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Music was a popular theme in the first year of Endeavour.  Three girls worked on different projects that built on existing skills they had in learning musical instruments, but increased the level of challenge.  They were all keen on careers in the music industry.  These projects exemplify the different levels of success that can occur with Endeavour, and highlights some of the challenge children face.

A P7 girl who played the tin whistle and piano wanted to write and record her own song as a music video.  She successfully researched different types of music and styles and along with the other two performers contacted the High School music teacher who kindly came in on several weeks during his free periods to support them in their Endeavours.  However she struggled to compose the music she wanted because her level of understanding of music was not high enough.  She instead focused more on improving her skills at the piano and composing a simple tune, and was happy at the end with what she achieved.

A P6 girl who was learning to play the piano decided she would compose, play and record her own piece of Scottish piano music. She learned the different types of tune and learned to play examples of each before composing a simple tune of her own.  She was more successful as her Endeavour was less ambitious and in line with her skill set.

Another P7 girl who was learning the accordion and was an accomplished Highland Dancer wanted to compose a piece of Scottish music for her accordion which she would record and then invent her own dance to go with the music which she would then video.  She was able to learn a suitable tune, but composing and creating a new dance were more challenging.  In the end she used an existing tune which she then learned to play and created a dance with steps to fit the tune before recording it as a video, dancing and playing-although not simultaneously!  She was applying new skills of combining her talents and videoing them, and you can see the finished video below.

A Scottish Performance By Emily Logan from Jo Clark on Vimeo.

Another one of the projects from 2013 was carried out by a Primary 6 boy who was interested in wilderness survival and wanted to take up Kayaking, as there is a local club on Islay.  He planned to carry out a kayaking expedition to Jura, the neighbouring Island, with his dad.

There were a lot of challenging skills to be learned for this project which involved careful planning.  After he organised a meeting with a local coastguard he encountered his first problem; the currents between Islay and Jura are too strong to safely Kayak.  He then altered his plans to make the trip to one of the small uninhabited islands off the coast of Islay.  Attending Kayak club weekly with his father he built up his skills, and in school he used maps to prepare his route, learning about tides and prevailing winds.  Using examples from his father’s work he made his own risk assessments that included detailed plans of what to do in an emergency.  He finally took the trip to Texa island, camping overnight and successfully concluded his Endeavour.  Motivated by his interest in the project, this learner was successfully able to apply new skills in a meaningful context, and although the project was not directly related to a future career, the skills he developed would be useful in any career path he might choose.  He even recorded his endeavours in a blog: http://1kidskayakingadventer.blogspot.co.uk/

In the first year of Endeavour there was some trepidation as to whether the project could work.  To me the key to the success of Endeavour was children working independently and being challenged.   This meant support of planning and monitoring of progress but not having adults do the project for the children; support from home was purely in providing opportunities and resources.  I did not want children coming in to school with lovely posters or models that their parents had spent hours preparing for them.  I also needed children to take on tasks that challenged them suitably through developing new skills and knowledge- they had to come across problems and find solutions and if that wasn’t happening then the project was not challenging enough.

SHEEP

In the first year of Endeavour one of the outstanding projects was a documentary on sheep farming which was made my a primary 7 girl who lived on a farm.  In order to make the project challenging she had to do more than present what she already knew about farming in a powerpoint.   She decided to create a documentary on a year in the life of a sheep farmer, and her key new skills were learning how to make a documentary film.  After analyzing some David Attenborough documentaries she was able to plan how her film would look using a storyboard.

At each stage in the sheep farming cycle she would film the process on the farm and then bring the video into school to edit and add narration.  She recorded every stage of the process; from her lambing a sheep to selling her own sheep at the local auction mart, for which she was given the morning out of school.  She even organised a visit to the abattoir with the local Vet, and filmed the final stage of the process, with the vet showing her the anatomy of the sheep.  This part of the filming process was not included in the final cut for viewing audiences however!  She also identified key areas of knowledge she would need as a sheep farmer, such as diseases and official record keeping, and researched these often challenging areas very successfully.  The final film was a big hit at the Endeavour presentation to parents and was a true reflection of the hard work and independent learning involved.  Although supported by her parents in accessing resources, the work was all her own, and an excellent example of how Endeavour can work well.

You can see the video below:

SHEEPS YEAR from Jo Clark on Vimeo.