BUBBLEGUM A Music Lesson Plan by Tonie DePasquale, NBCT

Focus: Rhythm, Texture

National Music Standards:

- Reading and Notating Music
- Performing on Instruments, Alone and With Others, a Varied Repertoire of Music

Objectives:
Students will
1. Read and notate rhythms.
2. Identify instruments by timbre.

Body of the Lesson:

In a prior lesson, have students brainstorm flavors and brands of chewing gum.
Notate them rhythmically.

Anticipatory Set:
Explore some of the interesting facts about gum using the link on the first page of
the Smart Notebook file.

Apply:
Have students clap and say the rhythms on page two of the Smart Notebook file.
Select students to come up to the Smart board to match the gum names with the
rhythms.

Teach the traditional jump-rope rhyme, Bubblegum.

Bubblegum, bubblegum chew and blow.

Bubblegum, bubblegum scrape your toe.
Bubblegum, bubblegum taste so sweet.
Get that bubblegum off your feet!

Explore the poem by dividing the class into two groups; one group says
bubblegum the other group says the rest of the words. Switch.

Add body percussion. Bubblegum=clap; Underlined words=pat

Distribute two different timbres of instruments. (E.g. Wood/metal or sticks/hand-

drums). One timbre plays bubblegum the other timbre of instruments plays the
rest of the words.
Develop the following form:
 A play the rhythm of the words
B speak or play a sequence of four of the gum rhythms, repeated so
that it equals the length of the bubblegum rhythm.

Develop: Play the game

Bubblegum Game
Place 8 or so unpitched instruments in a row. The students playing these
instruments must be able to see the notated rhythms.
Display a selection of notated gum rhythms.
Student A closes his/her eyes.
Student B selects four of the gum rhythms and places them in a row.
Student C taps four of the people at the un-pitched instruments. Only those
people will play the sequence of rhythms.
Perform using the above form. Before student A opens his/her eyes, student
B must either return the rhythms to the pool of possible rhythms, or mix
them up.
Student A identifies the sequence of four gum rhythms by arranging the
cards in order. Next, another student identifies who played. (Consider
having student C walk behind each un-pitched player as the guesser
responds yes or no to each.)

Materials:

Smart board
Smart notebook software. Available as a free download from
www.tequipment.com
Unpitched instruments 8 different ones
Rhythm sticks and hand drums (or two other contrasting sets of
instruments); enough for whole class. If you do not have enough for the
whole class, arrange students in lines and give the first student in line the
instrument. When they are finished they pass the instrument to the next
student.
Bubblegum rhythms students have brainstormed in a previous lesson such
as:

Dentyne Ice Bub-bl-i-cious Ice Breakers