Integrated Arts Week 3
This was our third learning week and I could really start to see my confidence grow within particular areas of the arts, especially in music.
We began with a music work shop titled ‘Why Music is Important.’ We covered many areas such as where children can discover musical experiences such as in classes through music lessons, and in the community through live music etc. We then continued on to how children can participate in music. This could be from learning to play an instrument, to learning to listen to music in your free time. As a practitioner, growing up I did feel like you were only ‘musical’ if you played an instrument, so learning that simple skills such as listening contribute to musical participation was comforting to hear. We also then defined a definition of the word repertoire and what key words we related to this. We came up with examples such as playing, listening, and understanding music from other cultures. For our final part of the workshop, we reflected on the power of music. It has been evident that growing up around music and being musically involved from a young age can enhance skills in literacy and numeracy. This is due to reading music explores skills of problem solving and sequencing. This is supported by Hallam (2010) who states: ‘Research on Western classical musicians has shown that long years of active engagement with particular musical activities are associated with an increase in neuronal representation specific for the processing of the tones of the musical scale, the largest cortical representations found in musicians playing instruments for the longest periods of time’ (Pantev et al., 2003). Julie also informed us on music schemes that councils have introduced to encourage musical participation. I further researched into my home authority and found this twitter page called ‘East Renfrewshire Instrumental Music Services’ which gives you daily updates of information on music classes in the community, music opportunities and what is going on in different classrooms involving music. This was very encouraging to see that East Renfrewshire are creating an emphasis on the importance of music in the classroom.
Later we had another music lecture based upon rhythm patterns. We looked at the experience and outcomes from early to second level as we were building our own knowledge of rhythm patterns. First of all we identified key words such as pulse. To make this clearer to what pulse meant musically we were given shape patterns and asked how many syllables were in each shape. For example the square represented one syllable and a circle represented two. We then clapped the rhythms with our hands and were shown how this could be interpreted in an early level lesson. I have the freedom to use my voice, musical instruments and music technology to discover and enjoy playing with sound and rhythm. EXA 0-17a
We then developed further and introduced musical notes. These were then replaced with the shapes. We can clearly see the transition from early years to first level. We used drumsticks to control the rhythm with background music. I can use my voice, musical instruments and music technology to discover and enjoy playing with sound, rhythm, pitch and dynamics. EXA 1-17a
After we had identified the simple musical terms we then advanced into more depth about the beats. For example, how many beats in a bar, adding crotchet rests and minims. It was really clear the jump from first to second level as you had to define the differences in the notes as well as playing them on the correct beat.
Overall, I really enjoyed this workshop. It did take me back to feeling like I was doing a primary music lesson which made it memorable. I really developed my music terminology, sense of rhythm
We then explored drama across the curriculum focusing on freeze frames. We completed a ‘jump in, jump out’ warm up which got our brains active and then reflected on last weeks session. We then discussed how status can be shown in freeze frames through body stance and language. Angela asked us to demonstrate how we would portray a higher status knight, a middle class knight and a poor, troubled knight. We then identified the differences in our body language going from very large open posture making us look confident and intimidating to very crouched and small creating a timid effect. ‘body language is a communication by movement or position, particularly facial expression, gesture and the relatives positions of the speaker and listener’ ( BBCBitesize, 2020).
We then moved on to processed drama which is when teachers and students are working in and out of role. ‘Processing drama is not about creating a ‘product’, i.e it does not have the end result of a play or a performance, the process is a product within itself’ (Bowell & Heap, 2013). Processed drama encourages improvisation in which children can explore their own creativity and imagination without being controlled by a script. They can take the character in role in their own direction and chose how they want to portray the emotion and personality of the character.
We then began to create cross curriculur links with drama in the classroom. For example, when using techniques such as teacher in role, this could then be carried into a literacy lesson, writing in role. This would then develop descriptive language, creative and literacy skills.
We then watched a few short clips about how teachers have demonstrated teacher in role in the classroom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zD_3zlYUL7w&feature=youtu.be
In these videos, it really stood out to me the use of props in teacher and role. Once teachers used a prop or put on a piece of clothing this really immersed the children into the changing of character. The teacher chose to be a lower status character. This then encouraged children to make decisions for themselves and enables them to explore their own responsibility and creativity.
REFERENCES
BBC Bitesize. 2020. A Definition Of Body Language – Describing Body Language – GCSE Drama Revision – BBC Bitesize. [online] Available at: <https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zg8tgk7/revision/1>
Bowell,P.,Heap, B,S. (2013) Planning and Processing Drama Routledge
Education.gov.scot. 2020. [online] Available at: <https://education.gov.scot/Documents/expressive-arts-eo.pdf> [Accessed 21 October 2020].
Hallam, S., 2010. International Journal Of Music Educatiom. SAGE.
