How to Teach Music (The Basics of Music Theory) Lesson Plan

(5-7 minutes)

Goals:

• To teach the Basics of Music Theory

o Major and Minor scales
o Notes (the musical alphabet)
o The Grand Staff
o Treble and Bass Clef
• Read through “Twinkle Twinkle” connecting the theory we just learned to the song
• To show/explain how this is relevant to everyone
 Outline

Attention Getter:

Seeing a piece of music for the first time can sometimes be intimidating. I know it still is for me.

However, there are ways to make music a little less scary. One of those things is learning to read

music.

A. Background and Audience Relevance

Today I hope to teach you the basics of reading music. If you’ve ever taken piano (or

dropped out after a year like I did when I was 10) this might be a review for you. But

none the less it is important to at least know the basics of reading music.

B. Speaker Credibility

I have been through a year of music theory

This is a crucial part of my major

C. Thesis

I hope to be able to inform you of the importance of reading music and teach you the

basics of reading music

D. Preview of Main Points

• What is sightreading

• Why is it important

• Note:
 o In book one of Excellence in Theory by Ryan Nowlin and Bruce

Pearson, they define a note as a symbol used to represent the

duration and pitch of a sound

o The higher the note is on the staff, the higher it sounds

• Staff

o Nowlin and Pearson define a staff as a set of lines and spaces on

which music is written

• Clef

o Nowlin and Pearson define a clef as a symbol at the beginning of the

staff that assigns letter names to the individual lines and spaces of

the staff.

• Sightreading twinkle twinkle

Transition to first main point

II. Body (Approximately 3 ½-5 ½ mins.)

A. Main Point 1: Reading music

1. Sub point 1: why its important

a. In The Musician’s Guide to Theory and Analysis, Jane Piper

Clendinning and Elizabeth West Marvin discuss the importance of

learning how to read music and understanding Music theory. They

say “Music theory provides useful terms and categories, but it does
 more than that: it also provides a framework for considering how

music is put together, what musical elements are in play, when

particular styles were prevalent, and why music sounds the way it

does.”

b. To you this might not sound important but in some ways you already

are implementing parts of music theory. For instance when you hear

a song and the music just sounds sad or seems to evoke a certain set

of emotions, understanding music theory would be important to

understand that the composer did that on purpose. There are two

very common scales called Major and Minor and since composers

understand music theory they can use a minor scale to create a sad

or mournful tone.

2. Sub point 2: the different parts

Transition (signpost, summary, preview)

B. Main Point 2 different types in depth

1. Sub point 1: notes

2. Sub point 2: staff

3. Sub point 3: clef

Transition (signpost, summary, preview)

C. Main Point 3 reading twinkle twinkle based off what we learned

1. Sub point 1: can we figure out the clef

2. Sub point 2: can we say some of the note names and associate them with

the piano and the sound