Music bulletin boards can serve a few different purposes. They can display information that’s useful for students to have at a glance, such as note names, the circle of fifths, concert dates, or rules of the classroom. A musical bulletin board could also function to convey a fun message, such as welcoming students to the new school year, or displaying every student’s name in the class. A bulletin board could also be used to display student work, such as compositions, or drawings of their musical interpretations. Some bulletin boards are simply for a fun visual!
Whatever the goal of your musical bulletin board, they are a needed and appreciated element that livens up the classroom.
Table of Contents
- What Makes a Good Music Bulletin Board
- Examples of Music Bulletin Boards
- Learn Music, We Will
- Woodstock Doorway
- Notes On The Staff Doorway
- Percussion Patch
- Colorful Music Bulletin Board
- Notation Constellation
- Inspired by Composers
- Welcome Bach (With Chickens)
- Mrs. Pac Man Music Word Wall
- Keys To Singing
- DIY Light Up Staff Board
- Do-Re-Mi-nions
- This School Has A Grand Staff
- Together We Create A Masterpiece
- What To Listen For In Music
- Perfect Quotes For Your Music Bulletin Board
- Our School Rocks!
What Makes a Good Music Bulletin Board
First and foremost, bulletin boards are visual. They should be uncluttered and easy to read. Most will make great use of color, though you’ll see a few that effectively capture sheet music’s black-and-white aesthetic.
Second, a good bulletin board is creative. Again, your display can be informational, or it can be completely for fun!
To get those creative juices flowing, let’s take a look at what some other music teachers have come up with. There’s no limit to what you can put between those good old piano key borders!
Examples of Music Bulletin Boards
Learn Music, We Will
The Knight Shift
Music teacher Chris Knight has an entire Star Wars-themed classroom. Among the many cool things in this classroom, check out the very simple music notation bulletin board. It’s black with white letters that read, “Learn music we will.” The basic note values and a quarter rest are displayed, along with a picture of Yoda.
Woodstock Doorway
No Firedrills
Super fun! The door into this teacher’s classroom features a giant purple guitar with pictures cut out and pasted onto it of each student dancing. In big letters along the wall, it reads, “Woodstock.” This eye-catching display would make any student excited to walk into this class.
Notes On The Staff Doorway
Gavri Yares
Another idea for a doorway display, this one is set up on the interior wall of the classroom. It features the grand staff with all the different letters labeled on colorful notes. Having the letters on the staff easy to view from anywhere in the classroom is a must for teaching notation. Drape a blanket over it when it’s time to put students’ knowledge to the test.
Percussion Patch
Mrs. King’s Music Class
Visit Mrs. King’s blog post for a bunch of different musical bulletin board ideas, but especially cool is her “Percussion Patch.” A bunch of huge, high-definition pumpkin pictures are laid out across the board, each with an actual percussion instrument taped to it. So creative!
Colorful Music Bulletin Board
Erin Kub
Here’s a really beautiful example. We see the words, “music makes life colorful” across a long bulletin board. In the middle sits a giant treble clef, dividing the board in half. On one side are 5 twisted strips of black crepe paper that look like a music staff. On the other side of the treble clef, the crepe paper streamers continue in a vibrant, colorful rainbow. The look is cheerful and visually appealing.
Notation Constellation
Mrs. Cookie’s Music Room
That’s just fun to say: notation constellation! Mrs. Cookie has these words cut out and taped up to her wall, underneath which are many gold star cutouts, each with a different musical symbol printed on it, plus its name. A piece of yarn runs between a few of the stars as well, drawing out the big dipper.
Inspired by Composers
Christine Skog
You can tell this teacher had a unit on composers. The bulletin board suggests inspirational verbs to students, influenced by composers from the classical era up through John Lennon. For example, “persevere like Beethoven.” On the periphery of this rather long bulletin board, you can spot a few write-ups of some of the composers for students to draw inspiration from.
Welcome Bach (With Chickens)
Musicbulletinboards.net
This one is getting guaranteed giggles from your students. We have here an image that reads, “Welcome Bach,” as if for a welcome back beginning of the year bulletin board. Underneath, we see many chickens and roosters with poor Johann’s head on them, the words “Bach,” “Bach,” “Bach,” “Bach,” written out below the entire roost. You could make your own version of this with rubber chickens, too.
Mrs. Pac Man Music Word Wall
I Heart Recess
This teacher used colorful tape to create a Mrs. Pac Man board up on her classroom wall. Ghosts, Mrs. Pac Man, and Pac Man travel around the board eating the pellets from the game, only these pellets have musical vocab words on them. Certainly an eye-catching visual!
Keys To Singing
All For The Passion Of Music By Patti Anderson
Patti Anderson makes a lot of beautiful bulletin boards. Check out her blog post for more examples. This “Keys to Singing” bulletin board is a great display for a choir room. Seven elements to practice during choir rehearsal are listed out: “focus,” “teamwork,” “relaxation,” “posture,” “diction,” “listening,” and “breathing.” Each word is written on a large, colorful key. A giant lock opens in the middle of the bulletin board. This is a great way to help students remember those key elements you always want in the forefront of their minds as they practice.
DIY Light Up Staff Board
Mrs. King’s Music Class
You’ve got to see how cool this looks! This is another bulletin board from the mind of brilliant music teacher, Mrs. King. For this project, she bought a bunch of color-changing push lights (AKA puck lights), which are round like a note head. Next, she took a magnetic whiteboard and created a treble clef staff on it using black tape, perfectly sized to the lights. Then she glued magnets to the back of the push lights, and voila! Light up musical notes that can be placed anywhere on the staff! Mrs. King also added letters to her push light musical notes. You could do the same, or leave them blank so you or your students can place any light anywhere.
Do-Re-Mi-nions
The Musical Rose By Michelle Rose
Who doesn’t love minions? This is an adorable way to grab attention and make learning solfege fun. A simple treble clef staff is laid out, with a slightly different minion representing each note of the scale, their overalls labeled with the corresponding solfege syllable. It could be fun to have your students sing the scale in their best minion voices!
This School Has A Grand Staff
All For The Passion Of Music By Patti Anderson
Another cool bulletin board from music teacher Patti Anderson’s blog. This display pays tribute to the staff at her school. Get it? A grand staff! All the teachers’ names are written out on different musical notes. It’s on an incredibly long bulletin board, of course! At a distance, it looks like each note on the grand staff is simply labeled by its letter name, but on closer inspection, you can see the letter corresponds to a teacher’s name. What about all the teachers whose names don’t begin with a letter between A and G? Another letter in their name is used instead. Students can find their teacher’s name, as well as see the correct letters on the staff. Really cool!
Together We Create A Masterpiece
Cathy Turner Black
This bulletin board also displays musical notes on a grand staff with names written on them. In this case, the names are those of this teacher’s students. The colorful little eighth notes are smattered around the grand staff randomly; the goal here being simply a fun visual to recognize each student. At the top of the bulletin board it reads, “Each individual is like a single note.” The analogy is completed underneath the staff: “Together we create a masterpiece!” A beautiful sentiment about humanity overall, and oh so true about how we create music together.
What To Listen For In Music
David Row At Make Moments Matter
This is a bulletin board set available for purchase, detailing six categories of elements to listen for in music. Those categories include style, lyrics, dynamics, mood, tempo, and timbre. Each category comes with a definition, as well as several questions students can ask themselves relating to that category to help them listen to music mindfully.
Perfect Quotes For Your Music Bulletin Board
Midnight Music
This example is a little different from the rest as it’s not a picture of a finished music bulletin board. This one is a blog post compiling music quotes that work well specifically for a music class bulletin board. For example, “the only thing better than singing is more singing,” said by Ella Fitzgerald. If you don’t find a quote on the list that’s just right for your classroom display, scroll all the way down and click on their part two post.
Our School Rocks!
Shannon Y
This very last example is cute and vintage-y. A large bulletin board is covered in old records. The label from the center of each record is replaced with a label for each class in the school. On the surrounding vinyl, each student’s name from that class is written in metallic marker. The background for the bulletin board is an appropriately 1960s reddish orange.
A music bulletin board can help students refer back to helpful information, or it can simply lift their spirits as they walk through your classroom door. What will you come up with for your own classroom this year?
