Music In The Classroom

Primary Assembly: Sounds of Music

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 12:21:44 +0100

Resources
It will be useful to have access to this web page:

Songs and clips of the film, or a workshop to mix your own video clips using a choice of music, stills and graphics, are available from the High School Musical website.

Introduction

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Supporting pupils with SEN in music

sara — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 12:21:40 +0100
Support for SENCOs

Music across the curriculum

Music to 'settle' children entering the hall for assembly is now used in many schools to good effect and can significantly reduce incidences of low-level disruption on such occasions. Teachers have also found it useful as a calming influence in some classrooms and though it certainly can't be claimed to be a 'cure-all', it's certainly worth a try in this respect.

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Enrichment Activities: Listening and Citizenship

sara — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 12:21:39 +0100
This week's primary enrichment activity gets pupils to think about sounds, using the example of scientists who are recording the noises from under the ice shelf in the Antarctic sea.

This week's secondary enrichment activity uses the example of a pensioner who has successfully put up a roadblock on his street, to get pupils to consider community and citizenship.

***Primary Enrichment***

KS2: Listening, and applying knowledge and understanding

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Enrichment Activities: representation and recycling

sara — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 12:21:37 +0100
This week's primary enrichment activity draws on the recent news of a missing fishing net. Using this as the inspiration, pupils have to design a dance to represent the net, encouraging pupils to think about the different elements of creative representation.

This week's secondary enrichment activity uses two examples of houses built from recycled materials. Getting pupils to think about waste reduction and innovative ways to use recycled materials effectively.

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Music as a learning aid

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:21:01 +0100

Reports in the press and books such as The Mozart Effect by Don Campbell (2001) have popularised the idea that music can have beneficial effects upon learning. They have claimed that listening to certain types of music may enhance thinking skills, or create an appropriate mood, or climate, for effective learning to take place.
Meanwhile, serious attempts to establish clear and objective links between listening to music and the enhancement of learning in general have been undertaken by Shaw (2000) and others.
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Making music with SEN pupils

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:59 +0100

Are we experiencing something of a musical renaissance in our schools? According to the government, yes! And there are some impressive spending figures to support this view. Twenty years ago the introduction of the Education Reform Act led to instrumental lessons and group musical activities being labelled ‘non-essential’. With the delegation of funding under LMS (local management of schools) schools could choose to buy back these services or spend the money elsewhere.
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Free concert tickets for budding music critics with Bachtrack

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:54 +0100
Are you keen to encourage a deeper appreciation of classical music in your pupils, and at the same time develop their literacy skills?

Bachtrack, an informative website for classical music lovers, is challenging young people aged between 12 and 16 to review a classical concert or opera, by giving away free tickets to performances around the country. The finished review will be published on www.bachtrack.com.

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A different approach: teaching through the arts

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:54 +0100
Gallions Primary School opened in September 1999 on the Winsor Park Estate in the London Borough of Newham. Nearly all the children who came to the school did so because they had failed at their previous schools. They were disillusioned with the concept of education. We had to reverse their expectation.

Curriculum

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Funding for music in school

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:51 +0100

Youth Music is a UK-wide charity set up in 1999 to provide high-quality and diverse music-making opportunities for 0- to 18-year-olds. Its focus is on young people living in areas of social and economic need who might otherwise lack opportunity. It has three specific roles: a funder, development agency and advocate.
Its aim is to establish a music-making legacy that fulfils the following objectives:
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Encouraging musical creativity in the early years

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:35 +0100

Small children spend much of their time playing and most have no fears about the challenge facing them as they set about painting a picture or modelling with play dough. Children are equally at home when improvising their own songs and playing with musical instruments, although putting them in the spotlight without first preparing the ground can turn a budding composer into a shrinking violet. Before they can make their own music, children need to have some experience of rhythm, pitch, dynamics, tempo and timbre and this they acquire by interacting musically with adults.
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Soundtracks for concentrating

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:30 +0100

Brain-based learning expert Eric Jensen has found that only 10% of learners prefer to study in total silence. That leaves 90% who prefer some background sounds. In my work with adult learners I find that the 10% are used to getting their way and seem surprised when I suggest background music while they and their colleagues work. My own impressions are that Jensen is about right – the majority seem to work well on their own with some kind of musical accompaniment.
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Soundtracks for creativity

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:27 +0100

A few years ago, a study by Susan Hallam of Oxford Brookes Unviersity concluded that suitable music could aid creative writing in school. 54 pupils aged 9 to 11 were divided into three groups and were asked to write an exciting story. Each group did so with different musical accompaniment – exciting music, calming music and no music. The results were compared and the calming music produced better stories than either no music or exciting music.
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Soundtracks for learning review

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:26 +0100

The purpose of concert review is to allow learners to review the content of your lessons for a few moments at the end, whilst slow, steady and relaxing music is played in the background.
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Music Manifesto - the state of play

ewtemp — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:20 +0100

On 16 and 17 January, 2007, the Music Manifesto State of Play conference took place at the Roundhouse in the London borough of Camden. Over 1,000 music professionals, students, educators, administrators and policy makers attended the festival-style event and representatives from all over the country were able to exchange ideas and approaches to music education with the aid of performances, demonstrations, forums and practical learning experiences.

Manifesto update
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Musical concepts and elements

ewtemp — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:19 +0100

The curriculum for creative development in the Foundation Stage and music in Key Stage 1 includes a requirement to teach children about musical concepts and elements. Young children will find pitch, dynamics and tempo the easiest to understand and when these have begun to be explored, duration, timbre, texture and structure can be introduced. At first glance it seems like a pretty tall order, but the process is made very much simpler if you apply some of the basic principles of teaching.
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Singing your way to PSHE goals

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:17 +0100

One of the best ways for young people to express their creativity, meet new friends and develop a range of skills is to join a choir. This is a pursuit that knows no age, gender, economic, geographical or social boundaries, and one which offers considerable benefits. No specialised equipment is required, costs are low, and choirs for all types of music – jazz, classical, pop, folk, musical theatre – are in operation all over the country. There is wide support for tutors regarding choir networking and special singing ventures.
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Laying plans for better music provision

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:12 +0100

The Music Manifesto was set up by the government in 2004 when prominent individuals in the music industry and education were brought together to generate ideas for promoting music education.
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Singing in tune

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:08 +0100

Children that arrive in the nursery already able to sing in tune, and with some awareness of musical pulse, are those who have been exposed to the right kind of musical experiences. These may be many and varied but will certainly have included singing, being sung to and probably bounced up and down on somebody’s knee.
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How music can promote wellbeing

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:08 +0100

Music is now more widely available than ever before in human history. Young and old are constantly accompanied by their personal music players. Public spaces are filled with ambient sound and homes are dominated by electronic transmission devices. How does this music influence our emotions, moods and behaviour?

Physiological effects

Music is known to affect a listener in many different ways:
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Planning for participation

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:06 +0100

Rhymes, songs and singing games are valuable tools to enhance learning across the whole curriculum, and to support children’s social and emotional development, but that is only part of the story. We also have a duty to plan sessions that will enable the children in our care to develop their musical skills.

It goes without saying that music sessions should be fun, but for planning to be really effective, there are three basic principals to keep in mind:
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Radio and the early years

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:02 +0100

The alarming decline in the communication skills of children in recent years seems paradoxically linked to the rise and rise of our screen and keyboard culture. The faster our children can connect with each other electronically the less they seem able to communicate one-to-one.
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Making music matter

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:58 +0100

NS: What kind of music education is best suited to early years settings?

LD: In early years, I don’t believe you can separate music from dance. To be really effective it has to be a physical thing, using the whole body. Keeping a steady pulse isn’t just a matter of clapping your hands together, you need to feel it in your heart.

NS: But aren’t a lot of parents eager for their children to start learning an instrument as early as possible.
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Music to develop SEAL

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:53 +0100

The new school year brings with it a world of possibilities, opportunities and challenges, both for us and the children in our care. For some, it will be the first year of a long teaching career and for others, the last before a well-earned retirement. This may be the year that brings an Ofsted or early years inspection so maybe now is a good time for a health check. Open wide and sing ahhh... How's your music?

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Soundtracks for visualising

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:52 +0100
Storytelling and reflection can really benefit from a well-chosen musical accompaniment. The music adds to the learners' experience in several ways:

it signals that an important activity is under way

asking pupils to listen to the music gives them something else to do rather than talk

slow-paced and calm music slows the learners' bodies and brains

the emotional qualities of the music help to draw listeners into the story/scene

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Multi-cultural Arts Day at Congleton High School

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:47 +0100

The day involved an experience of the art and music of a different culture. It links with the citizenship scheme of work in which we look at and celebrate diversity. This activity helped to address both the development of citizenship in the whole school development plan and to further embed the awareness of global citizenship within our school community.

Congleton is a small rural Cheshire town that has very little cultural diversity and therefore we felt that it was a particularly enriching experience for our students.
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Scoring with music

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:43 +0100

Music has never been easier to use. For hundreds of years if you wanted music in your home, you had to make it yourself or hire someone in to perform it. Even fifty years ago, gramophone records were mostly 78s, there were a mere three domestic radio stations, recording tape was for professionals only and music in pubs came from the 'old joanna' in the corner.
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Top Tunes for Your Classroom

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:41 +0100
One line of a familiar tune can spark many ideas. Music can be used at any point in the lesson; a thought-provoking starter or a tool to inspire a review. Try musical microphones.Pass a microphone around the class as music plays and when the music stops, the person with the mike has to tell everyone what they have learnt today.

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