Classroom composing is a lot of work, but it is tremendously rewarding for students and for teachers. The learning and skill development that attends composing efforts can make the addition of composing activities to a music classroom both useful and enjoyable. In this article, the author provides five steps for leading students in classroom composing: (1) Set learning goals for each activity, and share them with students; (2) Model composing before the students try it; (3) Practice individual steps in the process before giving students more complex composing tasks; (4) Scaffold early composing tasks to help students develop their composing and collaborative skills; and (5) Always have the students perform their compositions for each other and discuss their decisions so they can learn from each other. (Contains 3 figures.)