Make Music with Homemade Maracas

Making maracas with your little one is a fun way to explore a new musical instrument and practice different math concepts. Practice the early math concepts of number sense, counting and making patterns with this maraca-making activity.

Learning Goals

In this music-making activity, your child will:

• Practice identifying how many items are in a small set by sight.
• Copy and create patterns using color, movement and sound.
• Count objects and sounds using numbers one to 10.

Vocabulary

• Number sense is knowing how many of something there are and connecting that quantity with a number name. Building number sense helps children develop the foundations they need to build a love of math!
• A pattern is a sequence of things that repeats over and over and over, following a rule. Patterns can be physical things, like colors painted on the maracas, or can be more abstract, like the sounds you make with the maracas.
• Counting is finding out how many of something there is. Counting is made up of many different skills, like knowing number names, understanding number order, knowing to count objects in a set only once, and understanding that the last number counted is equal to the total number of objects in a set.

Watch

Watch: Families Find Patterns While Preparing Lunch

Materials

• Two empty toilet paper rolls
• Markers
• Tape
• Washi tape, optional
• Acrylic paint, optional
• Dried beans or rice

Step-by-Step Instructions

1. Decorate your maracas with patterns! Use various fun colors to decorate the toilet paper rolls using colored markers, paper washi tape, or an acrylic paint kit like those found at dollar stores. You can create patterns around the roll, up and down the roll or both! For example, a ring around the roll of red dashes, a ring around the roll of blue stars, a ring of yellow circles and dashes, and repeat. Start by creating a pattern for your child to copy. This will help your child become comfortable creating a repeating sequence. You can choose to create the pattern on a piece of paper or have your child copy your pattern from the first maraca to the second maraca.

2. Practice number sense with your little one by laying out the dried beans or rice with which you will fill the maracas. Lay out small sets of one to four beans. Ask your child to find two sets that look the same. See if they can do this without counting each bean, but by sight alone. You can also compare sets by pointing to two of them and asking which has more or less.

Craft Shiny Robots and Spaceships

3. Transform the toilet paper rolls into maracas. Fold one end of one roll and seal it with tape. Next, place a handful of beans or rice inside it. Seal the other end with tape. Repeat with the other roll.

4. It’s time to make music! Put on one of your favorite rhythmic songs and shake the maracas to the beat. Alternatively, use this fun compilation of nursery rhymes from PBS KIDS. Start by making a rhythm that your child can copy before asking them to create their own. Try some of the strategies below to incorporate counting and patterns into your rhythms.

• Practice counting by shaking beats of a number between one and 10. For example, start by shaking four beats of three.
• Practice creating patterns with the shakes. For example, start with this pattern of “one, one, three.”
  • Shake (one)
  • Shake (one)
  • Shake, shake, shake (three)
  • Shake (one)
  • Shake (one)
  • Shake, shake, shake (three)
• You can also incorporate movement into your patterns. Try shaking the maracas on different sides of your body, like this example.
  • Shake, shake (two) to the left
  • Shake, shake (two) to the right
  • Shake, shake (two) to the left
  • Shake, shake (two) to the right
• What are some other rhythmic patterns you can create with your maracas? Ask your child to suggest their own repeating pattern of beats and movement. Then shake away!

Keep the Conversation Going

• Maracas come from the rattle family of instruments and are traditionally made from gourds (fruit with hard skin) and filled with small objects like beans or seeds. Today, maracas are made out of many different materials, like wood or plastic, and are most commonly used in Caribbean, Latin American and South American music. Maracas are usually played in pairs by holding one in each hand but can also be played with two in one hand.

Family Math Activity: Rock Out with a Tissue Box Guitar

• Make other instruments together and form a small band to practice your musical patterns as a family! You can try making atissue box guitar or a Puerto Rican güiro using an empty water bottle decorated with patterns and a pencil. Use the pencil to scrape the side of the water bottle and make different sounds. Try scraping the water bottle in short and long strokes and comparing the sounds. Want more? Create a tambourine by placing dried beans in the middle of two paper plates, then seal the edges. You can incorporate patterns as you decorate your tambourine by drawing a spiral going from the center of the plate outward, with repeating colors in each ring of the spiral.
• Compare the sounds of the different instruments you make. How does the güiro, tambourine, guitar and/or maracas sound the same or different? Count how many beans, strings, or ridges each instrument has. Which instrument has more objects that make noise, and how does that affect the sound?

Book Suggestions

"Rhythm Rescue" (Ages 3-9)
Written by Vicky Weber and illustrated by Geneviève Viel-Taschereau

In this interactive book that uses clapping, kids can help Tala and her friends make music on Beat Street.

"Patterns / Patrones" (Ages 2-5)
By Kristen Reed and Jessica Young
Have fun with your child by noticing the patterns around us that you can see, hear, or touch.

Corresponding Standards

California Preschool Learning Foundations

• Number Sense
  • 1.0: Children expand their understanding of numbers and quantities in their everyday environments.
  • 1.1 Recite numbers in order to 20 with increasing accuracy.
  • 1.3 Identify, without counting, the number of objects in a collection up to four objects

• Algebra and Functions 2.0: Children expand their understanding of simple, repeating patterns.
  • 2.1 Recognize and duplicate simple repeating patterns.
  • 2.2 Begin to extend and create simple repeating patterns.

Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework

• Goal P-Math 1: Child knows number names and the count sequence.
• Goal P-MATH 2. Child recognizes the number of objects in a small set.
• Goal P-Math 7: Child understands simple patterns.