Supplemental Books to Learn the Notes!

Not everybody likes to learn notes with flashcards (although if you do, I’ve got a link to those at the end)!. Here are books I have previewed and that I recommend for use with your kiddos as they learn to recognize notes on the staff and on the keyboard.

While I’m going to add the Bastien preferred books first, I do have a few Note Spellers by other methods that I like and I include them after the flashcards. Want a recommendation? Please ask.

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Gamification!

This book is fun for beginners. Recognize the notes, name them, color the picture and connect the dots!

Name the notes, connect the dots, and color the picture! This is an excellent book for our youngest beginning students.

Color by Note! Find all the A’s and color them Blue. What kind of picture will you end up with? This is a fun book, and nice to work on as an adult/child team. Let your child teach YOU the notes!

Color by Note! What kind of picture will you end up with? This book is nice to work on as an adult/child team, especially for an older beginner, as the picture are more intricate than the Note Picture book above. Let your child teach YOU the notes!

Traditional Note Spellers

Why do I like this note speller for beginning students? Because it involves multiple ways to learn the notes–naming, drawing, playing, and hearing. We don’t all learn the same way–this book allows multiple learning techniques!

A continuation from Book 1. Focuses on ear training, and recognizes notes including flats and sharps.

A Bastien Note Speller from the original Bastien Piano Library. It’s not flashy and doesn’t have illustrations. It is however concise and thorough in teaching and reviewing concepts, and I recommend it.

This small book (more pamphlet size) is part of Bastien’s Theory Boosters Series. So far, I’ve only looked at the two note spellers, but there are several more in the series for me to review. They include gamification as a means for learning as well as the traditional methods. I like that the books are small, as students can complete them more quickly and feel success with that accomplishment.

Flashcards

The original, and most basic set of Bastien flashcards. The easiest to use when simply drilling the notes. I highly recommend this set.

We start learning intervals in the Primer. Then truly start drilling in Levels 1 & 2. These flashcards can help you memorize and recognize intervals a little faster, from 2nd to the octave.

We don’t start to learn key signatures until later on, but wow, these flashcards are helpful when its time to start recognizing and understanding the keys of a song. This set of flashcards also includes all of the single notes, which are closer to the size of “real notes” than the first set I mentioned above.

More Recommended Note Spellers

This unique note speller tells stories about 28 composers by the student speller out notes to complete words in the story. It combines appreciation for great composers with note spelling!

This book is unique and fun, with puzzles and a different look from the Bastien study. A student who has worked through Bastien and needs additional practice would benefit from this book.

This Note Speller is basic and thorough. It gets the job done for teaching the names of the notes to kids.