Music Symbols - Beginning of the Year Assessment

Last year I started at a new Middle School.  With all new students, I needed a way to find out what they already knew so that I could plan for a challenging curriculum.  When playing Music Symbol Games the usual course is to teach Dynamics followed by Learning the Others, however I did not want to spend time teaching students what they already knew.  So I created a game called What Don't You Know? I laid out all the Music Symbol Cards and asked students to place a magic note on any card that they did NOT recognize or could not name. When they were done I only needed to teach whatever had a magic note on it. Sometimes that was every card, and sometimes not. A wonderful result was that some more advanced students volunteered to teach or demonstrate the meaning of symbol cards to the students who were unfamiliar with them. It ended up being very interactive and fun.  

One thing I recommend is to play Hello Grand Staff and Clefs before doing this game.  That way there are a few symbol cards that students should be able to recognize even if they do not know many others. 

Happy Music Mind Gaming :)