How to Use Boom Cards To Engage Your Students During Piano Lessons
I’m not sure about you, but I get soooo excited finding new and exciting ways to make lessons fun and engaging for my students, and I love nothing more than helping other teachers find new ways to do the same! If you’re familiar with Cascade Method, then you may already realize that we offer TONS of different helpful online resources for piano teachers. From piano books to virtual piano games, my ultimate goal is to help YOU grow your teaching career to full time by developing students into passionate pianists where they are eager to come back for more — all while making a killer income!!!
In today’s blog post, I will feature one of my favorite tools to make piano lessons more exciting and fun for your students: boom cards. Boom Cards for Piano Lessons help students focus on different theory concepts including intervals, scales, piano keys, note reading, and so forth. You can use these in both in-person or virtual lessons. This fun online resource combines the excitement of playing an online game with teaching the fundamentals of piano theory which ultimately leads to an overall better musician and better note reader — talk about a win-win!
What are Boom Cards?
Boom Cards can be used on smartphones, tablets, or computers through an app called Boom Learning. They work by reinforcing a certain concept like piano keys, rhythm, scales, intervals, ear training, etc. In each deck, you can assign “tasks.” For example, in my Grand Staff / NoteMatch Boom card, I have instructions to “touch the treble clef” or “touch the bass clef.” This interactive activity can easily be incorporated into any lesson (even those that are hosted virtually)!
Boom cards are available in a bunch of different varieties. Here are a few of my favorites:
- Grand Staff, Line Note, and Space Recognition (NoteMatch Game 1):
This boom card deck comes with 37 different cards and is a great way to start familiarizing your students with NoteMatch — an essential piano reading tool that helps students make the connection between the notes they see on their sheet music and their location on the piano. With this activity, students will start to feel familiar with the terminology and notes of the grand staff.
- Intervals: Steps and Skips:
This deck is great for beginner students and comes with 100 different boom cards and helps teach directional reading. Students can review steps and skips and identify when a note is moving up or down.
- Major and Minor Chords for Ear Training:
Distinguishing major and minor chords is so important when learning to play by ear and this boom card deck is a great way to help reinforce this skill. This boom card deck also helps to reinforce grand staff terminology.
- Grand Staff Pumpkin Music Notes:
I have to say that this festive, fall-themed boom card deck is one of my absolute favorites! It’s hard not to get excited about fall and we all know that kids love Halloween. So, what better way to engage them than with a little bit of spooky fun?! This deck will help students recognize notes on the staff by choosing the correct pumpkin that corresponds with each note.
It doesn’t stop there! Those are just a few of the different piano boom card options that are available in my online store!!
Want to see how it works for free?
Try out our simple set of boom cards — identify the bigger interval!
Ways to Use Boom Cards for Piano Lessons
You and your students will each have your own sign-in to the Boom Learning platform, through which you can assign boom cards to your students and your students can access them. You can assign all of your boom card decks to each student or select specific ones for students who are just starting out and only need access to certain ones. Boom learning can also track your students’ progress. As students gain points, they’ll unlock different avatars which helps students get excited to practice their boom cards.
This learning tool is so much fun and the different decks teach students so many important piano skills! Here are a few of my favorite ways to use boom cards for my students:
- Boom cards can be assigned as a practice assignment for students to do at home, in between lessons to help reinforce certain concepts.
- You can incorporate boom cards as a part of your in-person lessons to create interaction and boost student engagement.
- As an online resource, boom cards can be incorporated into virtual lessons. When teaching students online, you have to get creative on ways to make it as entertaining and engaging as in-person lessons. Boom cards do JUST that!
- If a student doesn’t seem very engaged in a lesson (we all have those days) break out the boom cards to lighten things up!
If you’re feeling creative, you can even create your own boom cards for your students. This can help you tailor them to specific lessons as your students advance.
One of my greatest passions as a piano teacher is finding ways to help students get excited about their lessons so that they can really hone in on their talent and be the best pianist they can be! Finding resources such as boom cards and other helpful games has made a huge difference in my own students, and I know that it will for yours, too! Boom cards make learning fun and may even be the only motivation your students need to review what you’ve gone over in lessons while they’re at home. Don’t miss out on this teaching resource — it may be all you’re missing to spice up your in-person or online lessons!
Did you know that the Cascade Method Course includes free access to all of my boom card decks? Start your certification today, get access to ALL our resources, and set your student’s accounts up (for free), and get boomin!
I recently hosted a boom card workshop where I break down everything you need to know about boom cards, including how to set up your account, how to sign your students up, and how to create your very own boom card decks! If this workshop interests you, you’ll just need to make sure you’re subscribed to our email list to gain access! When you sign up for my email newsletter, you’ll also receive notifications about our monthly sales, freebies, and giveaways! So trust me, you won’t want to miss them! 
