I "Mustache" You a Question!

Last week, we had our first group lesson of the new year.  I entitled it "I Mustache You a Question".  I started out by writing that very question on a white board and posting it in the center of the studio on a stand.

 There was immediate curiosity!  But I saved the question for later in the lesson.

The first game we played was our Jumbo Shut the Box!  Shut the Box is a favorite game in our studio and when I made it a jumbo game, it became an immediate hit!  The directions are the same as the original game described in a previous post here.  I made jumbo musical dice out of boxes and duct tape (instructions found here.).

A laminated game board, 2 dice per team and a whiteboard marker is all you need!
Fun, fun, fun!

After drilling them on note values, we went inside, had a snack and went to work on our note identification!  I used a bit of a different twist just for fun.  I set up the Apple TV in the studio, used flashcards and my iPad.  Instant hit!!  I simply divided them up in teams - in our case, girls against boys - and showed each member a flashcard.  If they could name the note correctly, they were able to add a "part" to Mr. or Mrs. Potato Head - a very fun app on the iPad.

As you can see...they got a bit silly with it! Arms in eye holes, noses in ear holes, etc.  All the more fun though!

I wanted this group lesson to focus on practicing habits and strategies so I changed up our game, "You've Been 'Stached" to ask them practice-type questions.  You can find the directions to this game here.  For this game, I changed it up and assigned the colors as follows:

PURPLE - Name an excuse as to why you don't practice!

ORANGE - Give an idea that helps you practice!

GREEN - Name a strategy that helps you polish a piece!

This game was a hit and we sure some great discussions about practicing!


I had purchased "My Practice Stache" from Melody Payne.  You can find it here.  It is a fabulous set of tips to use while practicing.  Using her ideas, I put together a set of my own for my studio kids using 20 tips (the original set comes with 52) as a start.  I gave each student one of these at the end of the lesson along with a die to go with 2 of the tips and a challenge for them to use them throughout the week.  This great resource is available in her store and is currently on sale!


Oh and the question??!!  At the very end, I said, "I mustache you a question!"  When they yelled, "What?", I said "Did you have fun today!"  A resounding "Yes!" was yelled back!