Your child is tired of just drawing quarter notes over and over again? Or learning the rhythm from a textbook? Here are fun music activities for learning quarter notes that make learning about music theory better.
1. Learning and Talking About Quarter Notes
In the beginning music teachers like to right away tell their students: "Quarter notes look like this, they have one beat and...". So many things to know about a note. Although it is important to know all characteristics about the note there is another way.
By having different fun activities children have the chance to "get to know" the note before they are asked to play it exactly as it is supposed to be played.
Music Puzzle with Quarter Notes
Here is a cute music puzzle for getting to know the shape of the note. When children are asked to put the puzzle together there is a lot of talking about the right shape, how the note needs to be put together and so on. You can talk about where the stem of the note and where the note head is and the child, of course, needs some imagination of the shape for putting the puzzle together.
Mini Music Memory
For learning to distinguish quarter notes from other note shapes it is nice to have a reason to talk about them more. And we don't mean basic questions like "what's the difference between quarter notes and half notes?" Make it fun by using this little game of Memory. It gives you and your child a good reason for saying things like "No, they are not the same, right?", "Does it have a note stem, too?" or "Is the head of the note filled in, like in the quarter notes?"
I Spy Note Values
Here is an activity that your child can also easily on their own and at the same time they learn to differentiate the different note shapes.
2. Quarter Note Rhythms
For getting a feeling of how the quarter note sounds like and how many beats it has there are some fun music games to help you out.
Rhythm Animals Music Game
Imitate an elephant stomping for getting this "marching feeling" that quarter notes many times have. Is is also a great way to practice the regular timing with quarter notes (or pulse in general). Compare it with the eighth notes on this paper and you also have another good comparison to another note value.
Note Hopping Music Game
Now (maybe for the first time) you can ask more concrete and theoretical questions about the quarter note as a note value. For winning this game you neet some luck, but you can also improve your chances by knowing precisely how many beats quarter notes and the other notes have.
3. Drawing the Quarter Notes
After doing all the other game we suggested, it is time to draw the quarter note ourselves. At this point drawing the note should have become very easy since the child interacted with the shape so many times in the other games.
Trace Quarter Notes 1 and 2
These two worksheets give a child the opportunity to first simply trace the shape of the already pre-written quarter notes. After this they will be able to write them - big or small - all on their own.
How can I find music activities?
Find more activities like these on our website: https://www.paupa.org
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