One of my favorite rhythm games to play with my students is Busted! from the Stay Tuned! blog. It’s easy to put together, easy to play, and a lot of fun!
Every now and then I like to change it up a bit to keep it fresh. And that’s where snowballs come into play! I found my snowball toss game at Walmart marked down after the holidays and thought it would be a fun way to kick off my lessons after Winter Break (but any target-type game will work). It was a huge hit!! The kids have been asking to play it for the past couple of weeks and it’s been fun to dust off our rhythm skills after two months of Christmas Carols (we start in November, the day after Halloween!).
Here is a similar game from Amazon that works just as great and can be used for any season of the year!
Here’s how we played it:
Place all the rhythm sticks inside the container along with only one “Busted!” stick.
Each player gets two chances to land a snowball in a hole before it’s the other person’s turn.
The first player (I always let the student go first), tosses a snowball at the board.
If the snowball lands inside one of the holes, the player removes the number of rhythm sticks corresponding to the hole the snowball landed in (for example, 40 hole = 2 rhythm sticks, 60 hole = 3 rhythm sticks, 80 hole = 4 rhythm sticks, 100 hole = 5 rhythm sticks). The player lays out the sticks to create a rhythm sequence. If the player already has sticks from a previous turn, the new sticks are placed after the last stick of the previous sequence, thus creating a longer rhythm sequence.
In order to earn the points, the player must clap and count the rhythm sequence correctly.
Then it is the next player’s turn. Repeat the same instructions.
Play continues until someone pulls out the “Busted!” stick and the game ends.
The total score of each player is calculated and the player with the highest score wins.
The game is more fast-paced then traditional Busted! (which can take awhile to play depending on how many rhythm sticks you used) and the kids had an absolute blast! It would be a fun game to play at piano party, buddy lesson, or a group lesson.
I plan on using this same game board for other games, I want to get some mileage out of it (and improve my aim!! I learned that my sweet spot is the 80 points hole, but I can’t seem to get the snowballs in any other hole! lol). It will most definitely be back and revamped!
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