Homeschool Music Curriculum:
No Experience Necessary

Why have a homeschool music curriculum? I think because most children like music. Some say that music increases math and language arts understanding. Children with special needs sometimes respond more to music than spoken language. According to Howard Gardner music is one of the eight intelligents.

Homeschool Music Curriculum and Children with Special Needs

Music can help children memorize facts. Sing the ABC song. There are songs for the how many days each month has, history facts, and spelling rules. Learn math facts by chanting.

Use songs to teach reading. Many songs can be found as an illustrated picture book. One is I Knew an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly. Sing or read the book together.

Use music to develop muscle control. Have your child do the movements to Head, Shoulder, Knees, and Toes or other movement songs.

Here are some of my ideas for developing a homeschool music curriculum.

Listening and Singing

When your children are young sing or play CDs. I didn't sing much but I played a lot of Christian music when my children were young. They all would stop crying and listen.

When my children were preschoolers I used a CD that had nursery rhymes. We sang a lot and did finger movements. They liked Itsy Bitsy Spider and Where is Thumbkin.

If don't have CDs you can sing along with the internet. Children's Songs has lots of lyrics that you can listen to and print out.

When my children were first and second graders we sang songs about American history. We listened to songs such as We Have Been Working on the Railroad and Dixie.

We also sang patriotic songs such as America the Beautiful and The Star Spangle Banner.

Another way to teach music is to listen to different types of music. Your child will learn to appreciate different the different types. Listen to Blues, Jazz, Country, Asian, and Classical. You can listen when you are eating lunch or during quiet time.

Art

You can incorporate art into your homeschool music curriculum. Have your child draw when he is listening to music. Ask your child to draw what the music means to him. Talk about what the music might sound like such as wind in the trees or an angry storm.

Another fun art activity is to make instruments. You can make a tambourine by placing beans between two paper plates and stapling the plates together.

A drum can be made out of an oatmeal box.

Shakers can be made out of coffee creamer jars and either sand or beans placed inside.

Xylophones can be made out of glasses and different amounts of water.

A paper towel and wax paper can make a horn. Look in the library for books on making music instruments.

History

Your homeschool music curriculum should include the study of the composers. You can find information about the composers from many different sources. Look in your library for books and DVDs about famous composers. Many books and DVDs are geared for children. My children liked Beethoven Lives Upstairs. Many libraries also have music CDs to check out.

When you are studying a time period of history also study the music of the time. What music was popular during World War II?

Field Trips

Another idea is to go on field trips. Go to the symphony. Many have afternoon matinees that are geared for children.

You could also go to concerts put on by your local high school. Don't forget about marching bands and choir.

A fun field trip that my children went on was to a violin factory. They got to see how violins, cello, and violas were made. The children also got to hear the different string instruments played.

No Music Experience?

I admit I do not have much experience with music. I do not sing or play a music instrument. As you can see I relied on CDs and DVDs. Here are some other ideas to teach music when you do not have much experience.

My older children took piano lessons from a music teacher. For a while we were part of a co op through our school district that had music lessons. Private lessons can be pricey see if your homeschool co-op has a music teacher that will do several children on one day and will give a discount.

Does your child want to play the guitar? Play Acoustic Guitar has a discussion how to buy a child's guitar.The site even has free guitar lessons

A homeschool music curriculum should have some instruction on music instruments. Look in books to find pictures and read about different types of instruments. You can also go on line to listen to instruments at datadragon

Making Music Fun is a free website that has information about composers, worksheets, and songbooks that are available to download. The website also has fun games.

A homeschool music curriculum can be fun and with a little help from other people can be easy to teach.

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