When I had my frog chart up on my door, my younger students loved to just stand there and count the number of students I had whilst waiting for me to finish with the student before them.

Parents thought it was great too, and I thought it was good for some parents to see that I didn’t only teach their child!

Here’s another one with a Cat in the hat theme.  Each hat has a student’s name on it.  I have a few students!  If you have a giant noticeboard, you could have red paper as a background to make it look really effective.

If you’d like this for your studio, here’s a link: ‘Look how many’ poster

Here’s a preview of my Sneetches tally board:

I whipped up some Scale Rhythms using the names of Dr Seuss’ books.  The idea is that you give your student a scale to play, and they choose one of these cards and play their scale with the rhythm of the way you’d say the card.  The Harry Potter ones were a great hit with my students, and I’m sure they’ll love these ones as well.

I have separate backs (page 5 – pictured), and I have been told that the margins are different in America than what they are in Australia.  My apologies for that, but unfortunately I’m not a computer whizz and don’t know how to fix my rhythm cards to make it easier to print elsewhere.  I print the backs separately anyway because I love the double strength of two sheets of paper before I laminate them.

Scale Rhythm cards are here: Scale Rhythms

I removed all the Harry Potter containers and jars from my piano, and I have a new canister there now.  It is labelled “You have brains in your head, you have feet in your shoes.  You can steer yourself any direction you ‘chews’ “.  I have filled it with Apple Chews, and students are drooling!

They need to get over 200 mins consistently or beat their practice score from last week in order to earn a ‘chew’.  The great thing is that there are different varieties of ‘chews’, so you can add different things to the jar each week.

Here is the quote I used on my jar.  Jar quotes It seems such a waste of paper for one quote, so I will rack my brains to try and come up with some more.  I have some flash cards in mind, and may need a quote or two to put on those.

Given the craziness of life at the moment, I needed a really nice, easy theme for the next two terms.  I need to keep my students happy and motivated too, and the Harry Potter one seemed to do that.  A lot of them were disappointed that I didn’t have this new one up in time for their lessons last week, but I had so much going on…long story.

I really like this theme too.  It’s very motivational, and suitable for all ages.

First up is to divide your students up into two teams.  One lot as Star Sneetches, the other as Non-Star Sneetches.  Here is the link to cards I have done to do just that: Sneetches cards with and without stars.  I have covered a preserving jar with yellow paper (so students can’t peek) and put two example cards on the outside so they can see the difference between the two cards.

Here’s a list you can write your student’s names on once they pull a card out of the jar: Star Sneetches and NonStar Sneetches student list

I also like to stick an inspirational or interesting quote on the door, so here are 10 I found from Dr Seuss.  You can Google your own if you want different ones. Dr Seuss Quotes

For those students who need the extra motivation:

“And when you’re in a Slump

you’re not in for much fun.

Un-slumping yourself

is not easily done.”

But hopefully this theme will help a little ;D

Enjoy your music making!

My studio finished up with the Warthogs theme last term.  Most of my students got involved and absolutely loved it, but you may get some students who can’t do Harry Potter either because they’re too young or for religious reasons.

We had an awful lot of fun though.  Slytherdor won.  We worked out they ended up with almost double the points of what the poor Ravenpuffs were able to achieve.

Here are the few final details you probably wanted to see.

Golden Snitches:

These were gold foil covered chocolate balls.  They were a big hit, because no-one had seen them before.  The secret is that they’re Christmas chocolates from Darrell Lea.  They also come covered in red and green foil, but I ate those ones ;D

…and the Tally Board for the second last week of Term:

Poor Ravenpuffs definitely got slaughtered in this challenge.  I would write up the total tally of the week in red on the top half of the board, and keep doing the weekly individual practice numbers on the bottom half of the board.  So our Harry Potter challenge lasted for 7 weeks, with another week introduction (or a practice run), and one week to close so students could see who won, and the final prize be awarded (a new shoulder rest), and one week right at the beginning to wait for all the students to come back to lessons.  Ten weeks altogether.  Hopefully that makes sense ;D

I have a new theme for the next two terms. One that  will involve the younger students too.  I think it will be as much fun and be inspirational as well.

Happy music making!

Two days into recording points for the houses, and we’re doing really well so far!

Lots of house points already.  The ’5′ points is from someone getting all the musical symbol flash cards correct. 

Appropriate tags for the jars.  The label on ‘Amortentia’ states “…must be administered continuously to maintain effect’.  Perfect for flash cards, don’t you think? ;D 

Skele-Gro for Bone Regeneration has the rhythm cards for scales.  Develops strong fingers and joints ;D

I haven’t gotten to these this week, but if students beat their practice score from the week before, they get one of these.

My Musical Sorting Hat takes pride on top of the piano.

To go with my Warthogs theme, I whipped up some music symbol flash cards for my violin and piano students.  Feel free to take out ones that are not relevant to your studio.

You can find the flash cards here: Music Symbol Flash Cards

If you’d like backs on the flash cards, they’re here: Music Symbol Flash Cards Backs

I allowed those students who knew all the cards to gain 5 points for their team.  Boy were they excited!

Something simple, but it works. I cut out these cards, put them in a small Pringles container and hid that underneath my Musical Sorting Hat.  Each student gets to put their hand under the hat “Careful, it has been known to bite”, and pull out a random card.  No peeking!

Here’s the link:  Slytherdor and Ravenpuff students sorting cards

The two house mottos I am using.  I made the Slytherdor one up all by myself.  The Ravenpuff one was on the same site as the shields…which seems to have disappeared (so I can’t give appropriate credit until it pops up again).

The mottos kind of end up meaning the same thing – working hard and being intelligent.

Here they both are: Warthogs Mottos