Music – 2nd Level: BBC Ten Pieces – Connect It – Lesson 3 (Canon)

Experiences and Outcomes:
I can sing and play music from a range of styles and cultures, showing skill and using performance directions and/or musical notation. EXA 2-16a

I can use my voice, musical instruments and music technology to experiment with sounds, pitch, melody, rhythm, timbre and dynamics. EXA 2-17a

Inspired by a range of stimuli and working on my own and/or with others, I can express and communicate my ideas, thoughts and feelings through musical activities. EXA 2-18a

I have listened to a range of music and can respond by discussing my thoughts and feelings. I can give and accept constructive comment on my own and others’ work. EXA 2-19a

Lesson Outcomes
After this lesson, pupils will be able to:

  • Listen and reflect on a piece of orchestral music
  • Invent their own musical motifs and structure them into a piece
  • Perform as an ensemble
  • Learn musical language appropriate to the task

Curriculum Checklist
Learners will:

  • Play and perform in ensemble contexts, using voices and playing musical instruments
  • Improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the interrelated dimensions of music
  • Listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory

Activities

Warm up. To get some energy into the room, challenge your groups to remember their ‘name-motifs’ from last week and perform them whilst travelling across the room so you create a mad, swirling carnival of ideas.

Ask your children if they can remember what a ‘canon’ is. If they can’t, demonstrate by either singing a canon or round they all know (Frere Jacques or London’s Burning perhaps), or using one of their motifs.

I.e. teach one of their longer motifs to the whole circle, start one side of the circle and ask them to loop it, start the other side halfway through.

Ask your class to suggest ways they could use their motifs to make a bigger piece and make a quick list of suggestions on the board. They might say things such as:

  • Make a canon
  • Make a Mexican wave (this is just a canon with the parts entering very quickly after each other)
  • Fragment the motif (break it up into separate sounds again)
  • Repetition
  • Overlap two motifs
  • Perform ideas backwards
  • Build up from one sound, adding a new sound each repeat until you have the full idea
  • Add rhythm

Split back into your groups and ask each group to make a short piece using their motif, other motifs and perhaps borrowing from the Meredith motifs they learnt in lesson 1. They must use at least one of the ideas on the list above.

Bring the class back together and hear each group one by one. Give gentle feedback.

Finish the lesson by encouraging each team to write down what they have done.

Additional resources and a more detailed lesson plan can be found here on the BBC Ten Pieces website;
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/ten-pieces/KS2-anna-meredith-connect-it/zhyyb82