Unit Plan 14 (Grade 4 Music): Notating Melodic Ideas
Grade 4 music unit where students use iconic and standard notation to write simple melodic ideas, connecting what they hear, sing, and play to what they see on the page.
Focus: Use standard and/or iconic notation to document simple melodic ideas, connecting what students hear, sing, and play to what they see and write on the page.
Grade Level: 4
Subject Area: Music (General Music • Creating • Performing • Responding)
Total Unit Duration: 1–3 sessions, 50–60 minutes each
I. Introduction
Students deepen their understanding of how melodies can be captured on paper so that others can see, remember, and perform them. Building from familiar songs and teacher-modeled patterns, they move from hand signs and contour lines to iconic notation and simple staff notation. By the end of the unit, students will have created a short melodic idea, notated it using standard and/or iconic notation, and checked that their notation matches what they can sing or play.
Essential Questions
- How can we show what a melody sounds like using symbols on a page?
- What makes a piece of notation easy to read and perform for another musician?
- How does writing down our musical ideas help us remember, share, and improve them?
II. Objectives and Standards
Learning Objectives — Students will be able to:
- Describe melodic contour (up, down, same) using movement, drawings, and simple symbols.
- Use iconic notation (shapes, dots, or icons) to represent short melodic ideas.
- Transfer melodic ideas from icons to staff notation using lines, spaces, and noteheads.
- Create a 4–8 beat melodic phrase, sing or play it, and notate it using standard and/or iconic notation.
- Check their notated melody by performing it and revising symbols so that notation and sound match.
Standards Alignment — Grade 4 Music (NAfME-Aligned)
- MU:Cr2.1.4b — Use standard and/or iconic notation and/or recording technology to document personal rhythmic, melodic, and simple harmonic musical ideas.
- Example: Notating a rhythm using standard notation and recording a melody for later revision.
Success Criteria — Student Language
- I can use movement or drawings to show if a melody goes up, down, or stays the same.
- I can use shapes or symbols to show how a short melody moves.
- I can place notes on a staff so that higher sounds are higher on the staff and lower sounds are lower on the staff.
- I can sing or play my melody and check that it matches what I wrote down.
- I can explain how my notation would help another musician perform my idea correctly.