JoyTunes is a company that has built two neat iPad apps to help students learn to play the piano and the recorder. The apps are games that require you to play the correct notes on your recorder or piano. When you play the correct notes you can move forward in the game. The notes that are you play are picked up by the microphone on your iPad. The piano version of the app is available here. The recorder version of the app is available here.
Playing the Joy Tunes games could be a good break from traditional music practice activities. I wouldn’t replace practicing scales and other time-tested methods with playing these games, but playing the games could throw a new fun element into practice.