Heidi’s Piano Studio: Free Christmas Themed Piano Teaching Resource Roundup

While rounding up free Christmas themed resources and ideas that I have gathered over the years for my upcoming Christmas Piano Group Lesson and found some gems that I have used in the past but had forgotten about. I hope you enjoy using some of these fun activities with your students this Christmas season! The game links are organized by concept with links to free Christmas music and improv activities listed at the bottom. Update: Unfortunately some of the resources are no longer free since this post was created years ago, but I come back to them year after year for Christmas piano fun.

GAMES

Notereading

Layton Music Christmas Tree Folder Game - Concepts: Letter Names on Piano Keys and/or Letter Names on Staff, Key Signatures Group Game or Private Lessons, Multi-Level
Susan Paradis Snowflake Keyboard Note Race - Concept: Letter Names on Piano Keys, Private Lesson Game
My Fun Piano Studio Eskimo Race - Concepts: Piano Key Names, Students identify piano key names and race to play them after crawling to the piano.
My Fun Piano Studio Tag the Gifts - Concept: Key Signatures, Students identify key signatures and then race to unwrap gifts.
Teach Piano Today Wunderkeys Christmas Note Reading Tree - Concept: Identify Note names within current music pieces and cover the alphabet tree ornaments. Private Lesson Game
Teach Piano Today Wunderkeys Reindeer Heave Ho - Concept: Identify Middle C's, Bass C's and Treble C's on the staff and roll a die until you match the # of Cs. Private Lesson Game

Rhythm

Layton Music Christmas Rhythm Unscramble- Concept: Rhythmic Dictation Group Game or Private Lesson, Multi-Level This free printable includes 2 measure rhythm segments from 8 different familiar Christmas songs that students have to arrange in the correct order. This makes a great intro activity as students are arriving for group lessons as you can select easier pieces like Jingle Bells for beginners or pieces with more difficult rhythms like Deck the Halls for intermediate students or they could work in teams to race arranging the rhythm of the same song.
Pianimation.com Christmas Carol Rhythm Matchup Concept: Rhythm Ear Training, Match familiar Christmas song opening lyrics to the rhythms they belong with.
Teach Piano Today Wunderkeys Holiday Rhythm Practice Game

Theory/Key Signatures

Susan Paradis Musical Christmas Lights Bingo -Play bingo style by following the directions on Susan's blog or read my post about how I adapted this game to play Musical Christmas Lights Pictionary.
Susan Paradis Silly Sentences - Group game where students read silly sentences in the manner of the music term (forte, ritardando, etc.) and students guess the term.
My Fun Piano Studio Beanbag Toss Circle of Fifths - Students drill # of sharps/flats in keys as they toss a beanbag in a circle

Multi-Concept

Layton Music Swat the Ornaments- Concepts: Landmark Notes, Key Signatures, Letter Names and/or Interval Ear Training Instructions for swat the ornament are on D'net's blog but this versatile free printable can be adapted for a variety of levels in both an individual and group setting. You could play memory matching key signatures to letter names
Susan Paradis Reindeer Tracks GameBoard Concepts: Various-Choose flashcards with various concepts in different levels based on the needs of your students
Teach Piano Today Christmas Fortune Teller Concepts: Note Values/Intervals, for use in private lessons

IMPROVISATION/COMPOSITION

Teach Piano Today Santa's Workshop Improv
Teach Piano Today Save Santa Composing Activity
Pianimation Christmas Carol Harmonization Worksheet
Pianimation Christmas Song Starter Worksheet
Compose Create Jingle Bells Theme and Variation Challenge
Heidi's Piano Christmas Canon Chords Improv
Heidi's Piano Joy to the World Scale + Harmony Experiment

MUSIC

Julie Lind Free Christmas Music Piano Song Download

Susan Paradis Pre Reading and Primer Christmas Music
Teach Piano Today Primer Christmas Music Pack
Color in My Piano Christmas Music Arrangements
G Major Music Theory Christmas Music
Making Music Fun Christmas Music

Michael Kravchuk Christmas Arrangements

Michael Kravchuk Christmas Lead Sheets
Defordmusic.com - Intermediate/Advanced Christmas Music
I've blogged in the past about the Christmas arrangements of Sally Deford. She has over 50 free arrangements of familiar and original Christmas pieces including choral and piano solo arrangements that you won't want to miss out on. Guard Him Joseph is still one of my all-time favorites based on the Pachebel's Canon chords.