Aug 28 2008
Music in East Lothian Primary schools
Next week I will begin delivering Creative Health Cover music workshops in East Lothian Primary schools. This is part of the authority’s Arts Education programme, which covers all creative arts and has proved to be popular in the past.
It’s a slightly new direction for me and one that I think will also provide useful experience. I am a musician in my spare time and have taught both instruments and in the classroom. Leading children through a creative musical experience is a little bit new to me, but I expect it to be fun (and noisy) and am really looking forward to it.
According to the programme notes, the workshops
address the various aspects of healthy living to include exploration of physical and emotional wellbeing, healthy diets and awareness of healthy environments and relationships.
Many of these projects are cross-curricular and readily meet the capacities identified in A Curriculum for Excellence. Some provide an opportunity for incorporating enterprising skills for pupils and for supporting Eco-school development, in addition to Health Promoting Schools Stage 2.
There are two types of workshop that I will be working on, Notes on a Story (P1-3) and Strolling on Song (P4-P7). Here are the details from the programme notes:
Notes on a Story
Using children’s stories with a healthy living theme as a stimulus, pupils will explore the wide timbres and tones of various instruments to create short pieces of programme music to interpret the mood and feelings provoked by the story.
Curriculum areas: Expressive Arts, Music, English, Health and Well-Being
Strolling on Song
Pupils will work with their teacher to identify and research a topic relating to Health and Wellbeing, such as the environment, healthy eating, positive relationships, etc. Then working collaboratively with a professional musician/ songwriter the class will create a new song or piece of programme music to interpret and express their findings and feelings on the matter.
The class will notate, graphic score and/or record their work and if appropriate this can be used by the whole school for assemblies or performance event.
Curriculum areas: English, Environmental Studies, Enterprise, Health and Wellbeing, Music, Art, PSD, Mathematics.
There is a series of three workshops for each class to explore and develop the music. The length of the workshop depends on the age and stage of the children. For example, the workshops next week are with P3 and last for an hour each.
There is a deliberate looseness in the remit to allow flexibility of experiences and outcomes. As well as being a teacher, I am a musician, and it is in this capacity that I will be working. My role is primarily that of a facilitator and not as a teacher, although I anticipate that some teaching element will inevitably arise in order to help make sense of what we are doing. The teachers are expected to remain with the class during the workshops.
I have my plans and structure in place and am prepared to develop or abandon elements of them in order to respond to the needs of the class. It should be good!
(Image courtesy of Omdur at Morguefile)
