World Music for Elementary
Learn about traditional and folk instruments, folk dances, & traditional musical styles from all around the world.
You and your students will LOVE the 65 lessons included in the World Music for Elementary online course!
Each lesson is about the music of a different country or area of the world. You'll learn about unique instruments, folk dances, songs, and styles.
- Listen to music sung in other languages.
- See indigenous people perform their music for you.
- Learn to love the people and their music from all around the world!
World Music for Elementary is a perfect complement to any world geography or world history course.
Each lesson should take you around 15-30 minutes, excluding the optional activity.
Some lessons, but not all, include instrument notebooking pages as well!
Check out Free Previews:
- Free Preview lesson for New Zealand here.
- Free Preview lesson for Slovakia, Slovenia, and Serbia here.
- Read "How to Use and FAQ" here.
- Free Samples of World Instrument Notebooking Pages and World Fact Cards printables.
Optional Activities from World Music for Elementary:
Each of the 65 lessons in World Music for Elementary contains an optional activity or two.
These are optional because they will take you beyond the 15-30 minutes promised for each lesson to take to complete, and they often require extra materials in order to complete.
But, if you do decide to do them (or at least some of them), it will bring the lesson more to life and help the student further connect with the country or culture they’re learning about that day!
Here are a few examples of Optional Activities:
- Set up an Indonesian Gamelan percussion ensemble in your house.
- Dance the Afghani Attan dance with scarves.
- Make a hula skirt to wear while you dance the hula from Hawaii.
- Make your own castanets from Spain and learn how to play them.
- Make your own washtub bass, a homemade folk instrument from the U.S.
- Decorate Slovakian Easter eggs with melted crayons
- Drink some Thai iced tea while listening to the instruments of Thailand.
Where you’ll visit in World Music for Elementary:
Take your kids on a journey around the world.
Start in Oceania/Pacific Islands, Asia, and the Middle East.
Visit the countries of Afghanistan
Then, and visit Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Zimbabwe.
Next, you’ll travel to Europe and the countries of Austria and Switzerland (Alpine regions), Britain (England, Wales, & Scotland), Croatia, Czech Republic, Scandinavia (Finland, Norway, and Sweden), France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Republic of Ireland & Northern Ireland, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Bulgaria, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Serbia, Spain, and Turkey.
After Europe, we fly over to North America and the Caribbean where we’ll learn about the music of American Traditional Folk Music, The Bahamas, Canada, Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, Mexico, Native America, and Puerto Rico.
Then, it’s down south to Central and South America where we’ll finish up by visiting Argentina, Bolivia and Andean region, Brazil, Chile, Central America (Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama), Colombia, Ecuador and the Andean region, Paraguay, Peru, and Venezuela.
"This course has been so fun! The lessons are quick and simple but include a nice variety of examples. We often end up searching for more videos to see and hear more. My kids have talked about the instruments and sounds with great enthusiasm. We’ve learned a lot and have had lots of great conversations after a lesson. (I just need a pronunciation guide for each instrument!) I love that it’s safe and ready to go – I would not be able to research instruments/songs, find quality video examples, review the videos for appropriateness, and still be a nice mom by the time we sat down to learn. This allows me to “open and go” for something different, entertaining, educational, and easy. Love it."
~ Emma
Your Instructor
Gena Mayo is a homeschooling mom of 8 who has been teaching music in various forms for 30 years. She has a Bachelors degree in Music Education and a Masters degree in Vocal Pedagogy (teaching voice lessons). It has been her joy to teach elementary and junior high choir, high school voice classes, private voice lessons for teens through adults, early childhood music and movement classes (babies through preschool), elementary general music, and music appreciation for elementary through high school. But, her favorite music teaching experience has been as musical director for stage musicals such as Seussical, Shrek, Singing in the Rain, Newsies, and Beauty and the Beast. It is Gena's desire to help all homeschoolers easily include music in their homeschools!
Notebooking Pages for World Music for Elementary
Some of the lessons include Musical Instrument Notebooking Pages for the instruments you'll be learning about. You'll receive the entire set of over 220 instrument pages, which can be used with other music courses or lessons!
You'll also receive the Country Fast Fact and Notebooking Pages set, which contains 66 pages for the following countries: Afghanistan, Algeria, Barbados, Bolivia, Canada, Chile, China, Congo, Cuba, Ecuador, England, France, Germany, Guatemala, Iceland, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Jordan, Kenya, Laos, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mali, Mexico, Morocco, Namibia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, South Korea, Sweden, USA, Ukraine, and Vietnam.
Again, this set can be used outside the World Music for Elementary course as well!
Download free samples of the notebooking pages here!
"I love this music course! As we study geography and history I can quickly pull up World Music for Elementary for a lesson that fits in PERFECTLY with anything we’re doing. It’s fantastic! My kids enjoy it, we learn about different instruments and cultures along with each music lesson, and I appreciate the notebooking pages as well. It’s a homeschool win! "
~ Tauna Meyer, homeschool mom and blogger at Proverbial Homemaker
Course Curriculum
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PreviewHow to Use and FAQ
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PreviewWorld Map
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StartNotebooking Pages and Printables: Musical Instruments, Country Fast Facts, etc.
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PreviewFree Samples of Notebooking Pages and Printables (for those thinking of purchasing)
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PreviewOptional Resources to Round Out Your World Geography Study
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StartCertificate of Completion
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StartRefer a Friend Program
Not Just for Elementary!
"Gena Mayo has done it again! Her new music course, World Music for Elementary, is simply phenomenal. I have had the opportunity to preview it with my 9th grade daughter, and this is going to be a part of our geography program this year.
Gena created this course for elementary ages, as is obvious from the title. I no longer have elementary -- or even middle school -- students, and yet I consider this course to be totally worth the price for my two high school students. Why?
We are studying world geography this year, and I want it to be more fun, and memorable, than my world geography class was. Incorporating local music is a great way to do that, and now that is something we can easily do. I don't have the time to research native instruments like an Afghani rabab or a caxixi from Guinea. While I know enough to find some great Irish dancing, and I have photos of Polish folk dancing, I had never heard of the galopera dance or the langisandur.
What I love is that this is something I can easily add into their coursework as the lessons are mostly between 15 and 30 minutes. They add so much to the study of the various countries without burdening their high school load. The country lessons can be done in any order you wish, so it is easy to coordinate with your curriculum."
~ Debra Brinkman, homeschool mom and blogger at Footprints in the Butter
Other Testimonials:
"I just took a look at the new world music courses and they look fabulous! I love how they combine geography with music for an enhanced learning experience. So cool! I can't wait to take my own children through this when they're a little bit older." ~ Lyndsey
"We have used Gena’s music courses for 3-4 years. We love how she is able to put so much music in different ways out there for almost any family! We have completed 3 different courses with her, and still have a couple more to go. We are excited for the Elementary Music class this year. Even the preschooler has loved her classes!
We also took the Amazing Journey around the world course last year for Geography. It includes lots of neat videos and it uses a great book list that you can dig deeper with or just learn a little more about the country!.
I would highly recommend Gena’s classes for all ages! They are awesome and worth the price!" ~ Kathleen H.
"My daughter loves logging in to her lesson everyday! Right now we are doing World Music and Musicals. It's so perfect for her!" ~ a homeschool mom
Frequently Asked Questions
Get started now!
By the way, are you looking for a Music & Fine Arts Membership experience?
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