Planning music lessons? here are a couple of ideas to help you create some fun music resources for your lessons.

In Austria the house where Mozart grew up have been converted into a museum. Have the students draw a design for the front cover of the brochure for this museum, showcasing why Mozart is still so popular today.

Here is a fun Listening Activity

Twelve Variations on “Ah vous dirai-je, Maman”

Before beginning this activity with the class, write a selection of emotions/moods on individual small pieces of paper (e.g. frightened, perplexed, rolling on the floor with laughter, chilled out, just been stung by a bee etc.) You could even come up with these as a class. Now choose a short phrase such as “I think it might rain”. Choose students to come out and randomly pick one of those pieces of paper. They must then say that phrase in the mood or emotion that their paper suggests, using changes of pitch, body language and speed of speech to best represent it. The class tries to guess which emotion the chosen student was acting out. Try as many of these as possible.

Now discuss how a single melody can be altered to give a variety of effects. Music that does this is called a set of “Variations”.

Listen to a very short excerpt from the very beginning of Mozart’s 12 Variations and identify what we know this song as today (Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star). Describe the differences in each variation and how they relate to each other.