Body Percussion

Body percussion can be viewed as a musical instrument, and used as a precursor to other musical instruments.  It involves clapping, slapping, tapping, snapping, stamping, and patting.  It is very fun for the children and gets them up and moving during the lesson.  It also has the advantage of producing different timbres, allowing for more creativity.  It improves rhythm skills as it is so good for internalizing rhythms.  This makes it a good tool for preparing children to play both non pitched rhythm and barred instruments.  If a child learns a rhythm through body percussion, they have the feeling of the rhythm inside them before they even start playing, which makes it easier to concentrate on things like pitch and technique.  A child can pat the rhythm on their legs, then when they play it on the xylophone, they can much more easily figure out the notes because they don't have to think as hard about the rhythm.

Development in Ability to Play Instruments

A child's ability to play instruments is closely related to their physical development.  While rhythmic skills develop as early as the first year of life, the muscle coordination required for playing an instrument doesn't come till much later.  Something as simple as playing a short melody on the piano requires enough motor skills and coordination to use the eyes, ears, and muscles in the fingers, hands, and forearms, all in tandem. 

This is the developmental sequence for Playing instruments:

Children of less than two years can rock, nod, and sway to a beat.  They have the ability to grasp objects, making them able to play rattles and jingle bells.

From ages two to three, children start having short periods of rhythmic regularity.  This gives them the ability to play the hand drum and rhythm sticks.

From three to four, children have longer periods of rhythmic regularity, a sensitivity to pulse, and can sway their arms.  They can now play the claves, woodblock, tambourine, guiro, maracas, gong, cowbell, and play the rhythm sticks by rubbing them.

From five to six, children start to be able to maintain a pulse, alternate their hands, and have basic eye-hand coordination.  This allows them to play the finger cymbals, bongo drums, timpani, cymbals, triangle, and even the keyboard with one hand.

From seven to nine, children have developed eye-hand coordination.  This allows them to play a wide range of things, including different pitched instruments such as the xylophone, the keyboard with both hands, the recorder, and the autoharp.

From age ten to twelve, eye-hand coordination has become much easier, as well as finger flexibility and control of the breathing apparatus.  They can now play melodies on the xylophone and keyboard, more notes on the recorder, chords on the guitar, and even orchestral winds and brass.

Teaching Notation for Reading and Writing Rhythms

Sound before symbol is always how rhythm should be taught, but eventually there needs to be a connection to notation.

Dalcroze uses "dash-a-note" to begin to introduce rhythm notation.  Children can draw horizontal dashes demonstrating what they hear and feel.  The longer the dash, the longer the sound.  These dashes are eventually converted into notes.

Kodaly starts notation by only writing stems instead of the stem with the head.  This allows for quick notation because the students don't have to take time to fill in the head, so more rhythms can be taught in a class period.  Teachers can use popsicle sticks, rhythm sticks, or wooden dowels to demonstrate these stems as well.

During kindergarten, rhythm notation should be mainly experimental.  However, by 1st grade, students should be able to match rhythms to different representations of the notation.

Rhythm Mnemonics

Mnemonics are rhythm syllables with no semantic meaning that are used to teach children rhythms and help them internalize them.  They are associated with specific rhythmic durations, and are similar to speech so they are easy for children to remember.  One frequently used system is word-chant, which uses words that the children already use in everyday speech.  In this case, different fruit names are assigned to different durations.  For instance, pear would be a quarter note, apple would be two eighth notes, boysenberry would be four sixteenth notes, and so on.  These are very effective because it uses the natural rhythm of the English language, which children are already accustomed to.  Two other common systems are the Kodaly and Gordon method.  These both use syllables that aren’t real words, but are good for solidifying rhythms.  The Kodaly method uses the syllable “t” mainly, because of it’s crisp, decisive sound, proving helpful for internalizing clear rhythms.  Similarly, the Gordon method uses a crisp “d” sound for the same purpose.  While these methods don’t use real words that children already know, syllables like “du-ta-de-ta” (Gordon sixteenth notes), are easy to spit out quickly and remember.

Detecting and Understanding Meter

A meter can be detected by listening for a strong pulse followed by weaker pulses.  The understanding of meter enables the listener to perceive the flow of musical ideas.  Some children respond naturally by rocking, swaying, singing, and chanting rhymes but most need a model to help them sense the loud vs. soft pulses.

One way to help children find meter is to play them a piece, and ask them to pat their knees on the strong beat only.  Then, play it again, and ask them to pat their knees on the strong beats, then clap softly on the weak beats.  Then, lead them in a chant while patting the strong beats and clapping the weak beats, so they can further internalize the rhythm by putting it in the context of speech.

Rhythm in Movement

Movement is a must in all lesson plans for children, and it's only natural to use it while teaching rhythm.  Using movement internalizes rhythm and develops a deeper conceptual understanding.  Dalcroze Eurhythmics is based on this concept, and Orff uses this concept as well.  Kodaly uses popular folk dances also to solidify rhythms.  Children become familiar with quarter notes because they have walked to them.  They are familiar with eight notes because they've clapped them.  No notation or counting is needed for children to sense rhythm naturally.

Rhythm in Speech

The English language is very rhythmic, and naturally lends itself to teaching students rhythm.  There is a universal pattern of rhythmic flow and stress of language, which children are presented with every day. 

Words become musical when:

1.   They are spoken over the foundation of a set pulse.

2.   Their sounds are transformed into chants of longer and shorter musical durations.

3.   Some words in a group are emphasized over others.

Words can be associated with durations based on syllables.  One syllable words, like "blue", or "pear", can be used as quarter notes.  Two syllable words, like "yellow" or "tiger" can be used for eighth notes.  Words like "pineapple" are used as triplets, and "boysenberry" for sixteenth notes.