Today was our last dance and music workshops, our last integrated arts workshops for the year.
In dance, we rehearsed our whole section dance routine in preparation to have our dance filmed that same day. I believe this task went well but everybody in the section seemed to be quite nervous and, almost, embarrassed. Although I have a dance background, I don’t think I have been this nervous for a dance routine, especially one as simple as the one we are performing. With these nerves, I am able to understand how a young pupil might feel having to perform a dance. Performing a dance is part of the Scottish Curriculum, it usually is an enjoyable subject to teach and learn but some pupils may experience a lot of nerves and as a future teacher, I need to be supportive and understanding of this. After performing and having our dance filmed, we were to evaluate our performance using three starts and a wish to identify things that had went well and anything that could be improved upon. This method of evaluation can be used in other subjects within the curriculum: literacy, drama, and social subjects just to name a few.
In music we focused on learning how to play the ukulele. Firstly, we learned the historic background of then instrument and then we had a chance to learn six chords on the instrument. With these six chords, we played along to a select few songs to get used to playing the ukulele. We then went onto use 4 chords to have the ability to play along to the famous Christmas song, ‘Last Christmas’. I found this experience very enjoyable, as did my peers. Personally, I have never played or even held a ukulele before so this was a new experience for me. Julie explained how ukulele’s are extremely accessible in schools and are fairly cheap if need to be bought. Knowing this information, I might introduce the fun instrument of the ukulele within my class.
Overall, this module has been extremely helpful, insightful and has changed my perspective of how important that expressive arts within the Scottish Curriculum. I believed that the expressive arts and the subjects associated with the expressive arts should be valued as just as important as subjects like numeracy and literacy. As a future educator, I will aim to ensure that my pupils have a fair and valuable experience of the expressive arts. I will also allow my pupils to explore their creativity as much as I can.
