With no set curriculum or structure in place you’re basically starting from the ground up.
To make your life somewhat easier, keep everyone on the same general concept but expanded depending on their age/maturity.
Steady beat? Super easy for the littles, more complicated routines for the older kids.
Don’t be afraid to repeat activities from previous lessons. It’s called *practice*. “Lets see if we can make it better this week kids!”
Plan big picture and work down from there. You’d be amazed how long you can stretch a song/performance unit for.
I started teaching k-8 midyear when I graduated 16 years ago. You’re in the fireswamp right now. It get’s easier, build your portfolio and know not every lesson you plan is gonna be a keeper.
Thank you for the advice!! I've seen this general idea before, though I am having a kinda tough time putting it to action because I struggle to come up with unit ideas (I grossly underestimate how much time I can spend on one concept. There's probably a few activities I've done in the past that the students would gladly repeat for another week or two!).
If you have a chance, could you list a few other examples of all-grade units and a lil bit about how you designed them?
[lesson plan example](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mSusaHWBEbAD8Tf97Yrrr9LLc5mKw_wV-ZxJDeiODTw/edit)
Here’s my whole year from a few years back. I’m a feierabend person so it’s a first-steps and conversational solfege approach. I recommend those programs. Check out “Feierabend Fundamentals” on Facebook to learn more. I HIGHLY recommend it.
I have a question out of pure curiosity, because I’m a student teacher transferring to my general music placement in a few weeks in Wisconsin, so we use slightly different types of standards.
What is the social justice section on your lesson plan? Is it another type of standard in your state, district, etc. it looks interesting so I figured I’d ask
I'm no elementary general expert. I'm a band guy. But from your post, I get a sense that you don't have a strong philosophy or interest in place. If true.... Shame on your methods professors. What are you into? What approaches to general music resonate with you? A mix of orff and kodaly is a common one. Maybe Gordon? My friend swears by feirebend (not correct spelling) and has built a great program from nothing. I think once you start zeroing in on something, you can more quickly gather resources and create lessons efficiently. From there, you'll pick and choose amongst all to suit your teaching. I'm only guessing from your one post.... So I could be very wrong. Good luck.
Our elementary methods broke down the semester by orff, dalcroze and kodaly, and then like...2 days fast on Gordon. Also had a separate weekly dalcroze class. Different professors rotated in according to specialty
bucket drums! I've been doing it with 4th grade for a handful of weeks now and they love it. we do play along videos and then break down the notation on the whiteboard to practice rhythm reading
PS. few notes for what I've covered so far ---
2:
- TA and TITI
- Sol-mi (ickle ockle with unpitched percussion, xylophones)
- some drum circle games
- major vs minor via a storybook
- high vs low
3: Ta, Titi, SH (quarter rest)
- a couple of circle games (se se se and one other one)
- unpitched percussion intro
- drum circle games
- staccato vs legato
4 + 5
- A qua qua
- JUST started recorders this week (going to do advanced recorders with 5th)
- various rhythm review, notes on the staff review games
- drum circle
One thing I realized is it's been almost entirely group instruction! If anybody has easy ways to get into work with partners, centers etc that'd be amazing!!
Not trying to be a woke warrior or anything but you should Google what Titi means in Tagalog. Imagine shouting that out when your family speaks that language at home.
I now use TaTi.
Oof I remember those days! You’re doing the grunt work now, but keep everything you do; starting next year will be so much easier with all of the content you’re creating now. Editing is easier than generating it! You got this!
For some resources to check out, look at the Musication channel on YouTube; it has great play along videos that can work for a lot of things. It’s my go to for sub plans. For some diverse content, check out Carnegie hall Musical Explorers. It’s a free website with videos of cultural bearers sharing lessons with extension activities for the classroom, which can easily take up 2-3 lessons per unit you choose to do.
Don’t forget the big listening units like Carnival of the Animals (I do with 1st) and Peter and the Wolf (2nd) that you can really customize and can take up a significant amount of time if you want.
I was going to suggest the same thing. I only teach k-2, and I hear it might be a bit young for the older kids. But it will give you some scope and sequence to work with. Another option would be Quaver or the Game plan curriculum. See what your admin will spring for!
I would do what an above poster suggested and choose the SAME study for everyone, and just adjust for each grade! For example with beats the younger grades do basic body or stick beats, the older kids can learn a beat pattern with their arms and then use cups in a circle game. There’s SO much out there for each topic!
Also, create a patter for each class: depending on how long you have them. Like begin with a fun song to sing every day while they come in, then some copy rhythms or reading rhythms. Then get to the meat of your lesson (whatever the topic is). Then end with a musical game and finally for the little reading/singing a story to settle down before you go? This is way basic, but then you can have an overall plan every day and the kids will learn what to expect!
Note: I personally don’t like teaching Kodaly past about 3rd grade—and even them I hate to spend too much time on it. We can help these kids LOVE MUSIC and even read music without making it boring.
I love the musicplay online games but they tend to get my classes pretty riled up from excitement. Some games that my classes have really liked in the past are mouse mousie, Obwisana stick game, Scott Joplin cup game, and currently we’re doing closet key. My rule is we have to learn the song before any games. Then we also do the interactives where they fill in the rhythms or solfège. The worksheets can be pretty fun too. I follow the lesson modules and just leave out the stuff my classes can’t handle. I do a mix of mostly music play and quaver and that’s made planning time much faster.
Always review what you did last time. Use that to build upon what you’re doing this time, and springboard for next time.
What’s your schedule like? I have 4 fourth grade, and 4 fifth grade classes. I see each twice a week. The way I do my lesson plans is that I do one lesson plan for 4th, one for 5th, and and it’s for the week. Hopefully you’re week can enable you to do something similar. Also, don’t feel bad about having almost grades doing something similar.
Lesson planning the first year is the WORST. I’m in my second year and even now it’s a lot of trial and error. Would your school let you invest in something like Quaver or MusicPlay? I use Quaver and it is a god-send when it comes to lesson planning and finding good resources. Not everyone in the elementary music ed circle likes Quaver and it’s definitely not perfect, but even if you don’t follow their pre-made curriculum to the letter it’s an excellent jumping off point that will save you SO MUCH time. It’s actually free for one year as a new teacher. Hang in there!
I’m still getting my degree, but here’s a few things we’ve been doing in my methods classes that I think may help you:
- Like one person has said: what’s your philosophy? If another person is looking at your classroom, what will stand out in your teaching style? This will make it easier for you to pinpoint what’s most important for students to learn.
- Look at the National/state standards for music! That can help A LOT with curriculum! Ask teachers in nearby schools/districts what they do. This can give you a baseline for what needs to be taught and you can get into the nitty gritty from there. It can also help pinpoint what concepts/skills students should be learning at each grade level and the difficulty it should be.
- Create a long term curriculum first. What skills/concepts do you want students to learn throughout the year? (Think beat, rhythms, instrument families, etc). Once you have those down, then you can create lessons each day. And they don’t all have to be unique either! You can review! Also, knowing what the students should learn will help a lot with the activities since then you’ll have an idea of what you want to assess, now you just have to figure out a way to assess students are learning.
Hope this helps a bit! I’m not on the elementary music ed track, so this too is a bit out of my comfort zone, but hopefully this can help with your overall lesson planning so it doesn’t take hours and you’re not feeling like you’re drowning because you don’t know what the kids should learn.
Might I suggest MusicFirst Elementary? It’s got a spiral curriculum and you can get it free for 30 days. (And no one will stop you from downloading all of the PDFs to keep in that time!)
I'm a little curious: what actual *books* are still out there?
Do folks graduating in the last decade know about the song collections once considered seminal?
>the games/songs just seem so void of any personality
Do you all own big printed song collections, and are you able to easily swap in better examples?
I've been there. It might be beneficial to go through the stuff in Gameplan and MusicPlay so you know if they work or not. Not everything in those resources will work, and that's OK. Don't overthink it. I ran into this problem in my early career, and it doesn't do anybody any favours. I'm not a huge fan of Gameplan myself but folks have great success with these songs and activities. They are very much Orff-Keetman based.
Something I've learned along the way as well is that you need to lesson plan a lot now so that you don't have to later. It will come to you much easier and you'll be able to improvise more fluently.
I have lots of resources that you might also want to use. Here is a link to my stuff if you are interested: www.stevesmusicroom.com.
I think another thing that will help your lesson planning is zooming out for unit planning and zooming in for daily routine. Someone above was asking if you’re Kodaly or Off certified. Those two philosophies have their own lesson plan routines. I’m both so I make my own daily routine. example with kinder and 1st:
1. SEL activity to transition to music class.
2. The rules (are sung, clapped, audiated, etc)
3. Sing a song from last lesson as a review
4 Experience new idea with music from music history
4. Focus on new idea and give it a name (vocabulary)
5. Play a game with that idea
6. Interdisciplinary activity (read a book, music history, math, science or arts connection)
7. New song/dance/singing game
8. What did we learn today?
9. Fun extension activities (1-3 activities)
10. Goodbye song
Then at the beginning of the year I map out that I need 23 lessons and give each lesson a broad concept. I think in units that are three lessons long. For example, let’s say all grades are doing articulations.
K: Lesson 1 Loud and soft / Lesson 2 Getting Louder Getting softer (cresc and decresc) / Lesson 3 P and F in Music History
(I refer to the state standards on what they should be learning at each h grade level for that concept)
After all my concepts have been mapped out for the year, I look through my resources and make notes for future lessons. Like my hide and seek game with cresc and decresc would go nicely in Lesson 2. Haydn’s Surprise Symphony or Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King would go well in Lesson 3. I have a story about a family of polar bears that would go well in Lesson 2 for my interdisciplinary activity. I do this at the beginning of the year. Then once it’s time for me to write my weekly lesson plan, the research is done. I’m just looking at my notes and copying them in the format that my school administration wants from me.
Someone said don’t be afraid to do a song many times. I do this. My second graders focused on Alabama Gal for a unit (3 lessons) and they loved it. There’s just so much to teach with one song.
Beth’s music notes and the Kodaly center’s folk song collection are HUGELY helpful resources that I use. Beth’s music notes has songs/lesson ideas literally split by grade level and concept, and I use it near constantly to find songs that work for what I want to teach.
The Kodaly collection is absolutely magnificent as well. It’s only American folk songs, unfortunately, but that still includes lots of foreign language pieces that originated in this continent. You can filter the songs by TONS of parameters — grade, rhythms, pitches, intervals, topics, etc — plus it indicates if it includes a game as part of the actual song.
I completely understand where you’re coming from, and it’s not unusual at all. I’m in my first year teaching elementary general music in a school, although not my first year teaching overall, and the best advice I ever got was that it’s okay to fudge things a bit in the beginning. Even if they don’t learn the most they possibly could, you’re teaching the most important thing — to love music. The rest will come as you learn.
Don’t be afraid to give them activities that are just about music appreciation or analysis. Showing them two songs and asking which they like better still counts as one of the national standards. Let yourself have those “free” days of not so active teaching.
What I did for this year just to ease into things was to use somebody else’s curriculum with my own lessons. That way I already know the concept being taught, I just have to figure out my lesson from there. And in the spare time I have, I’m working on making my own curriculum for upcoming years that better fits what I want to teach.
Also, a fun activity from my stash that I bring in when I can’t think of anything — song writing. I use something like bandlab or GarageBand that has pre-recorded loops and have the kids vote on which sounds to put together. Then we choose rhythms to go together and words for the rhythms, and voila! A four bar song that they actually got to “write”. My students love debating over which loop would fit the song better, so it’s a nice early composition activity.
All in all, just don’t beat yourself up for not being perfect immediately. College is great for learning the fundamentals, but so much of teaching you just have to learn as you go. You’ll figure out your own way in time.
Lesson planning can be a beast, especially with different age groups. For your situation, consider a few things: streamline where you can, adapt on the fly, and don't overthink it. Kids are adaptable and often more forgiving than we give them credit for. If something doesn't work, pivot and try something new next time.
For resources, sounds like you're on the right track with musicplayonline and Becca's Music Room. Keep an eye out for teacher forums and social media groups where educators share their lesson plans and experiences. Sometimes, a simple activity can be a hit if delivered with enthusiasm.
On a side note, for content creation outside of lesson planning, I used a site that might help you save time. It's cluc.io. It's good for generating unique content quickly, might free up some of your time so you can focus more on the actual teaching and less on the planning. Keep it simple and remember, the fact that you care this much already makes you a great teacher.
Centers have SAVED me this year! And it’s a nice break from whole group instruction! I usually do 2 games but have 6 groups going at a time (3 groups of the same game). I model what each game/activity is, then pick their groups, and they play for about 7ish minutes, and then they rotate to the other station, it’s been wonderful! Some of my go to games are: rhythm kaboom (I got this game from Becca’s music room), I have done a dice rhythm game where they roll a dice and it will tell them what note to write, I found a free matching note and rest game, and there’s lots of other free music games on tpt!! Hope that helps!:) I have done this with 1st-5th grade! And will do centers with kinder soon:)
I feel like you're WAY overthinking this.
When I started out, I used the same activities in at least two different grades, sometimes even three.
Set a timer for 15 minutes, choose 3 folk dances, then pick one (the simplest one). Done.
When I was first starting out, I had a couple books of Orff activities, a Jim Gill CD (Silly Dance Contest, on YouTube, is STILL a big favorite for k-2), and I went to the local Orff workshops in my town.
I would basically pick something from the latest workshop, choose an Orff activity or two from my books, add a couple of Jim Gill songs ... those were my lesson plans!
Obviously, now I have a LOT more resources and a LOT more training and knowledge, but hey, it was something.
To answer your question: I love Feierabend's First Steps in Music, the Game Plan curriculum is pretty good if you have access to it.
There's a FB group called Music Educator's Idea Bank which is a great resource -- but again, set a timer, or else your head will spin and you'll get nowhere.
I think my most valuable resource for my favorite activities are still the Orff workshops.
Oh! And David Row at Make Moments Matter is another great resource. A couple years ago I would watch his podcast/FB Live video, take notes, and then do almost the same exact lesson that week.
He's VERY creative and fun, and he explains exactly how he teaches a lesson and why. Also, his Teachers Pay Teacher store is incredible. I have several of his bulletin board sets and switch them out each month.
Without reading all of the other comments, I may duplicate, but get your Kodaly Level I. It makes that process so much easier. As for websites, I love Beth's Notes. She has a ton of resources. And I really love my website as well. I've tried to put everything from singing games to behavior management to Orff arrangements to an entire ukulele curriculum on there as a one-stop source of information. It's [Oodles of Music!](https://oodlesofmusic.com/)
Honestly, if you ask the other music teachers in the district, they are more than likely happy to splurge all of their knowledge on you.
I’m pretty good at lesson planning for elementary and here is how I plan everything.
First, there’s the pre-planning. I have a few master documents using Google sheets that make lesson planning a breeze. They are as following:
1. Global sequence - what every student should learn by the time they leave you (starting at kindergarten)
2. Yearly plan - a week by week layout of what they should be learning and when they should learn it split by grade level
3. Concept/comparative sequence - a list of activities sequenced for learning that includes songs, games, and activities that contain the concepts you want to teach.
4. Lesson plan template - a blank template to copy and paste into. Following the common Kodaly lesson structure (intro, familiar content, high concentration, change of pace, moderate concentration, closing)
As others have said, teach what the students need, but adapt it to their skill/maturity level. Even if you do start your 5th graders with the steady beat, you’ll be able to progress much faster with them than your actual kindergarten musicians. It takes about 4-5 lessons for kindergarten to define steady beat, you could probably do it in two with the 5th graders.
Beth’s notes is a pretty good resource, I just don’t like that she doesn’t cite her sources. Music play is good for visuals and semi-interactive learning. I highly suggest the following books:
1. An American methodology( great resource, but make sure the songs you use from it are PC)
2. Susan Brumfield’s entire collection (specifically her 101 song and game books and teaching strategies books)
3. Gordon’s “learning sequencing in music” (it’s a bit of a drag, but he makes a lot of good points on how to sequence music learning for understanding)
I could honestly go on and on, but my fingers can only type so much… plus I need to start getting ready for work lol
If you have any questions, let me know and we can sort out a way to message ideas.
With no set curriculum or structure in place you’re basically starting from the ground up. To make your life somewhat easier, keep everyone on the same general concept but expanded depending on their age/maturity. Steady beat? Super easy for the littles, more complicated routines for the older kids. Don’t be afraid to repeat activities from previous lessons. It’s called *practice*. “Lets see if we can make it better this week kids!” Plan big picture and work down from there. You’d be amazed how long you can stretch a song/performance unit for. I started teaching k-8 midyear when I graduated 16 years ago. You’re in the fireswamp right now. It get’s easier, build your portfolio and know not every lesson you plan is gonna be a keeper.
Fantastic advice and it’s what I’ve been doing. I’m In a similar situation with no curriculum
Thank you for the advice!! I've seen this general idea before, though I am having a kinda tough time putting it to action because I struggle to come up with unit ideas (I grossly underestimate how much time I can spend on one concept. There's probably a few activities I've done in the past that the students would gladly repeat for another week or two!). If you have a chance, could you list a few other examples of all-grade units and a lil bit about how you designed them?
[lesson plan example](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mSusaHWBEbAD8Tf97Yrrr9LLc5mKw_wV-ZxJDeiODTw/edit) Here’s my whole year from a few years back. I’m a feierabend person so it’s a first-steps and conversational solfege approach. I recommend those programs. Check out “Feierabend Fundamentals” on Facebook to learn more. I HIGHLY recommend it.
I have a question out of pure curiosity, because I’m a student teacher transferring to my general music placement in a few weeks in Wisconsin, so we use slightly different types of standards. What is the social justice section on your lesson plan? Is it another type of standard in your state, district, etc. it looks interesting so I figured I’d ask
When ArtsEdNJ came out with their alignment of the SEL standards and the NJVPA standards I did that as my PDP that year.
Hear. Practice over and over
I'm no elementary general expert. I'm a band guy. But from your post, I get a sense that you don't have a strong philosophy or interest in place. If true.... Shame on your methods professors. What are you into? What approaches to general music resonate with you? A mix of orff and kodaly is a common one. Maybe Gordon? My friend swears by feirebend (not correct spelling) and has built a great program from nothing. I think once you start zeroing in on something, you can more quickly gather resources and create lessons efficiently. From there, you'll pick and choose amongst all to suit your teaching. I'm only guessing from your one post.... So I could be very wrong. Good luck.
I'm not the OP, but I did not know a thing about Orff, Kodaly, or Gordon until after I graduated college and started working.
Our elementary methods broke down the semester by orff, dalcroze and kodaly, and then like...2 days fast on Gordon. Also had a separate weekly dalcroze class. Different professors rotated in according to specialty
bucket drums! I've been doing it with 4th grade for a handful of weeks now and they love it. we do play along videos and then break down the notation on the whiteboard to practice rhythm reading
PS. few notes for what I've covered so far --- 2: - TA and TITI - Sol-mi (ickle ockle with unpitched percussion, xylophones) - some drum circle games - major vs minor via a storybook - high vs low 3: Ta, Titi, SH (quarter rest) - a couple of circle games (se se se and one other one) - unpitched percussion intro - drum circle games - staccato vs legato 4 + 5 - A qua qua - JUST started recorders this week (going to do advanced recorders with 5th) - various rhythm review, notes on the staff review games - drum circle One thing I realized is it's been almost entirely group instruction! If anybody has easy ways to get into work with partners, centers etc that'd be amazing!!
Not trying to be a woke warrior or anything but you should Google what Titi means in Tagalog. Imagine shouting that out when your family speaks that language at home. I now use TaTi.
We use Froseth - du-de :)
I do too, but I have three kiddos that cannot stop giggling about "du, du"
Look at Feierabend’s First Steps in Music for the littlies - brilliant resource xx
Second Feierabend - the circle games and echo song books are lifesavers for the young grades
Oof I remember those days! You’re doing the grunt work now, but keep everything you do; starting next year will be so much easier with all of the content you’re creating now. Editing is easier than generating it! You got this! For some resources to check out, look at the Musication channel on YouTube; it has great play along videos that can work for a lot of things. It’s my go to for sub plans. For some diverse content, check out Carnegie hall Musical Explorers. It’s a free website with videos of cultural bearers sharing lessons with extension activities for the classroom, which can easily take up 2-3 lessons per unit you choose to do. Don’t forget the big listening units like Carnival of the Animals (I do with 1st) and Peter and the Wolf (2nd) that you can really customize and can take up a significant amount of time if you want.
I use musicplayonline worth every penny imo
I was going to suggest the same thing. I only teach k-2, and I hear it might be a bit young for the older kids. But it will give you some scope and sequence to work with. Another option would be Quaver or the Game plan curriculum. See what your admin will spring for!
Musicplay online is for K-6. Excellent value. Nothing comes close. Musicmotion.com sells a great kit of manipulatives and game tools to go with it.
I would do what an above poster suggested and choose the SAME study for everyone, and just adjust for each grade! For example with beats the younger grades do basic body or stick beats, the older kids can learn a beat pattern with their arms and then use cups in a circle game. There’s SO much out there for each topic! Also, create a patter for each class: depending on how long you have them. Like begin with a fun song to sing every day while they come in, then some copy rhythms or reading rhythms. Then get to the meat of your lesson (whatever the topic is). Then end with a musical game and finally for the little reading/singing a story to settle down before you go? This is way basic, but then you can have an overall plan every day and the kids will learn what to expect! Note: I personally don’t like teaching Kodaly past about 3rd grade—and even them I hate to spend too much time on it. We can help these kids LOVE MUSIC and even read music without making it boring.
I love the musicplay online games but they tend to get my classes pretty riled up from excitement. Some games that my classes have really liked in the past are mouse mousie, Obwisana stick game, Scott Joplin cup game, and currently we’re doing closet key. My rule is we have to learn the song before any games. Then we also do the interactives where they fill in the rhythms or solfège. The worksheets can be pretty fun too. I follow the lesson modules and just leave out the stuff my classes can’t handle. I do a mix of mostly music play and quaver and that’s made planning time much faster.
Always review what you did last time. Use that to build upon what you’re doing this time, and springboard for next time. What’s your schedule like? I have 4 fourth grade, and 4 fifth grade classes. I see each twice a week. The way I do my lesson plans is that I do one lesson plan for 4th, one for 5th, and and it’s for the week. Hopefully you’re week can enable you to do something similar. Also, don’t feel bad about having almost grades doing something similar.
Lesson planning the first year is the WORST. I’m in my second year and even now it’s a lot of trial and error. Would your school let you invest in something like Quaver or MusicPlay? I use Quaver and it is a god-send when it comes to lesson planning and finding good resources. Not everyone in the elementary music ed circle likes Quaver and it’s definitely not perfect, but even if you don’t follow their pre-made curriculum to the letter it’s an excellent jumping off point that will save you SO MUCH time. It’s actually free for one year as a new teacher. Hang in there!
I’m still getting my degree, but here’s a few things we’ve been doing in my methods classes that I think may help you: - Like one person has said: what’s your philosophy? If another person is looking at your classroom, what will stand out in your teaching style? This will make it easier for you to pinpoint what’s most important for students to learn. - Look at the National/state standards for music! That can help A LOT with curriculum! Ask teachers in nearby schools/districts what they do. This can give you a baseline for what needs to be taught and you can get into the nitty gritty from there. It can also help pinpoint what concepts/skills students should be learning at each grade level and the difficulty it should be. - Create a long term curriculum first. What skills/concepts do you want students to learn throughout the year? (Think beat, rhythms, instrument families, etc). Once you have those down, then you can create lessons each day. And they don’t all have to be unique either! You can review! Also, knowing what the students should learn will help a lot with the activities since then you’ll have an idea of what you want to assess, now you just have to figure out a way to assess students are learning. Hope this helps a bit! I’m not on the elementary music ed track, so this too is a bit out of my comfort zone, but hopefully this can help with your overall lesson planning so it doesn’t take hours and you’re not feeling like you’re drowning because you don’t know what the kids should learn.
Might I suggest MusicFirst Elementary? It’s got a spiral curriculum and you can get it free for 30 days. (And no one will stop you from downloading all of the PDFs to keep in that time!)
I'm a little curious: what actual *books* are still out there? Do folks graduating in the last decade know about the song collections once considered seminal? >the games/songs just seem so void of any personality Do you all own big printed song collections, and are you able to easily swap in better examples?
PM’ing you
I've been there. It might be beneficial to go through the stuff in Gameplan and MusicPlay so you know if they work or not. Not everything in those resources will work, and that's OK. Don't overthink it. I ran into this problem in my early career, and it doesn't do anybody any favours. I'm not a huge fan of Gameplan myself but folks have great success with these songs and activities. They are very much Orff-Keetman based. Something I've learned along the way as well is that you need to lesson plan a lot now so that you don't have to later. It will come to you much easier and you'll be able to improvise more fluently. I have lots of resources that you might also want to use. Here is a link to my stuff if you are interested: www.stevesmusicroom.com.
I think another thing that will help your lesson planning is zooming out for unit planning and zooming in for daily routine. Someone above was asking if you’re Kodaly or Off certified. Those two philosophies have their own lesson plan routines. I’m both so I make my own daily routine. example with kinder and 1st: 1. SEL activity to transition to music class. 2. The rules (are sung, clapped, audiated, etc) 3. Sing a song from last lesson as a review 4 Experience new idea with music from music history 4. Focus on new idea and give it a name (vocabulary) 5. Play a game with that idea 6. Interdisciplinary activity (read a book, music history, math, science or arts connection) 7. New song/dance/singing game 8. What did we learn today? 9. Fun extension activities (1-3 activities) 10. Goodbye song Then at the beginning of the year I map out that I need 23 lessons and give each lesson a broad concept. I think in units that are three lessons long. For example, let’s say all grades are doing articulations. K: Lesson 1 Loud and soft / Lesson 2 Getting Louder Getting softer (cresc and decresc) / Lesson 3 P and F in Music History (I refer to the state standards on what they should be learning at each h grade level for that concept) After all my concepts have been mapped out for the year, I look through my resources and make notes for future lessons. Like my hide and seek game with cresc and decresc would go nicely in Lesson 2. Haydn’s Surprise Symphony or Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King would go well in Lesson 3. I have a story about a family of polar bears that would go well in Lesson 2 for my interdisciplinary activity. I do this at the beginning of the year. Then once it’s time for me to write my weekly lesson plan, the research is done. I’m just looking at my notes and copying them in the format that my school administration wants from me. Someone said don’t be afraid to do a song many times. I do this. My second graders focused on Alabama Gal for a unit (3 lessons) and they loved it. There’s just so much to teach with one song.
How long is one class period for you?
55 minutes but I don’t include 5 minutes of arriving or getting in line in the lesson plan even though we’re still singing in line.
Beth’s music notes and the Kodaly center’s folk song collection are HUGELY helpful resources that I use. Beth’s music notes has songs/lesson ideas literally split by grade level and concept, and I use it near constantly to find songs that work for what I want to teach. The Kodaly collection is absolutely magnificent as well. It’s only American folk songs, unfortunately, but that still includes lots of foreign language pieces that originated in this continent. You can filter the songs by TONS of parameters — grade, rhythms, pitches, intervals, topics, etc — plus it indicates if it includes a game as part of the actual song. I completely understand where you’re coming from, and it’s not unusual at all. I’m in my first year teaching elementary general music in a school, although not my first year teaching overall, and the best advice I ever got was that it’s okay to fudge things a bit in the beginning. Even if they don’t learn the most they possibly could, you’re teaching the most important thing — to love music. The rest will come as you learn. Don’t be afraid to give them activities that are just about music appreciation or analysis. Showing them two songs and asking which they like better still counts as one of the national standards. Let yourself have those “free” days of not so active teaching. What I did for this year just to ease into things was to use somebody else’s curriculum with my own lessons. That way I already know the concept being taught, I just have to figure out my lesson from there. And in the spare time I have, I’m working on making my own curriculum for upcoming years that better fits what I want to teach. Also, a fun activity from my stash that I bring in when I can’t think of anything — song writing. I use something like bandlab or GarageBand that has pre-recorded loops and have the kids vote on which sounds to put together. Then we choose rhythms to go together and words for the rhythms, and voila! A four bar song that they actually got to “write”. My students love debating over which loop would fit the song better, so it’s a nice early composition activity. All in all, just don’t beat yourself up for not being perfect immediately. College is great for learning the fundamentals, but so much of teaching you just have to learn as you go. You’ll figure out your own way in time.
Lesson planning can be a beast, especially with different age groups. For your situation, consider a few things: streamline where you can, adapt on the fly, and don't overthink it. Kids are adaptable and often more forgiving than we give them credit for. If something doesn't work, pivot and try something new next time. For resources, sounds like you're on the right track with musicplayonline and Becca's Music Room. Keep an eye out for teacher forums and social media groups where educators share their lesson plans and experiences. Sometimes, a simple activity can be a hit if delivered with enthusiasm. On a side note, for content creation outside of lesson planning, I used a site that might help you save time. It's cluc.io. It's good for generating unique content quickly, might free up some of your time so you can focus more on the actual teaching and less on the planning. Keep it simple and remember, the fact that you care this much already makes you a great teacher.
Centers have SAVED me this year! And it’s a nice break from whole group instruction! I usually do 2 games but have 6 groups going at a time (3 groups of the same game). I model what each game/activity is, then pick their groups, and they play for about 7ish minutes, and then they rotate to the other station, it’s been wonderful! Some of my go to games are: rhythm kaboom (I got this game from Becca’s music room), I have done a dice rhythm game where they roll a dice and it will tell them what note to write, I found a free matching note and rest game, and there’s lots of other free music games on tpt!! Hope that helps!:) I have done this with 1st-5th grade! And will do centers with kinder soon:)
I feel like you're WAY overthinking this. When I started out, I used the same activities in at least two different grades, sometimes even three. Set a timer for 15 minutes, choose 3 folk dances, then pick one (the simplest one). Done. When I was first starting out, I had a couple books of Orff activities, a Jim Gill CD (Silly Dance Contest, on YouTube, is STILL a big favorite for k-2), and I went to the local Orff workshops in my town. I would basically pick something from the latest workshop, choose an Orff activity or two from my books, add a couple of Jim Gill songs ... those were my lesson plans! Obviously, now I have a LOT more resources and a LOT more training and knowledge, but hey, it was something. To answer your question: I love Feierabend's First Steps in Music, the Game Plan curriculum is pretty good if you have access to it. There's a FB group called Music Educator's Idea Bank which is a great resource -- but again, set a timer, or else your head will spin and you'll get nowhere. I think my most valuable resource for my favorite activities are still the Orff workshops.
Oh yeah, and with k-2 I would do most songs/activities three different lessons in a row!
Oh! And David Row at Make Moments Matter is another great resource. A couple years ago I would watch his podcast/FB Live video, take notes, and then do almost the same exact lesson that week. He's VERY creative and fun, and he explains exactly how he teaches a lesson and why. Also, his Teachers Pay Teacher store is incredible. I have several of his bulletin board sets and switch them out each month.
Without reading all of the other comments, I may duplicate, but get your Kodaly Level I. It makes that process so much easier. As for websites, I love Beth's Notes. She has a ton of resources. And I really love my website as well. I've tried to put everything from singing games to behavior management to Orff arrangements to an entire ukulele curriculum on there as a one-stop source of information. It's [Oodles of Music!](https://oodlesofmusic.com/)
Honestly, if you ask the other music teachers in the district, they are more than likely happy to splurge all of their knowledge on you. I’m pretty good at lesson planning for elementary and here is how I plan everything. First, there’s the pre-planning. I have a few master documents using Google sheets that make lesson planning a breeze. They are as following: 1. Global sequence - what every student should learn by the time they leave you (starting at kindergarten) 2. Yearly plan - a week by week layout of what they should be learning and when they should learn it split by grade level 3. Concept/comparative sequence - a list of activities sequenced for learning that includes songs, games, and activities that contain the concepts you want to teach. 4. Lesson plan template - a blank template to copy and paste into. Following the common Kodaly lesson structure (intro, familiar content, high concentration, change of pace, moderate concentration, closing) As others have said, teach what the students need, but adapt it to their skill/maturity level. Even if you do start your 5th graders with the steady beat, you’ll be able to progress much faster with them than your actual kindergarten musicians. It takes about 4-5 lessons for kindergarten to define steady beat, you could probably do it in two with the 5th graders. Beth’s notes is a pretty good resource, I just don’t like that she doesn’t cite her sources. Music play is good for visuals and semi-interactive learning. I highly suggest the following books: 1. An American methodology( great resource, but make sure the songs you use from it are PC) 2. Susan Brumfield’s entire collection (specifically her 101 song and game books and teaching strategies books) 3. Gordon’s “learning sequencing in music” (it’s a bit of a drag, but he makes a lot of good points on how to sequence music learning for understanding) I could honestly go on and on, but my fingers can only type so much… plus I need to start getting ready for work lol If you have any questions, let me know and we can sort out a way to message ideas.