Last week we received a few new students and I wanted to get a sense of where they are. Because I only see my students weekly for a short time, the assessment needed to be quick, easy and fun! The whole thing took only about 5-10 minutes (For a couple of classes I kept adding rhythms to see how far I could push them!). 

Here is the set up: 

1. make a list of 4- 5 rhythms on the board (you can make them as simple or as complicated as you would like)
   1. | | ∏ |
   2. | ∏ ∏ ∏ 
   3. ∏ | |  ∏  
   4. ∏ | | |
2. Clap out one of the rhythms
3. Have kids hold up the correct finger to indicate which number they think it is (I remind kids not to copy a neighbor, as that person could be wrong OR have them close their eyes)

The best part of this is that you can go for as long as you would like! After you finish clapping out all of these rhythms, you can erase and add harder ones. You can even have kids create a series of 4 – 5 rhythms and have them be the leader so that they are clapping out a chosen rhythm ~ which of course, furthers your assessment 🙂 Either way, you will get the information you need within a few minutes and the kids will have fun seeing if they are correct! Win-win!!