Top 3 Ways to Teach Music Theory When Your Students Aren’t Interested

Teaching music online is a difficult task as physical interaction – an integral part of the process, is missing. The task becomes more difficult when you have to teach music theory to your students. That’s because students consider it to be the most boring aspect of learning music. While some may find music theory to be too difficult to deal with, others may think it pointless to sit through a theory class. But you don’t need to lose sleep when you have students who simply don’t care about music theory. Here are some ways that you could use to make teaching music theory a fun activity.

1. Use online flashcards

Create a group of flashcards where each would have some music theory on it. It could be a group of music notations, time signatures, rhythms and rests, chords and scales, intervals, musical terms and definitions in Italian/German/French, etc. You can use an online service like that of Brainscape or Doctor Mozart to create flashcards that help your students learn music theory fast and even retain the knowledge.

2. Create online quizzes

You can use an online platform like Mousiki.io to create online quizzes and make your students participate. There are several online tools that can let you use preset templates, which can be customized to fit your students’ skill levels. From musical terms, note values, rests, and scales to the difference between sharps, flats and naturals, ties and dots, and tones and semitones – there’s a wide variety of subjects that these quizzes related to music theory can have.

3. Use theory to create compositions

When teaching music online, let your older students use their knowledge of music theory to create compositions. Ask them to choose a specific theoretical element, which could be a key change from minor to major, time signatures, etc. Then, make them set a composition based on their chosen element. This will strengthen their theoretical knowledge and even help them notice how music theory can be put into practice.

4. Use songs of popular artists to teach theory

Find a couple of popular songs by artists like Katy Perry, Beyoncé, Ed Sheeran, Taylor Swift, etc. that your students must have heard of. Break them down into individual vocal lines and instrumental arrangements. This will let your students understand and learn how these popular songs are created by using music theory elements.

Come up with more similar ideas to ensure your theory classes are no longer boring when you’re teaching music online.