Ni Pa Vou Cards

The Ni Pa Vou cards and games are based on Music Mind Game's Do Re Mi Cards.

Do Re Mi Cards & Magic Notes

Students use Magic Notes in Music Mind Games to write melodies on the Grand Staff.  Michiko likes to use "moveable Do" and has students place a red magic note on treble G to represent Do.  Students can then write basic melodies out in a G major scale since most simple melodies don't need an F#.  She also uses them in conjunction with another material---the paper pianos.  She finds it useful for all instrumentalists to have a basic understanding of the piano and so she has students learn to associate Do Re Mi with C, D, and E on the piano.  

Students use the Do Re Mi cards for all sorts of games but many link back to the Daily "Do".  

The Ni Pa Vou cards are used in conjunction with the Nightly "Ni".  First they are used to teach the diatonic scale.  These cards work in conjunction with the Curwen hand signs (a spatial representation of pitch).  The colored cards give students a visual representation for pitch---something that they picture in their minds.  The cards also give them something to move with their hands.  Maria Montessori found that children learned best when they were manipulating things with their hands.  

Even though we do not have a staff, I have found the magic notes to be useful for my students.  When they come to a new phrase in the the Parallage Phrases we often place the colored magic notes below each interval symbol.  This helps them think through the phrase before chanting and gives them something concrete to do (as opposed to writing out Ni Vou...).  My more advanced students use them to write out phrases of hymns.


The Ni Pa Vou cards are mostly complete.  One deck consists of 5 sets of colored cards from Ni to Ni' and four games.  I am considering making the deck 6 sets of cards instead of 5 if I find teachers need more cards in a deck.


To read about the games that I use with these cards you can find them in the materials tab--->Scale--->Ni Pa Vou cards.