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Objective: Learn the natural tones used in music and the spacing of the tones - The objective is not to learn the sharps and flats because they are relative to the natural tones (the E is next to the F but one fret apart from the D) This lesson applys to all instruments including the guitar, piano, violin, flute, bass, harp, and just about anything that makes a noise including the drums...

(1) Get a Plain Piece of Paper.
(2) Write out continuously:

A-BC-D-EF-G-A........

  This is something that even younger kids can do, Start out saying that the only tones used in music are ABCDEFG - The sharps and flats are irrelevant because you still only use ABCDEFG and none of the other alphabet letters. Now you can introduce the fact that some of the tones are seperated by one (space), Or that some of the tones are freinds and sit next to each other and some dont get along and have to have something in between them..

The (-) indicates a space between the Notes

A (space) BC (space) D (space) EF (space) G (space) (BACK TO 'A')

When you get to 'G' then it goes on to 'A' where there is a (-) space between the G and A (G-A) - Since there are only 7 (seven) letters used it should be somewhat easy to learn this fairly quickly, Once this is fairly easy to do (one whole sheet) then it can be breifly brought up every now and then to further burn it into memory...

Your students paper should look like: 

A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-
A-BC-D-EF-G-A-BC-D-EF-G-

 You can mix this up a little bit by starting each line with a randomly chosen letter (of the seven ABCDEFG) and then complete it to the end of the line, This will come in handy when doing the next lesson plan which is applying this knowledge to the guitar. Another good idea is to supply the first letter of each line, The idea is that they will be able to complete the pattern regardless of which letter they start with. It is realistic that a four year old child can learn this basic 'skill'...

By all means do not skip this lesson before going on to the next activity, This goes for you adults too - Thinking that this activity is something you can skip over is like trying to run before you can walk - With all that said you can go on to part two (Lesson Plan I.I) when this is complete.