Christmas Piano Game: Life Size Gameboard

 

Hi All!  I created a life size board game for my piano students to celebrate the holidays with.  Check out the video below to see how it all came together.  

  Since I teach one student at a time I had to create tasks and spaces that would make it exciting for a single player game.  You'll notice spaces like the "Five Second Freeze".  They had 15 minutes to get through the entire game so landing on the "Five Second Freeze" space would be just as bothersome as a "lose a turn" space when playing against other people.  My students had to race against time not other players.

I used a die I had created for a Valentine's Day Game rather than create a new one for this game.  I say there's nothing wrong with repurposing items wherever possible!  Saves a lot of time.  The die only went up to the number three to give my students the opportunity to earn as many prizes as they could throughout the game (the "Hot Cocoa" spaces).

The Game:

I set the timer for 15 minutes, gave my student the die, and had them move forward however many spaces they rolled from the die.  I had about 20 piano questions written out beforehand for each level of instruction. Every space they landed on (except for the T-A-S-K spaces) was an opportunity for them to earn 5 points.  

When they reached any letter of the word T-A-S-K they had to complete the task and then slide to the letter K before rolling the die again.  The tasks were finding ornaments from one of the Christmas trees and placing them in the correct slots from the box they were given...

 

 

 

to creating a rhythm from the notes and rests provided...

 

to matching "cookies" to the correct spots on the cookie tray.....

 

to throwing "snowballs" at a rhythm adhered to cups they needed to knock down while counting it out....

 

Each task was worth 20 points with a total of 4 tasks.  I also created harder questions (extension questions) for when they landed on the sparkly spaces.  Those questions were worth triple points; 15 points each. 

 

 There goal was to earn 120 points by the end of the game to earn a holiday treat bag.  If they landed on a "Hot Cocoa Card" and answered the piano question correctly they would then flip the card over and collect a prize from the stocking (balloons), mailbox (pencil), bucket (erasers), tray (Hershey's kisses), or gift box (candy canes).  The gift box is what you see below filled with candy canes.

 

 

Most of my students did earn the final prize (the holiday treat bag).  The ones who didn't were the ones who hadn't kept up with their weekly checklist of piano tasks like studying their musical terms, going through their flashcards of notes, etc.  

If you create this game in your studio let me know how it goes!

Piano Blogger signing off................Happy Holidays.