Curvy Chords!

I realized as I was working with many of my students on chords and chord inversions that I didn't have a really good, fun way to review them.  I have loads of games and activities devoted to note identification, rhythm, terminology, etc., but nothing that I felt worked well to review chords, so...I put on the 'ole thinking cap and came up with...

CURVY CHORDS!

This is actually a very simple game, but hopefully makes a big impact on my students! Using a green foam board, I cut out 1"x 2" rectangles in 3 different colors. Altering them, I adhered them in a curvy motion around the boards, hence the really "original" name! Then I added die cut letters to make up the title of the game and the words, "start" and "finish". As a bit of excitement during the game, I randomly added an eighth note to a few of the rectangles. I cut these out with a fun punch that one of my students gave to me. After that was all done, I simply applied contact to the board! Easy, peasy!!

Then, I put together three sets of cards.

 Again, three different colors to match the colors of the rectangles I put on the board.  Here's how the game works...students move around the board with the roll of a die.  The color their game piece lands on determines the color of the card they pick.  The cards ask them to do one of three things...Play It! They are asked to play a specific chord on the piano.  Name It!  They are given three letters of the musical alphabet and asked to put them together in root position in order to name the chord.  And Invert It!  They need to play or name a chord in first or second inversion.

If they can correctly answer/play what is asked of them on the card, they can leave their game piece on the new rectangle.  If they can't, they must return their game piece to their previous position.  Obviously, the first to reach the finish wins! 

To add a bit of excitement to the game, each color also includes three specialty cards that say, "Your a Chord Master!  Take an extra turn!", "You've curved off track! Lose a turn!", or "Invert your game piece!  Switch places with another player.".  As far as the little eighth notes on the rectangles, I use those as bonus spots.  If a player lands on a rectangle with an eighth note and can correctly answer the card, they get a bonus and can move ahead 3 extra rectangles!  In addition to the game board you will need to make, and cards you can download here, you will need game tokens (like those cute smiley face erasers?), and a die.  And of course, you will need students who are eager to work on their chords!

 

I hope you enjoy using the game in your own studio!