Easy Guide To Teaching The Elements of Music

The six elements of music are the building blocks for how music is created. Many school curriculums (including the Ontario Music Curriculum) use the elements of music as a major component of their learning expectations. When teaching the elements of music, notice that different elements take on a different level of importance depending on the grade – rhythm is key in the early grades, while elements like texture and form are focused on more in the later grades.

Duration – The pattern of movement in time.

  • Grade 1: Beat vs Rhythm
  • Grade 1: Fast & slow tempo
  • Grade 1: 2/4 and 4/4 metres
  • Grade 1: quarter note, eighth note, quarter rest
  • Grade 1: rhythmic ostinato
  • Grade 2: half note, half rest, whole note, whole rest
  • Grade 3: 3/4 metre
  • Grade 3: dotted half note, sixteenth-note, sixteenth rest
  • Grade 3: very fast (presto), very slow (largo)
  • Grade 4: syncopation of eighth-quarter-eighth
  • Grade 4: fermata

Pitch

  • Grade 1: High & Low
  • Grade 1: melodic contour
  • Grade 1: mi, so, la
  • Grade 2: high “do”
  • Grade 2: melodic ostinato
  • Grade 2: pentatonic scale
  • Grade 3: low “so” and “la”
  • Grade 3: pitch contour
  • Grade 4: melody maps
  • Grade 4: five line staff & pitch names in treble clef
  • Grade 4: major and minor tonality
  • Grade 4: major scale and intervals (unison, step, skip, leap)
  • Grade 4: key signatures
  • Grade 4: accidentals

Dynamics & Expressive Controls

Timbre

  • Grade 1: Vocal Quality
  • Grade 1: Body percussion
  • Grade 1: Pitched & unpitched instruments
  • Grade 1: environmental and found sounds
  • Grade 2: classification of instruments by sound
  • Grade 3: classification of instrument by sound production
  • Grade 4: ensemble instruments

Texture / Harmony

  • Texture
  • Grade 1: single melodic line (monophony)
  • Grade 2: melody & accompaniment
  • Grade 2: burdun patterns on “do” and “so”
  • Grade 3: two-part rounds, partner songs, canons
  • Grade 4: canon
  • Grade 4: two-part polyphony

Form

  • Grade 1: Phrase
  • Grade 1: Call and response
  • Grade 2: binary (AB) form
  • Grade 2: verse & chorus
  • Grade 3: section
  • Grade 3: ternary (ABA) form
  • Grade 4: verse and chorus
  • Grade 4: introduction & coda, repeats