Material: In "The Children's House" the musical staff is introduced by means of a board painted green with the lines in bas relief. On each line and in each space representing the octave to which the sounds of the bells respectively correspond, is a small circular indenture, or socket, into which the disk for each note may be inserted. Inside each indenture is written a number: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. The disks used in this exercise have a number written on the lower face and the name of a note on the upper: for instance, 1, do; 2, re; 3, mi; 4, fa; 5, sol; 6, la; 7, si:

This device enables the child to place the notes on their respective lines without making any mistakes and to examine their relative positions. The indentures are so arranged as to show an empty space wherever a semi-tone appears:

In the semi-tone spaces black counters are to be placed. At a later stage of this exercise the staff is represented by a wooden board similar to the one described above, but without the indentures. The child has at his disposal a great many disks with the notes written out in full on one face. He can arrange thirty or forty of these disks at random on the board, keeping them, however, in their places according to the names of the notes; but each time the surface showing the name of the note should be placed downward on the board, so that on the line only disks without names are visible. When a child has finished this exercise, he is to turn the disks over without disarranging them and so determine from their names whether he has placed them properly. All the disks on a given line or in a given space should have the same names. Should any doubt arise as to the proper place of a note, the other board with the numbered indentures can be used as a check.

When a child has reached this stage of development, he can practice reading the musical script, ringing the bells according to the notes he is interpreting. The musical staffs are prepared on oblong cards about seventeen centimeters broad. The notes are about two centimeters in diameter. The cards are variously colored—blue, violet, yellow, red.

The next step is for the children to write notes themselves. For this purpose we have prepared little sheets which can be bound together into a book or album.

We offer also a few songs employing two or three notes so simple in character that the child can make them out by ear on his bells. When, after some practise, he is certain he can copy the song, he writes the notes on his staff and so becomes the editor of his own music.

Treble and Bass Clefs

Arrangement of the notes in the form of a rhombus: All the exercises thus far have been in reference to the higher clef. However, no representation of this key has as yet been given the child. His first task is to learn the relative position of the notes on the two staffs. To supply this want, following the system of the Musical Conservatory of Milan, we have adopted the double staff.

The broken line (p. 328) indicates the position of do, the point of departure for the scale. In fact, as the notes pass from line to space and space to line, they form the natural series:

When the position of do has been determined, the other notes above and below it are easily found. From the do on the left the child can find his way to the do on the next octave higher and come down again. Likewise from the same point on the right (do) he can go down to the do of the lower octave and then go up the scale again. When these notes are represented on the combined staffs with the counters, the resulting design is a rhombus.

Separating the two staffs, the arrangement of the notes in the higher and lower key (the C scale and bass) becomes apparent and the different significance of the two series can be emphasized by placing to the left of the staff the two clef signs, which have been prepared as special portions of our material.

In this way the children have learned the scale in do major in the two keys. The arrangement of the black and white spaces puts them in a position to recognize these notes even on the piano. Our material, in fact, includes a diminutive keyboard where the keys are small enough to fit the size of a child's hand. It can be used as an exercise for the finger muscles. As each key is touched it raises a hammer marked with the name of the note struck, which the child can see through a glass. Thus while the child is practising his finger movements, he fixes his acquaintance with the arrangement of the notes on the keyboard. This small piano makes no noise. However, a sort of organ-pipe mechanism can be fitted on above the hammers in such a way that each stroke, as the hammer rises, connects with a reed which gives a corresponding sound.

All the exercises thus far have been based upon sensory experience as the point of departure. The child's ear has recognized the fundamental sounds and initiated him into real musical education. All the rest, such as the music writing, etc., is not music.