During today’s art inputs we took part in a music and art workshop. During both of our workshops looked at aspects of literacy and how it is intertwined within the arts. Our music input, looked at teaching of rhythm and how we could teach this to both early, first and second level. We were introduced to two different PowerPoints that provided a comprehensive lesson plan for teaching rhythm. This resource used shapes to help children learn the difference between a crotchet and Quavers. The number of syllables in a shapes name was the number of beats that we taped out. This is demonstrated in the diagram below.
This was extremely effective and made it much easier to tap the beat with the drumsticks or beater shown below.
Using these strategies rather than introducing rhythm and notation at the same time made it much easier for me to understand and I can also see how this would make it much simpler for children. Using these strategies, we also played along to music this really help to motivate me as you could see that you were doing it right. This is something that I feel that the children would really engage in as they are really accomplishing something. Although we jumped straight into playing the music and rhythm with children, I would implement the say, clap, play method that although the children to develop there understanding of rhythm before they begin playing.
As a teacher I think this will be a great resource as it provides teachers with everything, they would need to teach children about rhythm while also beginning to teach them about notation. Personally, I think that these PowerPoint’s would also really help teachers to get over their hesitation and negative opinions of music a they make teaching music easier. Gregerson et al (2013) implies that if a teacher holds a negative opinion of expressive arts then this will be transfer on to their pupils, this shows the importance of being positive when teaching music.
During our art session we looked at print making with a focus on how we can use prints to get a written message across effectively. During this session we took inspiration from Bob and Roberta Smith a famous print maker that uses bold colours and fonts. This showed that when print is used effectively it can have a huge impact. As the maker in this situation I found print making to be a great way to almost create a poster but with more impact. As you must come up with a short and sweet slogan that really coveys the point you are trying to make. These are the prints that we made.
I think that print making is an art lesson that I would do with a future class as there are many ways to tie it in with other curricular areas such as literacy. This activity also highlights the way that the arts can allow children to show their full cognition without being limited by their language skills (Eisner, 2002). As you could relate it to a book that your class is reading or even a history lesson. I think that with a history lesson you could make very bold print with eye catching statements on the topic of war for example. I feel that this is a lesson that I would be more likely to do with a first or second level class rather than with early level. This is an activity that children would get involved in as it allows literacy to become more interactive and engaging. While also allowing them to develop their creativity. This is such an important skill for children as it allows them to develop confidence that their own points of view are valid, to interpret and respond to different trends and issues in society such as politics and different technological advances and it even allows children to apply their creativity within subjects other than art. (Scottish Government, 2013).
Overall, both workshops today looked at the way literacy can be used to enhance and be taught through the arts. Within music, this week we were using the syllables within the name of shapes to help children learn and understand rhythm and beats. This clearly shows a link between music and literacy and how the two subjects are intertwined. Baker, 2011; Catterall, 1998 cited in Arts Education Partnerships (2011) clearly agree saying “Students who study music surpass non-music students in assessments of writing, using information resources, reading and responding, and proofreading.” While in art we looked at the way literacy and art can be combined to create a powerful eye catching and thought-provoking prints. These prints deal with hard hitting subjects and topics to say things that words alone cannot say.
References
Arts Education Partnerships (2011) Music Matters: How Music Education
Helps Students Learn, Achieve, and Succeed. [Moodle Resource] Available: Integrated Arts in Education module on moodle. [Accessed: 2 December 2019].
Eisner, E. (2002) The Arts and the Creation of Mind. Yale University Press.
Gregerson, M. et al (eds.) (2013) Teaching Creatively and Teaching Creativity. [Online] Available: SpringerLink. [Accessed: 3 December 2019].
Scottish Government (2013) Creativity Across Learning 3-18. [Online] Available:https://education.gov.scot/improvement/Documents/Creativity/CRE1_WhatAreCreativitySkills/Creativity3to18.pdf . [Accessed:16 October 2019].
