Music History

New Composer Lapbooks: Chopin & Haydn

Two brand new composer lapbooks have just been added to the ColorInMyPiano shop!

Meet Chopin!

Chopin both

Studying Chopin was the perfect opportunity to discuss various types of character pieces and listen to a variety of Chopin’s wonderful oeuvre for piano.  We also talked a bit about Chopin’s background as a Polish composer and his life in Paris, contributing as a musician during salon performances.

And here’s Haydn:

haydn both

When studying Haydn, my homeschool students learned about the popular music forms of the Classical Era (sonata, symphony, string quartet, concerto) and discussed the various places Haydn was employed as Kapellmeister (the Esterhazy palace, in particular).  My students loved hearing about Haydn’s poor and lowly childhood and how his hard work and determination enabled him to become a great composer!  I’m definitely going to use Haydn for the Classical composer for my summer camp this year.

You can view a full list of all the composer lapbooks now available here.

In case you are curious about what is next, I am excited to be currently working on a woman composer.  🙂  After that, I plan to choose another Baroque composer.

Music History

4 New Lapbooks Added to the Shop

I just got caught up with posting some new composer lapbooks to the Color In My Piano shop!

As you may recall, I teach a Music History Class for homeschoolers each week.  I started creating my own music history curriculum after I was unable to find anything quite like I was looking for.  I ended up using the lapbooking format for my curriculum, because it is a visual, interactive way to learn historical facts and information.  It has been quite a success so far!  I am constantly impressed with how much information my students are able to absorb each week.

I call my curriculum The Great Composers & Their Music.  Each $10 pdf download includes all the pages you will need to print for each student to create their own lapbook, as well as a printable biography booklet, and a few pages of extra information for the teacher.  The license for this curriculum allows you to print as many pages as you like, as long as you are using the materials with your own students.

The curriculum is a pretty flexible.  I teach each composer over three class periods, spending about 20-30 minutes out of the class on the lapbook.  (We do other activities during the rest of the class time.)  If you wish to use these lapbooks for a one-time class, you can probably cover the whole lesson in 60 minutes (or maybe 45 minutes if your students are junior high or older).  A lot of it depends on how much time you devote to listening to excerpts of the composer’s music (a link to a YouTube playlist is provided).

Here is a peek at the 4 newest composers that have been added to the Color In My Piano shop!  Continue reading “4 New Lapbooks Added to the Shop”

Group Classes, Music Camps, Music History

4 New Composer Lapbooks

Over the past week, I have added four new Great Composers & Their Music lapbook studies to the Color In My Piano shop!

The first one is John Cage.  I mentioned this lapbook before, when I blogged about my October Piano Party.  I think this composer study was my favorite one to teach so far!  It was so fun to teach students about Cage’s ingenuity as a composer.  As an extension, we explored the room to find “found instruments,” and experimented with prepared piano.  (No, I didn’t bring screws or bolts anywhere near my piano…but we did try laying pieces of felt and tinfoil on the strings/dampers to see what sounds we could create!).

Continue reading “4 New Composer Lapbooks”