Steps 3 & 4: Plan Engaging Lessons and Set Clear Procedures in the Music Room

The secret to a smooth-running music classroom? Solid plans and clear procedures. In this post, we’ll explore two essential steps for setting yourself—and your students—up for success. First, your lessons need to keep students singing, playing, moving, listening, and creating. Whether you're teaching a simple song or layering an Orff arrangement, thoughtful planning makes all the difference. Then, it’s all about routines: how students enter, sit, sing, and transition through class. When your expectations are crystal clear, students are free to focus on what matters most—making music! From writing your lesson objectives to establishing your classroom procedures, these steps will help you start strong and stay on track all year long.

Here's step 3 and 4!

Step 3:  Develop lesson plans that keep the students engaged and actively making music, responding to music, or creating music.

When structuring a lesson, your principal may require you to use their lesson format.  This may or may not be practical for use in the music classroom.  Normal things that you want to include for you are the objectives of the lesson, the activities you will be teaching (songs, dances, skill building on instruments or reading rhythms, notes, solfege, etc.).  If you are very new to teaching, you may want to write out the directions you will give, questions you will ask, and the order you want to teach the activity.  For example, you might be teaching a song with an Orff orchestration.  So, first thing you teach is the song (how to sing it, the lyrics).  Next you want to do some body percussion with the rhythms that will be transferred to the barred instruments (xylophones, metallophones, Bass, alto, soprano, etc).  Then you want them to learn the borduns (repeated harmonic patterns) to play on the bass xylophones, then the pattern for the alto xylophones, and finally for the soprano xylophones and glockenspiels.

Other things to add would be materials needed, accommodations for special education students and English Language Learners, plans for student reflection (what questions to ask and how will they accomplish this task).

In your lesson plan, you may want to add a warm up activity or a community building activity at the beginning as well as a closing song to sing as they line up to leave the room.

Step 4:  Design your procedures

You need to design and then teach EVERY procedure you will need the students to follow.  This list will grow throughout the year as you introduce a new instrument or a new task.  Start with entering and exiting the classroom.  How do you want them to do this every time they come to your classroom?  When they are singing, do they stand or sit?  Do you want them to show a specific posture when they sing?  How will you demonstrate that?  How do you explain why doing that will help them be good musicians?

How will they transition from sitting in their assigned seats (yes, you need a seating chart)?

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