Music appreciation is learning to listen. In a homeschool, it needs about 20 to 30 minutes a week and no musical training from the parent. In the early grades, children move, sing, and learn the instruments. In the middle grades, they study composers and the periods of music history. In high school, they follow longer works and write about what they hear.
This plan sets out what to cover at each stage. Use what fits your family.
Kindergarten to Grade 2: listen and move
Goals. Enjoy music. Feel the beat. Tell loud from soft, fast from slow, and high from low. Know a handful of pieces by name.
What to do.
- Play one short piece a day, the same piece all week
- March, sway, tiptoe, and freeze to the music
- Learn the four families of instruments
- Follow one story piece each term
Where to start. Peter and the Wolf and The Carnival of the Animals teach the instruments through stories. Classical music for kids to dance to has movement games. Composer study for preschool and kindergarten has a simple routine.
What to print. The instrument families listening chart and a listening journal page for drawing.
Grades 3 to 5: composers and instruments
Goals. Know six to nine composers and a few pieces by each. Name the instruments by sight and by sound. Use the words for speed and volume.
What to do.
- Study one composer at a time for several weeks
- Keep a notebook with a page for each composer
- Learn where each instrument sits in the orchestra
- Go to one live concert a year, if you can
Where to start. The composer study schedule covers six composers in a year. The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra gives each instrument a solo. Tempo words in music and dynamics in music give the vocabulary.
What to print. Composer fact sheets, the composer study notebook page, and the orchestra seating chart.
Grades 6 to 8: eras and forms
Goals. Place composers in time. Tell the main periods apart by ear. Know what a symphony, a concerto, and a sonata are. Follow a piece that lasts ten minutes or more.
What to do.
- Study one period each term: Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Modern
- Build a timeline and add composers alongside the history you are reading
- Listen to whole movements, and then whole works
- Write a short paragraph about one piece each month
Where to start. The guide to composers by era sets out the periods. Symphony, concerto, and sonata explained covers the forms. Longer guides include The Planets, Pictures at an Exhibition, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5.
What to print. The composer timeline and the composer cards for sorting by era.
Grades 9 to 12: a course for credit
Goals. Survey the history of Western music. Listen to complete works. Write about music with the right terms.
What to do.
- Follow a music history book or course as a spine
- Keep a listening log with the date, the work, and a few notes
- Attend concerts and write a short review of each
- Finish with a paper or a presentation on one composer or one work
Counting hours. A common yardstick for one high school credit is about 120 hours of work. A half credit is about 60. Rules differ by state and province, so check the rules where you live. A listening log is simple proof of the hours.
Students who take graded music exams may be able to earn credit that way. See RCM high school credits by province.
How to fit it into the week
Pick a slot. Ten minutes after lunch on three days works for many families.
Teach all ages at once. Play the same piece for everyone. Ask the youngest to move, the middle child to name the instruments, and the oldest to tell you how the piece is built.
Let the car do some of the work. Replay the week’s piece on drives.
Keep one binder. Fact sheets, notebook pages, and concert programs go in it. By June, it is a record of the year.
If you do not read music
You do not need to. Music appreciation is listening, and you are learning with your child. For the words on the page, music theory for parents explains the basics in plain terms.
Plan the year with the composer study planner, and read composer study for homeschool for the method.
More from this guide
This article is part of Composer study for homeschool: how to plan a year in ten minutes a week.
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A homeschool music curriculum laid out by age: the six strands, what to cover from preschool to high school, how much time to plan, and how to keep records.
How to teach music at home when you are not musical
How a parent with no music training can teach music at home: what to cover, a 15-minute plan, what to learn beside your child, and what to hand to a teacher.
Use it with your kids
Print a listening page, a practice chart, or a composer fact sheet. Or try a tool, such as the composer timeline or the piece picker.