I have thoroughly enjoyed the Integrated Arts module, and I have taken a great deal from it. I feel that, even though I was already comfortable with the arts, I am now willing to integrate it into other subjects in the classroom. Being a visual and pro-active learner myself, I definitely see the benefits of being creative in your teaching and in the children’s learning as it suits various learning styles.

I have also admired the lecturers’ passion and enthusiasm for drama, art, dance and music as it is very engaging and believable, and I hope to be able to reflect this teaching  in schools.

I hope to be able to continue with my passion for the arts in the upcoming ‘Expressive Arts and Culture’ module and in the future. I now feel happy with teaching each area of the expressive arts and I look forward to developing my skills further.

Music

“Music has a power of forming the character and should therefore be introduced into the education of the young”(DfE, 2011).

In this final session of the Integrated Arts module, the lecturer made it Christmassy and fun. We firstly discussed a few technical music terms and looked again at music notes and vocabulary before allowing us to use the instruments. I liked the fact that we got to choose which instrument to play, and I feel that children would like this too as it gives them a say and lets them choose which kind of instrument that they would like to try.

I chose the keyboard firstly as I find it a very enjoyable instrument to play. We played along to ‘Last Christmas’ as a class which was festive and enjoyable. I then switched instruments and played guitar, as I play guitar at home. Playing the tune altogether as a class tested our timing and teamwork and I feel that it gave us something to be proud of at the end.

Department for Education (2011) The Importance of Music- A National Plan for Music Education. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/180973/DFE-00086-2011.pdf (Accessed: 7 January 2017).

Music

“Children learn first to perform simple songs through listening to and imitating others. Young children also enjoy improvising their own chants and tunes on homemade instruments, musical toys or ‘found’ sound sources” (Council, 1999).

In music, we watched a TEDx  video of a young man talking about and demonstrating beatboxing.

(TEDx Talks, 2013).

This is an incredible video that shows that music does not need to come from a musical instrument or through a song. There are endless amounts of sounds that can come from the voice. I feel that this could definitely be integrated into classroom arts programmes.

Art

“Arts education refers to education in the disciplines of music, dance, theatre, and visual arts. Study in the arts is integral to our society” (Bryant, 2016).

Today’s art workshop consisted of using visual art cards. These cards had an image on one side and related explanations on the other. Below is the card that I got given:

Before reading the explanation on the back we were to observe the image and consider the following points:

The purpose of this activity was to consider all aspects of the image, how it makes you feel and what it says to you. I feel that this is a crucial skill that children need to develop, particularly in today’s generation where everything is instantly available to us.

The information on the back of the cards gave a small variety of possible explanations and feelings relating to the image. I like art, and particularly this exercise, as there is no correct answer and this allows children to express how the images make them feel as an individual.

TEDx Talks (2013) Beatbox brilliance | Tom thum | TEDxSydney. Available at: https://youtu.be/GNZBSZD16cY (Accessed: 2 January 2017).

Council, N. (1999) Music: Arts education. Dublin: Stationery Office.

Bryant, B. (2016) The importance of fine arts education. Available at: http://www.katyisd.org/dept/finearts/Pages/The-Importance-of-Fine-Arts-Education-.aspx (Accessed: 2 January 2017).

“Creating art is a fine way for children to make choices and solve problems. Every step involves making a decision: what color to use, how to make a line, what size to make something. With every choice the object becomes more and more their own” (Staff, 2011).

https://childdevelopmentinfo.com/learning/multiple_intelligences/the-importance-of-the-creative-arts-for-children-and-teens/#.WGe7CoXXLug

I enjoyed reading this article as it is from the point of view of a teacher, and why they found creativity vital to the classroom learning.

Staff, P.T. (2011) The importance of the creative arts for children and teens. Available at: https://childdevelopmentinfo.com/learning/multiple_intelligences/the-importance-of-the-creative-arts-for-children-and-teens/#.WGe7CoXXLug (Accessed: 31 December 2016).

Music

“In primary schools, one in every three girls was participating in extra-curricular music, compared with one in every seven boys. In secondary schools, only 6% of students with disabilities or special educational needs were involved in additional instrumental or vocal tuition, compared to 14% of students without these needs” (Ofsted, 2012).

This week in music we were back in the Mac lab. We were exploring the programme “Charanga” (Charanga, 2016). Charanga is an interactive and informative website resource that benefits both the teacher and the pupil. There are endless numbers of activities and worksheets that can help the children develop their music skills and knowledge.

There are pages that suit every level of the primary school which is extremely beneficial for progression, and a huge variety of song style that could be suited to topics and other curricular areas. We looked at Mamma Mia sheet music, sang the song as a class, then explored the various activities individually.

The reason why I liked this programme so much was that it provided assistance and lesson plans for the teacher. This is particularly helpful for me as I have a limited knowledge of music, so some assistance and inspiration is extremely useful.

For me, I feel like I learned a lot from this programme and that technology plays such an important role in the classroom in the present day and offers endless learning opportunities.

Art

“So the relationship between the two volumes is a balance between the educational need for continuity… and the recognition that these children may still be working at a level more appropriate to younger children, particularly if they have not been introduced to this way of thinking about art before” (Start magazine – teaching art in primary schools, no date).

Today’s art workshop was heavily inspired by the famous tenements painting by the Glaswegian artist Avril Paton. Her painting called “Windows in the West” shows the intimate lives of those living in tenement housing across from her flat in Glasgow.

(Glasgow Museums, 2011)

The stimulus for the workshop was to take inspiration from the painting and photographs of tenement houses. We then, using polystyrene, designed our own outline of a tenement building before using the template to print on paper.

We rolled coloured ink onto coloured paper of our choice, before printing and lifting the design leaving a mono-print picture.

I thoroughly enjoyed this workshop and also learned about the history of Glasgow, the artist Avril Paton and using the media for printing. I feel that this is a simple, fairly quick activity that could be integrated with various other curricular areas.

Ofsted (2012) Music in schools: Wider still, and wider. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/music-in-schools (Accessed: 16 December 2016).

Start magazine – teaching art in primary schools (no date) Available at: http://www.arteducation.co.uk/art_books.html (Accessed: 16 December 2016).

Glasgow Museums (2011) Avril Paton on ‘windows in the west’ at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and museum, Glasgow. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVDRL6wsQYU (Accessed: 17 December 2016).

Charanga (2016) Primary music curriculum, secondary & instrumental music. Available at: http://charanga.com/site/ (Accessed: 21 December 2016).

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=bVv-_x-f3dIC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA3#v=onepage&q&f=false

I thoroughly enjoyed this book by Charles Fowler and felt that it highlighted the strong importance for expressive arts in the curriculum.

Fowler, C. (1996) Strong arts, strong schools: The promising potential and shortsighted .. Available at: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=bVv-_x-f3dIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false (Accessed: 21 December 2016).

Music

“The most effective schools recognised that regular, sustained experiences were essential to secure good musical progress. Schools where curriculum provision was weaker showed limited understanding about musical progression or did not give enough time for music” (Ofsted, 2012).

 This week, we had our music lesson in the computer lab exploring the programme ‘Garageband’ on the Apple Macs (Inc, 2016). This programme is equipped with ‘a complete sound library that includes software instruments, presets for guitar and voice, and virtual session drummers’ (Inc, 2016). This, I feel, allows the children to be innovative and expressive through technology, but learning new musical skills at the same time. We tried and tested the various instruments and technologies before creating our own 32-count tunes.

https://1drv.ms/i/s!AnNTHzvgMm8cgSRMjtDcIaHSeDMM

This is a video from a school exploring Garageband and I think that when everyone puts their sections together to create a final piece it gives them something to be proud of.

Drama

“adopt a variety of drama skills to win the attention and interest of our students, to convey information effectively to our diverse and demanding ‘audience’” (Schoolzone, 2015).

Today’s main task in the drama session was micro-teaching. We did this micro-teaching in groups with the stimulus of a children’s book. The book that we chose was ‘Beside Myself’ which was about twins that swap identities. We felt that this was a good choice of book as there are two strong characters and a strong story-line that many themes can be taken from.

Our micro teaching consisted of  partner and class activities. The partner work was for the pair to act as their partners and mimic their mannerisms, speech and aspects that make them individual. This made participants consider all aspects of their partner’s personality and traits. This activity would work with all stages of the primary school, however, it is probably most effective with upper-primary school as they are more observant and aware of people.

The second activity was a thought tunnel with the whole group. The purpose of the thought tunnel was to consider how they would feel if their identity was swapped for another. We got a variation of good describing words and thoughts in this activity and I feel that this activity could also be done with a wide scope of age groups.

After our micro-teaching, we took part in other groups’ activities which varied from a Harry Potter stimulus, to The Gruffalo, and the activities ranged from freeze-frames to monologues. It was interesting from both a learner’s point of view and as a student teacher to take part in all of the drama activities.

Inc, A. (2016) GarageBand for Mac.Incredible music. In the key of easy. Available at: http://www.apple.com/uk/mac/garageband/ (Accessed: 17 November 2016).

Ofsted (2012) Music in schools: Wider still, and wider. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/music-in-schools (Accessed: 22 November 2016).

Schoolzone (2015) Schoolzone: Using drama skills in the classroom. Available at: http://www.schoolzone.co.uk/resources/articles/GoodPractice/classroom/Drama_skills.asp (Accessed: 17 November 2016).

Music

‘…pupils worked together with their older peers, sharing music, learning from one another and, through the universal language of music, they were able to make an instant and meaningful connection’ (Council, 2016).

Music this week was extremely rewarding. We got a visit from children and teachers from a primary school in Ayrshire. These children were involved in a programme called the ‘Strings Project’ which involved them all choosing and learning a string instrument as a class and creating a class orchestra. These children have been involved in incredible experiences through this project such as performing for royalty and along side well-known musicians. This kind of experiences will stick with children for the rest of their lives and hopefully encourage them to get involved in similar projects.

The part that we played in the session was to learn how to play a string instrument with the child being our teacher. This was very rewarding and was useful to learn a new skill alongside the children and from the capable hands of the children. I learned the viola and a girl helped me with the handling and the basic notes. We then, as a class, played the notes together which was a great experience.

In learning from the pupils’ point of view and listening to their class teachers, I can see the definite benefit in projects like the String Project. They appeared to be more calm in class, worked better together and had better concentration. The pupils were able to take pride in their progression and the fact that they have created an incredible project as a class.

Drama

‘Besides being “fun” learning experiences for children, drama and movement have proven to assist with developing decoding skills, fluency, vocabulary, syntactic knowledge, discourse knowledge and metacognitive thinking’ (Rieg and Paquette, 2009).

Today we looked at integrating drama into other subjects, and today we looked at literacy. We used the story ‘The Tunnel’ by Anthony Browne as a stimulus. This story has endless possibilities for drama with numerous themes and issues, but the theme that I felt was the main one in this story was the aspect of not making judgements of someone. The brother and sister, Jack and Rose, are extremely different and the strong characterisation in the book allows the siblings to be a perfect starting point to analyse  for a drama.

We used the story to create freeze-frames, thought tunnels and other drama techniques in order to reflect the chracters’ thoughts and feelings. We also drew out an outline of either Jack or Rose before writing words to describe their feelings on the inside of the person, and the way others perceive them on the outside of the drawing of the person. This allowed us to consider the way the character feels in contrast to the way others think that they feel and this could definitely be a strong theme in the classroom to prevent bullying and other issues. As we progressed through the story and got to know the main characters more, we were able to make our own opinions  which I also feel is important for a child to do.

“Peregoy and Boyle (2008) suggested that acting out stories and events is a highly motivating approach for students to process and to share information”  (Rieg and Paquette, 2009), therefore I feel that linking the drama elements into the literacy or vice versa enables the children to have a more engaging experience and better understanding. I would definitely use this method of learning in the future and feel the use of drama is very beneficial across the curriculum.

(Google images, no date)

Council, E.A. (2016) School’s musical visit strikes the right chords at Greenmill primary – east Ayrshire council news. Available at: https://www.east-ayrshire.gov.uk/News/article/schools-musical-visit-strikes-the-right-chords-at-greenmill-primary (Accessed: 10 November 2016).

Google images (no date) Available at: https://www.google.co.uk/imghp?hl=en&tab=wi&ei=vHQtWKeUI4XlUqrqpfgC&ved=0EKouCBYoAQ (Accessed: 16 December 2016).

Rieg, S.A. and Paquette, K.R. (2009) – document – using drama and movement to enhance English language learners’ literacy development. Available at: http://go.galegroup.com/ps/anonymous?id=GALE%7CA204682056&sid=googleScholar&v=2.1&it=r&linkaccess=fulltext&issn=00941956&p=AONE&sw=w&authCount=1&isAnonymousEntry=true (Accessed: 17 November 2016).

Dance

“Children are recognised for their individual perspectives, learning styles, and abilities to l earn and create dance movements”(Cone and Cone, 2004).

This week was our final session of dance. As a continuation and closure to the previous weeks, we carried on and finished our dance. Today, we put the whole routine together and made a 5 minute dance as a whole class. This involved adding our individual group dances together with the collective class one.  In doing this, it gave us a feeling of achievement as we had created this piece ourselves, which I feel children could take great pride in doing. The fact that it would be ‘child-centred ideas’ I feel would be much more effective in a dance session than simply using a routine that had been pre-planned by the teacher because it puts all focus on the child’s imagination and creativity (Fleming, 2012).

As the teacher, this is a flexible project that could be done under a time-constraint of only 3 or 4 sessions and could be linked with any topic that is studied in the classroom. The only work that is really done by the teacher in this situation is supervising and possibly dealing with technical issues like spacing, timing and performance. Then, above all, it is about a child’s cognitive development and to enjoy the learning process as they develop. “It is therefore important that all teachers and educators look for opportunities within their own teaching approaches for interdisciplinary learning and to foster partnerships with professional arts companies, creative adults and cultural organisations” as this experience can bring a whole new light to a child’s learning (Experiences and outcomes – how is the curriculum organised? – learning and teaching, no date). I feel that the dance sessions have really opened my eyes to the prospect of integrating it into the classroom and has made me more confident in leading it.

Music   

“Making music involves more than the voice or fingers playing an instrument; a child learning about music has to tap into multiple skill sets, often simultaneously” (jewjd, 2012).

Music this week was introducing instruments and some technical music concepts to do with rhythm. I don’t have much knowledge or experience with music notes, but I found this easy and fun to do.  We looked at various music notes including semi- quavers, rests, crotchets and minims . Once we knew how many beats each note was worth, we clapped out the rhythms that the notes made.  We then got out the glockenspiels and individually improvised to the song ‘Hit the Road Jack’ using only notes  C, D, E, G and A for 30 counts in front of the class. This activity was daunting to do in front of the class but because there was no wrong way to play, I feel that everyone was fairly comfortable which would be good for the classroom. It is definitely becoming more apparent to me since beginning this module that music in school is more than just tapping out a tune on the keyboard, it is developing a whole range of life and cross-curricular skills that you don’t always gain from other subjects.

Cone, T.P. and Cone, S.L. (2004) Teaching children dance. 2nd edn. Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics Publishers.

Experiences and outcomes – how is the curriculum organised? – learning and teaching (no date) Available at: http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/learningandteaching/thecurriculum/howisthecurriculumorganised/experiencesandoutcomes/ (Accessed: 29 October 2016

Fleming, M. (2012) The arts in education: An introduction to aesthetics, theory and pedagogy. London, United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis.

jewjd (2012) The benefits of music education. Available at: http://www.pbs.org/parents/education/music-arts/the-benefits-of-music-education/ (Accessed: 5 November 2016).

Art

“Integrating Art + Design into STEM education promotes critical thinking, a key 21st century skill” (STEAM, 2016).

Today we had the pleasure of having a guest speaker Isobel Laird from the council to give us her insight into integrating art in the classroom. She began by displaying various pieces of artwork from various stages of learning and various materials. I found this interesting as it allowed me to see the endless amounts of ways that art can be incorporated into the curriculum.  I also learned that one art project can last for up to 6-8 weeks and does not have to be a single piece of work, it would be fine art, design, photography etc. all merged into the one project.

In the workshop, Isobel guided us through a step-by-step collage that could be completed over a series of a few weeks in a school. Each stage was simple and could be done and adapted with early level all the way up to second level. Firstly, we completed a continuous line drawing of a washing line onto a small piece of paper. All that was needed for this part was a pen and paper. This was both fun and challenging as you were to keep the pen flowing on the paper without lifting it off and creating the washing was enjoyable.

We then, with water colour paint, filled in and designed our washing.

The next part consisted of choosing an A4 piece of paper and designing a wall with the limited poster paints given. This forced us to fix colours and be experimental. We were also provided with some photographs of various styles of wall to gain inspiration from.

After this, we completely covered a larger piece of paper with a wash of  colours of our choice. Isobel instructed us to sprinkle salt onto our paintings which, once dried, would give a textured effect.

Once dried, we ripped this painted paper into several strips and created a skyline from it. We then pieced our creation together, tearing and sticking our wall down and cutting and sticking the washing line on top.

This project would enable each child to have a completely different collage by the end of the project which would give them a sense of pride and achievement. This whole idea was taken from a stimulus of a photograph in a book of a washing line, wall and landscape, so it is clear that you can begin a project from any kind of stimulus and end up with something unique.

This project could be developed over a period of 4-6 weeks depending on the age group, but is multimodal, enjoyable and certainly not hugely difficult to teach. I do, however feel that it is vital that teachers allow the children to be as expressive and unique as they feel necessary. Rachel Mason explains that a student quoted the following about art: “I like it better at home and I don’t have to do what I’m told, what and where and how”(Edited, 2004). This backs up the way I feel that our job as the teacher is not to get a child to copy or plagiarise in art,  it is to inspire and guide them to be as imaginative and expressive as they like through the use of a stimulus or technique.

Drama

“Though many classroom teachers do not have a drama teacher on staff to collaborate with, drama is a really natural place to begin arts integration, regardless of your experience (or lack thereof) in theatre arts”(Gidcumb, 2014).

In this week’s session we discussed various ways to use drama in the classroom. These are the different styles:

Andrew briefly went through activities that can be used for each one of these teaching methods. The styles that I enjoyed the most were still image and forum theatre. I feel that still image could be used with any age group and with any topic/stimulus. Forum theatre was a new concept to me but I thoroughly enjoyed the interaction between the focal character and the audience. I feel that this can allow children to be pushed and be the main character if they want the chance or if there are pupils that would prefer to be the audience interacting, you as the teacher can ‘be in role’.

I also feel that styles like thought tunnel can be used in a number of ways for different subjects and stimulus’s.  “Theatre arts promote creativity in problem solving. Theatre stretches perspective by giving students opportunities to reflect on behaviors, situations, and personalities in the context of a drama. Drama allows students to demonstrate deep understanding of pieces of literature”(Gidcumb, 2014). I believe that for children who maybe struggle to show or convey emotion or that have troubled backgrounds may be able to portray their feelings and stories through some of these styles of drama.

Edited, R.H. (2004) Art Education 11-18: Meaning, purpose and direction. Edited by Richard Hickman. 2nd edn. London: Continuum International Publishing Group.

Gidcumb, B. (2014) Integrating drama in the elementary classroom: Where do I start? Available at: https://educationcloset.com/2014/08/01/integrating-drama-in-the-elementary-classroom-where-do-i-start/ (Accessed: 29 October 2016).

STEAM, S. to (2016) Take action. Available at: http://stemtosteam.org/take-action/ (Accessed: 29 October 2016).