Submitted by Gretchen Taylor, Illinois

Idea posted July 18, 2003

Here's another idea for recorder classes and drilling both the staff notes as well as the fingering. You could prepare a diagram of the recorder like so (similar to the chart in the Recorder Karate book):

O

  O

     O

     O

     O

     O

     O

     O

Download this chart: Microsoft Word Editable, but may need revisions. | Adobe Acrobat.

I centered it and made it big enough so that the holes match the size of colored plastic bingo chips. I'm going to copy 25, mount them with a glue stick onto card stock, and laminate. Then I plan to use them (one for each student) along with a film cup, eight chips, and a little blob of poster putty. The putty I'll put on the inside of the lid. During use, the putty can be divided with just a little blob on the back of each chip. It will stick to the board and not fall off, but can be moved easily too.

Anyway, I'm going to do some finger dictation where I'll show a flash card of a note and the kids will fill in the necessary finger holes w chips to show how that note is played. I'll can check them all at a glance by calling "show me" and they all hold their boards up for me to see.

I may also prepare a deck of note cards with the fingering on the back for smaller groups to play and check during my recorder stations sessions.

If you're interested and can't figure out how to make this chart, email me privately and I'll send you the template as an attachment.