Here are some lesson plans that a non-music sub could easily use. Remember to make your plans easy. Prepare something that doesn't require music knowledge or even technology knowledge, for that matter.
This is a nice book with lyrics and photos of America. However, if you want to, you could also find photos online and make a PowerPoint. I made a PowerPoint, but I'm not sure I should share it, because I don't know if the photos are copyrighted.
Make sure you find a recording for the sub to play. You can find some great examples on youtube.com that the sub can play. Here's the sub lesson.
It's helpful to find different versions of America the Beautiful (i.e. Gospel style) that the sub can play while students color for the rest of the music class.
I would use this lesson with the younger grades.
For older grades, I love the song Fifty Nifty United States by Ray Charles (no, it's not that Ray Charles). I can't reproduce it here because of the copyright, but I'm betting you have a copy of the song and recording in your music curriculum. Here, I offer some lesson plans that could be used with a sub. The first page can be difficult for elementary kids, and it helps if the kids already know the song a little. But, the kids can always practice singing the song while doing the word search if you want. (I call this a good lesson plan for a sub, as the music expert, I personally wouldn't waste music time working on non-musical elements like this - just my opinion.)
