it in The Teaching Studio Store, or at the bottom of this post.

 

Includes a student Take-Home Book! 70 pages. Book is in downloadable e-book format.

This lesson plan is number 4 and the final lesson in our five-week Mighty Musicians piano class (or Day 4 in a week-long camp).

Birds of a Feather Lesson Plan

Now Available: Mountains & Hills – Mighty Musicians lesson plan!

April 26, 2014 Jennifer Boster
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Blog, Featured Posts, Uncategorized

Well, happy weekend everyone! I am super duper proud of myself for posting TWICE in one week (yay!), and excited to have yet another new lesson plan available! It is all thanks to the fact that we are MOVING in about three weeks, and I am trying to get things done before we pack up and go. My awesome husband is graduating from optometry school, and he got a job in Ogden, Utah. So, it seems all too appropriate that this next lesson plan to become available is all about mountains.

This lesson is part of our Mighty Musicians class, written especially for 5 and 6-year-olds. I really love these classes. It is a ton of fun, and this age group is amazing – they love to have fun and play and move to the music, they have a little bit better attention spans than those younger preschoolers, and they also are getting to that stage where they are ready for actual piano lessons! In fact, the Mighty Musicians class is a perfect introduction to piano lessons, and is a great way to determine which kids are actually ready for one-on-one lessons.

Each Mighty Musicians lesson includes a variety of activities to help teach the concepts in different fun ways. The format of each class is as follows:

Welcome – children sing the “Mighty Musicians” theme song and are introduced to the theme of the lesson!
Guided Listening – children are introduced to some great works of classical music and do various listening activities
Musical Concepts – musical concepts are taught in fun and hands-on ways
Sing & Move – children sing and move to classical music
Piano Primer – each child has an opportunity to play a pre-staff notation song on the piano
Creative Composition – children combine composition and art to use the concepts learned to write their own piece
Composition Performance – students have a chance to perform their composition for one another!

In this lesson plan, students learn that notes move up and down on the staff. Children will enjoy climbing their own “musical mountain” while learning how notes move up and down on the staff; will be introduced to Copland’s “Appalachian Spring” through fun listening and movement activities; will love singing and moving to “Simple Gifts;” will play a five-finger scale on the piano; will compose their own piece with notes moving up and down; and will have fun learning all about notes on the staff through song, play, movement, listening and art.

Here are a few previews of what this fun lesson plan includes:

Mountains & Hills is now available in The Teaching Studio Store under Lesson Plans For Sale. It may also be purchased in this post.




Mountains & Hills Lesson Plan:
Notes Move Up & Down
Digital download, includes student Take-Home book!
38 pages
Price: $10.00

Don’t forget to check out our other Mighty Musicians lesson plans we have available! I am hoping to have the final lesson plan of the 5-day camp, “Birds of a Feather,” up and available soon as well!

Forte Fireworks!

July 6, 2013 Jennifer Boster
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I hope everyone had a wonderful 4th of July this week! My family and I had a great day, including a breakfast at our church (where my husband and I played some rousing patriotic songs on the piano – so fun!!), a small-town parade, a barbecue with friends and then watching a few fireworks from our car. I am so grateful for our freedoms and for opportunities to celebrate them with friends and family!

It’s the perfect time to introduce our next Mighty Musicians lesson plan that is available for purchase! Forte Fireworks is a one-hour lesson all about dynamics.

This lesson is one of my very favorites and was one of the most memorable for the students. We use this as the culmination of our Mighty Musicians week-long camp. This patriotic lesson plan is a blast, as students explore fireworks, flags and more, and learn that music can be loud or soft! Students will march in a parade, play a matching game, explore dynamics using a variety of instruments, compose their own fireworks song, play a pre-staff notation piece, and go on a memorable musical adventure to “see” a fireworks show! Pieces that students will become familiar with include Handel’s Music For the Royal Fireworks, Sousa’s Stars and Stripes Forever, and Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture.

The highlight of this lesson is our musical “fireworks show” activity, which was so much fun at our class! As we listened to Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture we went on a musical journey using listening, singing, movement, and storytelling and ended up at an amazing musical fireworks show. I actually think that this song/activity really affected the students – they got so into the story and the movements that when we finally arrived at the fireworks show and heard those cannons go off, it was a really powerful moment. This activity really made the music come alive for these kids, and for me as well! Be sure to crank up the volume so children get the full exciting effect of the fireworks “cannons” at the end of this piece! Here’s a little preview of the song we sing and a great recording of this awesome piece.

Here are a few more previews of this fun lesson plan:

I hope you and your students enjoy it as much as we did!

This lesson plan is available for purchase in The Teaching Studio Store or right here in this post. It contains 50 pages (lesson plan, teacher’s guide, supplies needed, printable resources, student take-home materials, clip-art and more) and is in downloadable e-book format.

Forte Fireworks!: Mighty Musicians Lesson Plan
Price: $10.00

Lesson Plan Added: Traffic Jam! (and our giveaway winner!)

July 22, 2012 Jennifer Boster
2 Comments
Featured Posts, Uncategorized

We have a winner! The lucky reader who will receive a free copy of my “Night & Day” lesson plan is…

Congratulations dianne c! Please send me an email with your email address so I can get you your download link!

And I am excited to announce that there is a new Mighty Musicians lesson plan available for purchase today in the Teaching Studio Store!

“Traffic Jam!” is a lesson plan all about rhythm and beat in music. We learn that music is made up of a pattern of short and long notes, and that there is an underlying steady beat. Students are introduced to half, quarter, eighth and sixteenth notes in a fun way, we create our own Rhythm Traffic Jam by clapping and speaking the different rhythms. We listen and sing to Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, we write our own 1st Symphony. We listen and move to another fun song about traffic. We use our fingertips to play a pre-staff notation piece on the piano. Here are a couple of previews:

Like our other lesson plans, this one comes with a fun student take-home book and many other great resources and take-home extras. It is 51 pages and is in downloadable e-book format. You may purchase it on this post, or visit my new Teaching Studio Store page!

Traffic Jam! Lesson Plan: Music Has Beat & Rhythm
Price – $10.00

Have a great day!

 

Mighty Musicians! (…plus a giveaway!!)

July 15, 2012 Jennifer Boster
27 Comments
Featured Posts, Uncategorized

Happy Saturday!

Well as some of you may have noticed, I haven’t been around a lot lately. I’ve been a bit busy….my friend Nichole and I recently wrote a whole new curriculum and taught a new music class for 5- and 6-year-olds. We call it Mighty Musicians and it was a big success! We are so excited to share it with you all, and I’ve been working like crazy getting these lesson plans all ready to go.

Our Mighty Musicians class is similar to the Early Explorers course (and I *promise* to have more of those lesson plans available soon as well!), but geared toward those 5- and 6-year-olds who are able to catch on and then apply the musical concepts a little more quickly than the preschoolers. This class is very fun, and it involves lots of singing and movement and creative play with the music, but it also has some basic piano technique elements involved to give those kids a great and fun intro to piano lessons! At each class, students get to play simple pre-staff notation pieces at the piano, and they also get to compose their very own songs! We learn about some famous composers and their music and just have a blast singing and moving and listening.

We have five lesson plans that will soon be available for this class (for either a week-long camp or a five-week course). Each lesson is for a one-hour session. Our plan is to get a new one up and available each week….so stay tuned!

TODAY, the first lesson plan, Night & Day: Music Tells a Story, is available for purchase on my “Lesson Plans for Sale” page, and we will also be giving away ONE free copy to a lucky reader!!

The format of the lesson plan is a downloadable e-book, which is awesome because once you purchase it you can print out as many copies of the pages as you need for your class. It is 82 pages chock full of awesomeness…aside from the actual lesson plan and teacher’s guide, there are plenty of resources, printables, songs, clipart, and visual aids, and it also includes a ten-page student take-home book! We think you’re going to love it 🙂

So a little about this lesson plan – we talk about how music tells a story! We do this all within the fun theme of “Night & Day.” We go over some basic musical elements, learn a little about Edvard Grieg and a couple of his famous pieces, sing and move to his music, improvise at the piano, write our own compositions using the musical elements we learned about, learn some basic keyboard topography and play a simple piano piece!

Here are some sneak peeks into the lesson plan and its contents –

So would you like to win a FREE copy of this lesson plan? Just leave a comment! You may receive ONE extra entry into the giveaway by posting about this giveaway on your blog or facebook page (leave an extra comment to let me know you did it). Giveaway ends on Friday, July 20 at 11:59 pm Central time. I’ll announce the winner next Saturday.

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Happy 4th of July!

Mighty Musicians Piano Camp!

Birds of a Feather Lesson Plan Now Available!

Now Available: Mountains & Hills – Mighty Musicians lesson plan!

Forte Fireworks!

Lesson Plan Added: Traffic Jam! (and our giveaway winner!)

Mighty Musicians! (…plus a giveaway!!)

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