Group items tagged

Purpose of this resource: This resource is a custom instrument fingering chart generator. Musical Content: This website allows for the creation of custom fingering charts for standard band instruments, as well as world music instruments, keyboards, and wind controllers. There are options for standard, student, and professional model instrument charts, and each chart can be customized to include any combination of keyholes. Different colors can be used to fill in each chart. Other information: This website is maintained for current version web browsers, and is not currently compatible with internet explorer.

This article talks about the basics for teaching beginning flute to a student.

This article talks about the basics for teaching beginning flute to a student.

The website provides helpful information for assessing and diagnosing common mistakes on the clarinet. The author of this website offers useful advice for educators who may not understand the intricacies of teaching beginning clarinetists. This information would be most relevant for band directors and private studio teachers. 

games for instrumental practice

love this site for beginning band. I will use this for 5th and 6th. Fun game. Charanga Music World

Good for start up activities. Get the kids playing right away. Also great demo videos showing young student performers.

I use this website with my beginning bands when they are first starting to pick what instrument they want to play. It categorizes instruments by family and gives a brief description of each with a sound clip. There are strings, percussion, woodwinds, and brass. The woodwind section is missing tenor and bari sax, and the brass section is missing euphonium but otherwise it is quite complete. I usually show this while having the actual instrument out.

This game goes through The Magic Flute, and gives students examples of instruments as they appear in the music.

This website offers one interactive game, using The Magic Flute, where students guess the instrument sound, as it appears in the music. I would definitely use this in my beginning band classes, so that students can remember instrument sounds in an interactive way.

This website has helped me organize my instrumentation for my beginners. Knowing retention rates and how to get a better ensemble sound has been very benifitial

This set of music books is completely free and in PDF format. In addition to that, there are videos that you can show in class or have your students view on their own at home. This is a great resource for a beginning band program that does not have a large budget. All resources are free to use, and it is based in solfege so it is easier to teach a whole room of beginners on different instruments.

This site introduces ear training and music theory to beginners. Educators can use this site in their music classes and beginner band classes to begin teaching students the basics of theory and ear training.

This website provides multiple resources for encouraging musicians at all stages of music education to continue their studies. Band teacher who work with beginning students will find all the necessary videos, documents, and resources needed to inspire young musicians. This website is most relevant for educators who teach band and orchestra. 

Great recruitment site for beginning band students.

This resource can be used by directors to recruit and advocate for their programs. Directors can access and download videos that introduce students to different instruments and templates of documents to share with administrators and parents. Students may also be directed to the site and explore it individually, especially if they want to join an ensemble.

This site provides great resources for recruiting students and practice tips. The blog provides good ideas for rehearsing beginning bands. This site addresses topics such as best instrument equipment and rehearsal techniques

This is a website that we use at my school. We have sent the videos to all of the fifth grade teachers to allow their students to watch before we come and visit them at their school. We also post these videos on our band website for extra viewing. This is a great recruiting tool for middle school directors.

West Rowan High School has proved scale sheets for each instrument at different levels of ability. This source provides easy to read full range scale sheets for students practice their scales with. For younger students, one octave scale sheets are available to begin practicing their scales without the extra notes they do not know how to play yet.

This website has a series of games meant for younger children to understand sound, rhythm, mood, and sounds of the orchestra. I would use this in my beginning band classes, even though it's middle school, just to ensure that they understand instrument sounds.

Educator Seth Gamba provides his audience with a plethora of strategies for teaching rhythm in the ensemble setting. These include but are not limited to repeating exercises and excerpts as well as counting out loud. Most notably, each of the strategies he suggests can be adapted for use in just about any music classroom, including band, orchestra, chorus, and even general music. Therefore, music teachers are sure to find this resource to be particularly valuable, especially in instances where students are beginning to learn about rhythm.

This website has a bunch of resources! They have free, downloadable files like beginning of the year checklists. They also post a lot of instrument specific articles, like proper techniques and how to teach them.

My 6th grade students ask every year if we can play the star spangled banner at the Veteran's day ceremonies. I now have a version that is possible for them to play!

Here is a wonderful music education podcast. There are a number of important topics discussed in this podcast such as planning, reflecting, rehearsal strategies, and student leadership. This is a great resource for beginning and experienced music teachers alike.

This is a PDF file for clarinet fingerings. Along with showing the basic fingerings that are generally taught in beginning band, this PDF chart also shows the alternate fingerings that make clarinet playing more practical. This chart is particularly useful for teachers who may have a hard time remembering all of the alternate fingerings that would be useful for certain passages.

This is part of a video series showing beginning instruction on each instrument. This is a great video to share with students (and parents) to help them out in the first few lessons. Some information needs to be explained more completely, but this provides good basic knowledge and helps students remember what was taught during lessons.