Where to find printable beginner music worksheets

Music requires unified listening and reading comprehension. Most toddlers cannot read sheet music (unless they’re a prodigy!) at the beginning stages of learning piano and music theory. They will, however, advance in their musical skills through practice. Once they advance, use the websites below to download and print music worksheets.

Like reading a book, reading sheet music takes practice. There are three basic aspects of reading music that can be taught to children: basic symbols, beat, and melody.

Basic symbols

When teaching basic symbols, there are five points to remember.

1. The staff

This is where notes, rests, and other musical aspects are written. With a musical staff, the musician knows what notes to play or when to stay silent.

2. The treble clef

The treble clef informs the musician at what octave to play the notes (i.e. higher).

3. The bass clef

Similar to the treble clef, the bass clef tells the musician at what octave to play the notes (i.e. lower).

4. Notes

There are many aspects to notes, but here are the basics:

• Each note has a head, stem, and flag.
• Each note has a beat value. It can be a whole note, half note, or quarter note (there are more values, but these are the basics).
• Each note has a tone that’s denoted on the staff (either higher tone or lower tone).

5. Rests

Rests are designed to tell the musician when not to play. They will stay silent during this time. Each note has a correlating rest value (i.e. whole rest, half rest, and quarter rest).

Beat (tempo)

At the beginning of the staff is a time signature. For novices, 4/4 is the standard time played. For each beat, a quarter note or quarter rest is played (or not played). Use this online metronome to help establish a beat.

Tempos vary from song to song, but the most popular ones are…

• Largo (50 beats per minute)
• Adagio (70 BPM)
• Moderato (110 BPM)
• Allegro (120-160 BPM)
• Presto (170+ BPM)

Melody

The basic principle of melody is the pleasing sound of notes played in a particular succession.

Scales are consecutive notes played after one another either in ascending or descending in tone. The C major scale is composed of C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C. From the bottom “C” to the top “C” is an octave. This means the C on the bottom will sound the same as the C on top, but in an octave apart. If you travel up eight more notes, you will arrive at the next up C, and these will be two octaves apart compared to the C at the bottom.

This is important to know because these are on two clefs: the treble and the bass. This, however, is an advanced understanding of music and will come with practice.