Week 9 – Drama and Music

In this week’s drama inputs we continued to look at some more drama conventions that we could use in the classroom such as:

• Flash Back
• Flash Forward
• Narration
• Slow Motion

Due to the time of the year, we used these various drama conventions and

techniques to the theme of a haunted house where we were split into groups and tasked with acting out a scene.  This was an enjoyable task as it allowed each member of the group to collaborate their own ideas alongside improving our confidence when performing in front of our peers.  As well as this, we looked at the concept of ‘Forum Theatre’ which was founded by Augusto Boal.  This concept is when members of the audience are able to raise their hands and express their own thoughts on the ways in which the drama could be changed or improved.  Despite this approach working well during the workshop with our peers, this may not be suitable to use within a classroom as children may take the feedback as negative criticism.  Therefore, as educators, it is vital that we teach children to be able to receive feedback and use it as a positive to better themselves.  In this case, a forum theatre would be beneficial within a classroom as it allows children to adapt themselves and grow their experience through learning about new ways to do things.  It is important that we as educators let children know that their input and ideas could essentially better themselves as well as their peers.  There are various experiences and outcomes within the Curriculum for Excellence framework that could relate to these tasks such as: “I have developed confidence and skills in creating and presenting drama which explores real and imaginary situations, using improvisation and script. EXA 1-14a” (Scottish Government, 2017).

In the music workshop, we focused our time on the importance of the voice within music.  A teachers voice is one of the most powerful things that they have as it is their primary way of communication therefore it is essential that we look after our voices.  During the input we looked at advice from the British Voice Association regarding how we can take care of our voices.  Whilst looking at this information I found out that it is essential that we take care of our voices and we must ensure that we warm up our voice at the beginning of the day in order to prevent any strains (BVA, 2017). We were then able to take part in various voice warm up exercises using the music resource “Choon Baboon”.  Due to this resource being created in Scotland, it corresponds very well with the framework within the Curriculum for Excellence.  This is a fantastic resource for educators who may not feel confident teaching music as it provides them with all of the guidance and help that they may need.  This lesson could be easily replicated within the classroom as it was interactive and allows all of the children to engage in the activities.

Towards the end of todays music workshop we split up into groups and created our own music through a Graphic Score.  My group chose to make music to the theme of a rain dance.  To do this, we selected our own instruments and created the sounds: bang, trickle, ting, clap and rumble.  The Graphic Score would be a good resource to use within a classroom as it is an easy way for children to follow music as well as compose it themselves without having to have prior knowledge of reading music.

References

The British Voice Association (2017). About the Association. [Online] Available: http://www.britishvoiceassociation.org.uk/about.htm [Accessed: 13 December 2017].