Make your own instruments

Tips for cheap, easy, fun instruments

You don't need to be knowledgeable about music-making to help your children experience the benefits at home.
   
Making simple homemade instruments is a fun and inexpensive activity. The trick is to be imaginative - literally any household object can be used to make a sound. Encourage your child to experiment with the following homemade instruments to see what different sounds they make.

• Fill empty milk bottles with varying amounts of water and tap the rims with a spoon to make a tune. The more you fill the bottle, the lower the sound. Tap out a simple tune and encourage your child to repeat it back to you.
    
• Fill empty screw-top jars with beans, rice, pebbles etc. to make shakers. Make sure the lid is tightly secured before use!
  
  
• Empty cartons, pots and pans make great drums when hit with a wooden spoon
  
  
• Babies love repetition: sing their favourite songs over and over
  
  
• Wrap rubber bands round an empty shoebox or ice-cream carton to make a homemade guitar. Try using different sizes of rubber bands, thick and thin, for the strings
  
  
• Two pan lids can be banged together to make crashing cymbals
  
  
• Place a plastic ruler over the edge of a table and pluck it to see and hear vibration
  
  
• Staple sandpaper to two small wooden blocks and rub them together to make a swishy sound
  
  
• Cut a coconut in two, remove coconut and bang together as musical clappers
  
  
• Cut old pieces of dowling or pipes into sizeable lengths and bang together as rhythm sticks
  
  
• Create a triangle by suspending a metal object (such as a coathanger, pipe or horseshoe) with string and hitting it with a metal spoon