Today in music we focussed on the need for a pulse/beat when we are creating a piece of music. We started off by being given a set of beaters and were instructed to play certain beats on the floor or chair in front of us. Each musical note was expressed as a shape at first; a 
square represented a crotchet because the word square has one syllable, while a circle represented two quavers because the word circle has two syllables. We then progressed, looking at music with the conventional notation within the shapes before removing the shapes all together. The number of different notes in 
the music we were playing increased as the series of lessons progressed and by the time we were looking at second level work we were exploring the different note pitches and trying to think of ways to remember them such as ‘Every Good Boy Deserves Football’ and ‘FACE’. We played the beats of the music along with backing tracks and there was a sense of pride in the room; I think there were many of us who would never have believed we’d have learned to do this in one session. This shows how powerful teaching music in this way could be for children as they would receive inputs over a long period of time to build up their skills and understanding of music gradually; possibly inspiring them to continue learning to play a percussion instrument or to go on to learn another instrument with their new skill of reading notation.
As Sir Ken Robinson (2006) says: “All children have tremendous talents”. It is extremely important that we allow and encourage children to find these talents and to explore the possibilities within them. By helping them to build confidence in the arts through methods such as scaffolding like this, we are removing notation as a barrier to learning and introducing it as an enabler. I love the idea of exploring beats of the music in the classroom as I think that it could be used in numerous ways without the need for expensive materials and I would be interested to see whether or not it would be an effective method of getting the children’s attention; similarly to the way teachers clap beats and ask the children to clap them back. Throughout this input I was inspired to consider how I could use this in the classroom to learn about other things, as well as how to play and hear the beat of music. I noticed that in order for us to understand the difference between a full count and a half count, we need to understand fractions. Doing a lesson in which children explore the different meanings of a full beat and a half beat will help them to make the connection that 2 halves make one whole – as 2 half beats are the same as one whole beat. This could be explained by asking half of the class to clap a steady beat of one while the other half clap 2 fast beats. This would help to contextualise and develop connections within the experience and outcome of: I have extended the range of whole numbers I can work with and having explored how decimal fractions are constructed, can explain the link between a digit, its place and its value. MNU 2-02a
In the visual art input today we were reflecting on placement so far and discussing our experiences of the arts. There was a varied response with some of the group having experienced many integrated art lessons and with some having experienced none. Reflection is an extremely important part of the arts as it is this process in which we consider the successes and challenges of a situation and determine how we are going to move forward (Burnard, 2006). It could be said therefore, that it is through reflection on our experiences that we will shape our practice and impact on the lives of our future pupils. It was very interesting to hear the responses of others and I took away some interesting ideas which I would like to try in a classroom. These included making displays with different materials and exploring the use of colours to represent natural occurrences. We considered the impact of myth within the arts and discussed how this can be a much more powerful stimulus than fact, as fact forces us to work in one direction towards the truth. Myth has a greater sense of freedom and mystery and can arguably be infinitely explored.
“Uncertainty and mystery are energies of life. Don’t let them scare you unduly, for they keep boredom at bay and spark creativity.” – R.I. Fitzhenry
I was also inspired by our explorations of art lessons in Finland. They use natural resources to build and design. This sustainable way of learning is one which I think could be exciting and memorable for everyone involved, without wasting materials. The idea that the materials used (whether they be sticks, snow, or even sand) can be replaced by an almost unlimited supply removes the potential barrier of cost of materials to arts lessons in which trial and error should be encouraged. I feel that when we design things and go on to make them, we should be using trial and error as a means of learning about what works and what doesn’t – this is so much more beneficial than being told that something is not going to work. Csikszentmihalyi (1996) argued that creative environments are those which encourage communication and promote the generation of ideas and engagement. I would therefore argue that the outdoors and our natural environments are exceptionally creative environments and have such vast stimuli for creativity. Outdoor spaces are often bigger than indoor spaces and offer numerous opportunities for the exposition of a topic and for it to be contextualised. On placement, my class are currently studying ‘This Morning I Met a Whale’ by Michael Morpurgo. This novel has a strong focus on pollution and how human activity is negatively impacting the natural environment and our planet. It also provides opportunities for the students to consider the different types of birds mentioned in the novel and to consider the water and the whale. The whale in the story becomes beached and from looking at the models created by the children in Finland, I was inspired to consider how the children in my class could take a trip to the beach and make a whale out of sand – essentially creating their own beached whale.
This would be an activity which would come after careful research about the different types of whales and about why, when whales become beached, they cannot return to sea. This could be an interesting topic which could lead to the children learning about the human body and considering the physical differences between humans and sea animals. I also like the idea of all of the different sensory experiences a trip to the beach provides, such as the smell, movements, taste, and sounds of the sea and the texture of the sand and visual details of different shells. All of these things could be explored and captured through the arts and would help the children to develop an understanding of what it would be like to live under the sea. Samples of sea water could be taken back to the classroom and the sounds of the waves could be recorded using digital devices. They could then be replicated using musical instruments, while the movements of the sea could be captured through dance. The different fish, sea birds, and the sea itself could be recreated using various different materials to capture the texture of them.
Although most of the ideas which I have generated today would require some materials, I have come to the realisation that materials cannot replace experiences. In music, the barrier of a lack of understanding of conventional notation and a lack of musical instruments in schools cannot and should not hinder musical opportunities. Traditional methods can be changed to aid development of understanding and the use of clapping or hitting beaters off a table can be less intimidating than being handed a musical instrument; providing a more relaxed and confidence building experience. Getting out of the classroom and exploring the natural environment is a fantastic way to enhance creative thinking and to promote collaboration, trial and error with design ideas, and problem solving. It can also inspire expression and give children the opportunity to focus on nothing else other than their senses. Overall, we shouldn’t feel hindered by a lack of expensive materials as there are so many within the natural environment that come completely free.
References
Burnard, P. (2006) Rethinking the Imperatives for Reflective Practices in Arts Education. In: Burnard, P. and Hennessy, S. (eds.) Reflective Practices in the Arts Series: Landscapes: The Arts, Aesthetics and Education. Dordrecht: Springer, pp.3-12.
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996) Creativity: Flow and the Psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Collins.
Robinson, K. (2006) Do schools kill creativity? [Online] Available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY [Accessed: 26 September 2017].
I particularly like this book as there is a base on each page which triggers children to think creatively and to generate a creative response. It provides children with a starting point and with a small instructional sentence it guides their thinking and development without hindering their creativity by telling them how to complete the task; the instructions are always somewhat open to the interpretation of the child. 
For example, if a child is instructed to draw ‘the world’s strangest creature’ or to draw who they think is ‘riding the broom’, it is up to them to decide what the world’s strangest creature may look like and to consider what would make something out of the ordinary. It is also up to them to think a
bout who may be riding a broom – this may be influenced by stereotypes and previous stories they have been told about witches and wizards on broom sticks, or they may choose to have a totally different character riding the broom stick. These books and the use of following on from other pieces of work provide learners with guidance as well as control over their own learning. Anne Harris (2016) discusses the need for children to have these opportunities of control and power. 
Anne Harris (2016) argues that technology can act as a barrier to creativity as it provides people with an easier option than thinking for themselves. However, she also recognises that technology provides us with great tools to use to enhance creativity and Garage Band is an example of this point. By creating music to suit an animation children have to think critically about the message which they feel the animation should convey and the feelings which they want it to conjure. They are also experimenting with sounds and developing active listening skills. Apps such as Garage Band could be used to create audio books with soundtracks and sound effects to add depth, which would help learners to practice reading aloud and would also show them how their work can be displayed by means other than in writing. This is important as it is not all about teaching children for potential career prospects, but about teaching children how to appreciate the value of different forms (Smith, 2009). By asking them to consider the music and sound effects which they would deem appropriate for the piece of writing they are also developing a better contextual understanding. Teaching in this way can make a potentially boring lesson into something memorable which shows children that their work is valuable. This sense of value will hopefully encourage learners to try their best and to create something which they are truly proud of.
The only requirement was that the drawing filled the piece of polystyrene.
I chose to attempt to replicate the right hand side of the painting. We then used rollers and paint to cover the polystyrene before transferring the paint on to a folded piece of coloured A4 paper to make a print.
We repeated this process four times before slightly changing our polystyrene drawings – for example by cutting out some of the windows or adding more detail such as brick work. We then used a different colour of paint and transferred this different colour on top of our original copies. This made a range of different 
prints which had different contrasting colours. Although we were all given the same instructions and the same stimulus, each person’s prints were different. To me, this represented the fact that we all have different perceptions and we all interpret things differently. By using this as a follow up activity to looking into the house in the painting and considering the different people who may live there and the different stories that the house has to tell may encourage children to use certain colours and lines within their prints which to them, represent the mood which the house now conveys due to their imaginary stories of what goes on within it. This could encourage them to think critically about pieces of art instead of passively glancing at them. By allowing them to represent their own thoughts and feelings through careful consideration of the subject matter, we would be improving their higher order thinking skills in many ways.
The villagers took part in a meeting, lead by the mayor of the village (who in this case would be played by the teacher to introduce the drama using Teacher In Role). We discussed and decided on the action we were going to take to stop the dragon from causing more destruction to our village and in groups, we came up with freeze frames which we explained to the group. We all froze doing tribal dances to try to scare away the dragon. However, the dances did not work so we had to have another meeting and decide what to do next. All this time, the teacher should be asking the pupils what they want to do and letting them lead the drama, as this is what will allow them to discover the messages of the drama for themselves, and as Anna Craft (2007) believes, it is when learners discover messages and the meaning of lessons for themselves, that they take that knowledge for their own. After the second meeting we decided to find out where the dragon lived and went to her house to speak to her. This allowed for improvisation as we climbed the mountain to the dragon’s cave and then ‘hot seated’ her by asking her questions about why she was flying so low in the village and breathing fire. It was through this process that the children discovered that the dragon was not trying to terrorise the village – but that she was lonely and was flying so low to get a closer look at the villagers because she loved seeing them so happy and she breathed fire when she got excited. They also found out that she didn’t have enough food to feed her baby dragon. We then considered how we could help the dragon and decided to invite her to the village party, to give her the food we don’t use, and to build her and her baby a home in the village so that she won’t be lonely anymore.
orkshop completely changed my view; I can now confidently say that I would be able to teach music to learners using Figurenotes and to guide them through their progression to be able to read conventional notation. My aim is that I will learn to read conventional notation using this same progressive strategy, in order to make sure all of my pupils are set up in their best stead to get the most they possibly can out of music. 
Figurenotes started off in Sweden as a way to help young people with additional support needs which meant that they struggled to read conventional notation, to play music. This was a great success and the programme has moved across the world, as shown by a BBC Scotland report (MacAulay, 2010) which spoke of a seventeen year old boy from Edinburgh who has Autism who, after being introduced to Figurenotes, could confidently and happily play music with his peers. Clearly, this displays how Figurenotes are a fantastic force of inclusion and provide a whole new way in which people can be introduced to and allowed to experience music. Although, it is not only those with additional support needs who struggle to read conventional notation, and it is not only those with additional support needs who have anxieties about music. It is for this reason that Figurenotes are now being used across the country in all different classrooms – it will definitely be used in mine.
We were provided with paints in the primary colours and white and had to mix them to make the different colours which we required.
This allowed us to experiment with the different colours and to find out for ourselves what would happen if we mixed them. Using our handmade paintbrushes we painted the picture which we had heard a description of. 
All of the paintings were different and because we had never seen the picture which had been described, none of us really knew what our paintings were supposed to look like. This would be a fantastic way to help learners to build up a tolerance of ambiguity as it was the not knowing which made each of our paintings individual and which encouraged us to be creative. 
It is the not knowing which prevents replicas of ready-made things and which allows paintings to “encapsulate an expression of their own experiences, curiosities and worldview”, which Claire Gibb (2012, p.240) states as being very important when creating art. 
lities such as aspects of good versus evil, tense feelings, and a happy ending. However, young children have less life experience so have less preconceptions, meaning that their interpretations of sounds and visuals will often be very different to those of the child sitting next to them. This helped me to consider the fact that in the classroom, I should always encourage learners to embrace their imagination. It also allowed me to consider that within art, there is most often not a right and wrong answer, meaning that art is a fantastic way to help young people to feel a sense of achievement and to build confidence within and outwith the classroom. There may, for example, be pupils in the class who struggle with maths and literacy, but if they are taught that by simply using their imagination they can connect to the arts very effectively, they may feel more accepted in school and be driven to persevere.
and sticking with difficulty. Having read this wheel today, I feel that the habit of persistence is the one which we focussed on in most depth and its importance within the arts has became very clear to me.
They can also be incorporated into and improve performance in other aspects of the curriculum, such as literacy through speech, writing stories and contextual understanding as they allow for the development of many skills and expression of the self in a way which is controlled by the individual themselves.