Third grade students learn to recognize the tempo of a piece through practice. Often, children first learn the concept of a beat by walking around the classroom while mimicking the teacher as she marches to the beat of a song. Once students can march in time, the teacher can help students learn the definition of the beat. Tempo indications come next, where the teacher teaches the various definitions for slow, medium and fast tempos. Common tempo terms include adagio, andante, moderato, allegro and presto.
Third grade students begin to solidify the understanding of rhythms and note names used in music. Many schools concentrate on teaching notes of the treble clef first and then teach bass clef towards the end of the year. Note value terms that students learn include the sixteenth note, eighth note, quarter note, half note and whole note. Advanced students learn about the concept of a triplet, that requires students to divide three notes equally spaced over the duration of two notes. For instance, quarter notes normally get one beat each for a total of two beats. Triplet quarter notes require students to fit three quarter notes in the space of two.
The different dynamic levels often get taught to third grade students in a creative way. The teacher asks students to speak piano when the classroom needs to be quiet, mezzo-forte when the classroom should be at a medium level and forte when the students can yell and scream at recess. At the third grade level, students should know the different dynamic levels most commonly found in a musical piece, from the quietest dynamic to the loudest: piano, mezzo-piano, mezzo-forte, forte and fortissimo.
Students learn the names of common musical instruments and the difference between voice, brass, string, woodwind, keyboard and percussion instruments. Third graders learn the term "timbre" and how it relates to each instrument's sound. Other terms include solfege syllables that correspond to music note names, what instruments make up an orchestra and the names for various music symbols. Repeats, codas, flats and sharps are a few commonly addressed terms in the third grade music classroom.
Most third grade music students begin to learn about the concept of form in a musical work. Students learn how to name sections within a piece using letter names. While students don't need to identify the form of a piece by ear, the instructor can teach the concept of form within a piece first using a visual representation and then applying it to a simple song, like "Mary Had a Little Lamb." Binary forms consist of an A section and a B section and ternary forms consist of an A, B and return to an A section. Students should learn the difference between these two forms.