There has never been a better time to harness technology for your classroom. The internet is brimming with amazing games and activities. Many of these are perfect for schools. Online music games for the classroom are a brilliant way to connect with students. They will also save you time on preparation – no more photocopying or cutting out!
Students already love using the internet in their spare time. Bringing it into your music classroom will have them looking forward to your class. In this article we present five great online music games for you to include in your lesson plan.
What You'll Learn?
There are many online music games for elementary students. One of our favorites is Music Memory. This pitch recognition game is perfect for the classroom. When you start the game, it plays a pitch. The screen shows a selection of notes using the Solfa scale of Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, La, Ti. Students must guess which pitch was sounded. The game will tell you whether they are right or wrong, before moving on to the next pitch.
As well as being a lot of fun, this is a great way improve aural perception skills. You can also use it to teach students about the Solfa system. Encourage students to listen out to hear whether a pitch is higher or lower than the preceding pitch. This will help them to learn about pitch intervals.
This is another online music game that is ideal for elementary school. Orchestra Game from the Magic Flute uses music from this well-known Mozart opera. It teaches students about musical instruments. The screen shows a stage with orchestral instruments below. You will hear the sound of one instrument.
Students must guess which instrument is being played. When they guess the right answer, a cartoon animal appears on the stage playing that instrument. All sections of the orchestra are represented here, as well as piano and harpsichord. This is a fun game with entertaining graphics and a well-designed user interface. Students are sure to enjoy guessing the names of the instruments and seeing the cartoon musicians.
This great online music game is suitable for all ages, from elementary to high school. Solfeg.io features a wide range of songs with full notation available in your browser. You select a song for the class to learn, with genres from Children’s songs through to the latest Pop and Rock hits. The students will be able to read the music while listening to a high quality recording.
You can even use Solfeg.io as a minus one track – all the parts are available to listen to separately. Students can practice singing with instrumental backing. Or practice an instrumental part with the other parts accompanying them. With the music displayed on the screen or whiteboard, everyone is focusing on the same page.
This music game could be used in elementary or middle school. Theremin is an online synth instrument that makes many sounds. It shows a graphical sound wave on the screen. You could use this in the elementary classroom. Students can experiment with the different sounds they can make by moving the mouse.
In the middle school classroom this game would be perfect as part of a lesson on soundwaves. As well as the browser-based Theremin game, there is also an accompanying app available with a Recorder and Looper.
Audiotool is a powerful online music production studio. You could include this in your lesson plan in online music games for middle school or high school. It would be great for an introduction to music production for students or as a composition tool. Audiotool has a modular structure. It includes a range of synthesizers including beatboxes and sample players with access to over 250,000 samples.
It also has a virtual mixer and many possible effects that you can add. Students who love listening to their favorite electronic music will be thrilled to make the same kind of music in class. Audiotool allows you to share your compositions online to Soundcloud, YouTube or Facebook. Create a YouTube channel for your class and share their Audiotool tracks online.
"All of these five online music games make brilliant classroom activities. They can each be used to teach different parts of the music syllabus in ways that the students are sure to enjoy. There are online games that are suitable for every age group, from elementary to high school. So you can cover important aspects of music education while engaging your students in an enjoyable way."