Lesson Ideas from Travel

This week’s lesson ideas are all about creating lessons from your own personal travels. Think of it like show and tell, but for teachers, with the caveat that students will walk away with a better understanding of a specific music concept.

These ideas were inspired by pictures I took during my recent trip to London, but the same ideas can be applied no matter your destination. For example, the London Bridge inspired a children’s nursery rhyme, which developed into a circle game and song which children still sing today.

In a similar vein, St. Paul’s Cathedral inspired the song Feed the Birds from the movie Mary Poppins.

Have students work together to choose a landmark or object that they find inspiring. Depending on their age, it could be anything ranging from the biggest slide on the playground to an important landmark in their state. Find a photograph of their landmark or object, and put it on the board. Have students create a list of important facts about that landmark/object. From the list, students can begin to craft song lyrics dedicated to it. Younger students can set the lyrics to a known song. Older students might want to create their own melodies in GarageBand or other music making app.

Once students have completed their song inspired by the landmark/object, they will better understand how composers of the past and present were inspired by everything around them. Perhaps they’ll think to write a song during their next trip or dedicate some lyrics to their favorite place.