Autumn Scavenger Hunt (Part 2): A Piano Game

Hi All!  I decided to have 2 different types of hunts going on last week.  I already posted one of the hunts, now I'll share this one.  I especially like this version because there's no resetting of the game between lessons and it goes a lot fast.

I purchased a few bags of Autumn decor from Walmart like the ones above but you could probably find these on Amazon.  There were 8-10 items per bag.  I drew musical terms on each of the items (picture above) and placed sets of them in plastic storage bags. In addition to drawing a term on each of the pieces I wrote down the bag number they belonged to, just in case they were to fall out of their bags and get all mixed up. 

I wrote down the list of terms from each bag on a piece of paper so that I could quickly decide which term I wanted each of my students to look for from the bags. I also drew the opposite of the terms on other pieces to make sure they really knew their stuff.  Look back at the first picture.  I drew a sharp as well as a flat, an interval of a 5th as well as an interval of a 6th, a treble clef as well as a bass clef.  I numbered the bags and also wrote down the hiding place.  My students would only look for one item per bag per hiding place. This bag from the picture above went with the first clue I read out loud to the students. Down below is a picture of each of the 6 clue cards.

I left out the last word of the rhyme for my older students to figure out.  I'd give them about 5 seconds to find the hiding places before I revealed the location.  I'd then pick the musical term I wanted them to look for in each bag from the list of items I had written down on a piece of paper.  I gave them 10 seconds to find the correct drawing.  Placing the pieces in storage bags made them easier to hide.

This pic above is where I hid the first bag; behind the blue scooter.

The hiding places and clues are exactly the same as the other hunt I created but this one covers multiple levels, is quicker, and there's no resetting of the game between lessons!

Next week, my kiddos will be playing "Candy Coordinates" as their Halloween game.  Check out that blog I wrote on October 27th back in 2017.

Until next time, piano blogger signing off........

Pumpkin Scavenger Hunt: A Piano Game

 

Hi All! This week and next week my kiddos are going on a scavenger hunt that starts in the studio and continues outside to the front yard.  Above is a picture of one of the hiding places near the piano bench.

I created six scavenger hunt clue cards; a set for my older students (picture above) and a set for my younger students (picture below). I left the last word out of each rhyme for my older students to figure out.  I laminated them.

I bought a few inexpensive decorative pumpkins from Walmart and put velcro dots on them like the picture below.  

A few of my students have just learned their C position notes from the grand staff so that's what I'm using the hunt to test them on.  I've also created matching items to test other things like sharped and flatted notes, musical terms, primary chords, melodic/harmonic intervals, Major vs. minor scales, etc.  Here's a picture of one set of pumpkins below.  They hunt for the pumpkins that match the picture on the back of their clue cards and they place the pumpkins in a bag.

I went ahead and hid pairs of pumpkins inside and outside.  Here are a few hiding places.

These pumpkins are near the blue scooter.

These are near a shiny black bin.

Here's a pair outside, near the flowers.  The game took a total of 5 minutes from beginning to end!  

Here's how it works: I hand them the first clue card, they find the location of the first set of pumpkins, they pick the correct pumpkin, place it in their bag, and pick up the next clue card that I placed with the first set of pumpkins.  So clue card #2 is placed with pumpkins number #1, clue card number #3 is placed with pumpkins number #2, and so on until they're done. 

I hope this inspires you to create a scavenger hunt of your own.  Let me know how it goes!

Until next time, piano blogger signing off.......