It’s no surprise to say that we, as humans, are competitive. We love sports, games, competitions, you name it! Though being competitive can have downsides, generally speaking, if you are able to make something competitive, you can add incentive or motivation to that thing. Additionally, we often think of competition as “Us vs Them,” which in some instances is fine, but the idea of cooperative competition can be just, if not more, gratifying and motivating. When it comes to music, there are plenty of natural places where competition can arise, like the infamous “Battle of the Bands,” but often, the work it takes to hone a craft or skill requires you to be a “self-starter,” and if you don’t have that motivation, it can be difficult to grow as a musician.
We believe that this is one of the most challenging parts of learning an instrument, similar to learning other crafts/skills like cooking, woodworking, knitting, and “underwater basket weaving,” learning an instrument without any additional assistance is often a “solo” endeavor. But, simply because the work of learning an instrument is sometimes done “solo,” it doesn’t mean that it doesn't have to be competitive. Whether competing with yourself or with a teacher during music lessons, adding healthy competition and “play” to learning an instrument is a great way to boost your learning experience and can even be the reason you stay motivated!
The Benefits of Gamifying Music Lessons
If you turn something into a game, you are now putting your full attention towards the goal of winning because if you don’t, you risk “losing.” With music, you never really lose, but the idea of losing is enough to keep you interested and attentive. All of your focus now is on winning, and as you work towards this goal within the context of learning an instrument, along the way, you end up learning new musical concepts, improving your technique, and acquiring skills like “hearing” music in order to replay or transcribe it. On top of this, when learning music becomes a game, you can have a more positive and exciting experience, which can help increase your retention of what you’ve learned. Think about when you learn subjects in a classroom; which do you remember the most? The lecture hall course with 50+ students while you feverishly write notes or the science experiment in your biology class where you had to do the right combination of tasks to “win” the experiment? What if your biology class experiment was a group project, and you wanted your group to get the highest score? See what I mean? The more we think about it, the more “gamified” things already are during our “day-to-day” learning experiences.
But, while this is great information, how do you practically turn learning an instrument into a game?
Selecting the Right Games
We at Music U like to consider age-appropriate curriculum when teaching an instrument to a student, so the same care and consideration should also be taken with “music games.”
Consider the age and skill level of the student: Determining where your students are in their musical journey, or how old they are, is the first step when looking to incorporate games into their lessons or practice time. Simple can be the best place to start, and if it makes sense, try more complex games as you see fit. For example, one game that you can usually start with is a simple rhythm game, as it is less about note retention and technical ability and more about counting, clapping, and internalizing different “lengths of time.”
Tailor games to specific musical concepts or skills: This is very important on a per-lesson basis; it might seem obvious, but if you’ve just learned the difference between a “C” note and a “D” note on the piano, a great game to play is a quiz game with flashcards and dice or even a composition game where the number on the dice corresponds to the notes you are learning.
Balance fun and educational elements in game selection: Sometimes, depending on how the lesson is going, a game can be a reinforcement exercise and other times, it can be a respite from the number of concepts introduced during the lesson. It is always good to consider that sometimes, the game can actually be more of a “mental reset” or a way to review previous concepts without having to go backward in your method book. Consider not just what you are learning in the game but also how playing the game can help build trust and rapport with your student/kiddo.
Top Games for Making Music Lessons Fun!
So, you’ve come this far, now for the fund part. Let’s talk about games and go through some actual examples!
Rhythm Games
Game 1: “The Rhythm Game”
Objective: In this game, you take a simple grid of 4 squares representing each beat in a 4/4 measure and roll a custom “note value” die to see if you’ve added up rhythms that equal the entire length of the measure. Roll a die that shows a rhythm pushing you beyond four beats? You lose the round. Roll the exact number of beats in the measure? You gain a point for that round that gets added to a best out of 3, or 5 game. Win the most rounds? Win the game!
How it enhances rhythm skills: This game becomes effective at teaching rhythms when, after you’ve completed a measure, you either count and clap or count and play the rhythm that you’ve created or “composed.”
Tips for effective implementation: Make a laminated game board and rhythm pieces that are at the correct length of one, two, three, or four beats in a measure. You can even make the rhythms more interesting by subdividing the quarter notes into two eighth notes or four sixteenth notes. Want to include complex triplets or quintuplets? Includes these rhythms on the backs of the note lengths they typically divide. The possibilities are endless!
Game 2: “Word Rhythms”
Objective: Become familiar with the different rhythms that we speak every day when we say particular works.
How it enhances rhythm skills: Every word has syllables that are similar to rhythms that we encounter in music, so by associating these words with the rhythms you are learning, you can reinforce what these rhythm combinations sound like.
Tips for effective implementation: There are a couple of ways to teach rhythms this way, but each version may vary depending on the age group of the student you are working with. If you have a student who is younger, it can be fun to pick works like grape, apple, pineapple, and watermelon to show subdivisions of beats.
Grape = 1 quarter note
Apple = 2 eight notes
Pineapple = 3 triplets and
Watermelon = 4 16th notes
Note Recognition Games
Game 1: “The Matching Game”
Objective: Cover up a bunch of note names on a sheet of paper, and then as you recognize these notes on other pieces of paper that have the staff version of the note printed, work to find that note name on the game board. If you find it, you get to keep the token covering the note!
How it improves note recognition: The manner of repetition with record to associating note names and note symbols on a staff is the biggest benefit found from this game; similar to flashcards, sometimes you just need to see what a note looks like multiple times before the name begins to “sink in.”
Tips for effective implementation: Use coins or plastic tokens to cover the notes on the page; this will ensure the tactile and similar nature of playing a matching game. For additional reinforcement, after you’ve matched the note and received the token, ask your student to find that note on their instrument.
Game 2: “Place Your Bets! Note version”
Objective: Learn to find notes on the staff by assigning these notes to a dice. The more you find, the more likely you are to win, so the recognition of that note becomes very important to winning.
How it improves note recognition: Since you are trying to find this note on a measure or set of measures, you quickly become “invested” in it after you’ve rolled a number.
Tips for effective implementation: The best way to do this is with a longer piece of music, even if it isn’t one that the student is working on, because the stakes become higher if there are more notes to “claim.” Also, if you have more than six notes you are working on, you can assign the additional notes to their other numbers, like note 1, and note 7 can be claimed by rolling a 1. Or, for even more fun, use a 12-sided dice that can represent every note possible within an octave!
Ear Training Games
Game 1: “Skips or Steps?”
Objective: Am I playing notes that “skip” or notes that “step?” Guess correctly, and you are one step closer to winning!
How it enhances ear training: This is a great way to start ear training because you get used to associating melodies that have notes right next to each other and melodies that have notes that jump around as different. Eventually, it even helps with interval recognition of chords.
Tips for effective implementation: A fun way to set this game up is to have your students step forward or backward depending on what they hear. Or, step forward for a “step” and jump forward for a “skip.” Either way, have them look away from the keyboard and face a wall or threshold that they must arrive at to win!
Game 2: “Learn to guess Dynamics and/or Articulations.”
Objective: Try to guess if my notes are loud, soft, long, or short.
How it enhances ear training: Ear training is not just about what the notes sound like but how they sound. Are they loud? Are they short? Learning these differences can really impact how the student can interpret music later on.
Tips for effective implementation: Give a student a number of coins or tokens, play a number of rounds, and if they guess correctly, they get to keep the coin or token; if they guess incorrectly, then they have to hand one over, whoever ends up with the most items at the end wins!
Incorporating Technology into Music Lessons
In this modern world of phones and tablets, there have been plenty of games and resources developed to help “gamify” learning music and further a student's education. Additionally, these tools can become stepping stones to music notation and recording software, which, for older students, can be a fun way to record their own songs or compositions. Here is a great list of apps and software to explore:
Beatstar - Develop and play beats while taping your screen
GarageBand - an entry-level recording software that has a version for iOS devices
Staff Wars - play the correct note as it comes across the play to zap the note in space!
Yousician - A music teaching app
Simply Piano - A piano learning app
Flat.io - fun and interactive music notation software that works in a browser window
Tips for a Successful Game-Based Lesson
Regardless of whether you use one of our suggested games or if you come up with your own, here are some things to consider when choosing to play a music game with your student or kiddo:
As best as possible, try to play a game that helps reinforce musical concepts you’ve already or just learned about. This can help to solidify things that are fresh.
Ask yourself if the game is competitive or exploratory. Depending on the student, some might prefer to play a game where they can win, and others might want to simply use the game to gain new insights into what they’ve just learned; a composition game is a great example of an ‘exploratory” game.
Finally, you can always iterate! Does the first version not quite land with your students? Rethink and tweak your game until it is fun to play every time and even is fun to play multiple rounds of. If your student or kiddo is asking to play the game the next time you sit down for a lesson or practice time, you know you’ve got a hit!
