Are your students going wild for Pop-It toys? I love them too! There is something so satisfying about popping each one – like the magic of popping bubble wrap!
You can start using these in your lessons today with little or no prep. Here are some easy ways to use a Pop-It in your studio:
- Play the Pop-It as a percussion instrument and get students to “pop to the pulse” of different tempos
- Have students pop the pulse or rhythm of one hand of the music while you play the other on the piano—then switch!
- Call out finger numbers and have your student pop a bubble with that finger
- Students can pop a bubble for every correct repetition of a musical section until they fill a row, then they move on to another section and pop the next row until the board is full
- Have your student practice good finger position when they pop (it’s hard to pop with flat fingers!)
- Let a fidgety student pop while you are both discussing concepts
- Have students search for a certain element in a new piece (whole notes, eighth notes, slurs, etc.) and pop a bubble for each one they find
- Listen for the staccato sound of the pop and have students match it on the piano
- Have a student pop a bubble for every scale they can play correctly until they fill the board
I have several different shapes, but I tend to return to the 6×6 square Pop-It the most in my studio, so I made a few templates of this one… with musical twists! You can download a copy of these templates, a Pop-It instruction sheet with more than 25 game ideas, and more of our fun worksheets in the “Creative Piano Teacher Starter Pack” for FREE when you subscribe to our newsletter here.
The Starter Pack also includes a blank template so you can add any miscellaneous concepts the student is learning. For example, you can add terms or composer names to make a trivia game or use the Pop-It to make musical bingo sheets.
Hope these ideas help your lessons POP!
If you don’t already own these toys, you can find them at retail stores or online here.
Dr. Olivia Ellis teaches piano, group piano, pedagogy, and chamber music at Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. She’s an editor for Piano Magazine and has published several books including the Easy Piano Lead Sheets and Chord Charts series. She’s constantly creating new activities and games to teach concepts, and loves helping other teachers find their niche.
