First day back for me and first day on Steel Pans with Foundation and second with Year 1. I really wanted them to have fun exploring the sounds, listening to creating harmonies and keeping a steady beat. I worked with smaller groups in Foundation and we firstly sung our Gentle Hands song and clapped along… Continue reading Steel Pan Summer
We were lucky to be joined today by Elfyn from DMEH joined us for the first session with Year 1 today. We had a little introduction to the history of the pans, how to hold and play with the beaters (gently) and then had a go at finding some notes. We sung two songs to… Continue reading Steel Pans; introduction
First session back and I was impressed by all the classes enthusiasm and listening ears! This term I will be focusing on ‘pitch’ and planned a few sessions around the song ‘Down under the Sea’. So we started with circle games and a welcome clapping song (clap your hands together) and practiced listening to instructions.… Continue reading Down Under the Sea
After a busy and exciting few weeks with World Book Day, Paddleboat Theatre and World Sing Up, I thought Year 1’s needed a fun but chilled out session today in choir. So we started with ‘Rubber Chicken’ warm up and then I chose a very short and easy song for the learning today. It’s called… Continue reading Choir; better together
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ckNmB9S0hvI&feature=youtu.be Trinity Primary School have been practicing hard to join in with this year’s World Sing Up Day. Schools around the World will all be singing this same song tomorrow, how exciting. Here is the song so get ready to sing along with us! More info found here https://www.singup.org/about-sing-up/sing-up-day/
I absolutely loved this weeks session. I knew by now the sessions needed to get mixed up a bit to keep engagement so I decided to continue on from storytelling and compose a song. It was a windy, rainy day so was quite apt as I told them we were going on a boat adventure… Continue reading Djembes; composing sea songs
Here are some of the lovely books I have been using for some of the musical activities this term. I also use my own ideas, activities plus songs from Sing Up and ideas from some great music blogs out there such as Music Jungle, Ashley Danyew, Total Choir plus many more.
We kept the teams formula today as this worked well. But we started with recapping the song we learned last week plus some new songs; Meet my Uke Finger Rumba C Chord Song ‘I am C, look at me’ Then we played a game ‘Follow the leader’. Each team took turns to follow me around the room… Continue reading Ukuleles; singing with C
Following our African themed music we sung two African songs in choir today. The first is called ‘Nanuma’ which is a Ghanaian greeting song meaning ‘as we travel through life have we done enough to get to heaven’. The second song is called ‘Banuwa’ which is a beautiful lullaby from Liberia meaning ‘don’t cry pretty… Continue reading Choir; African rounds
Minibeast theme today! I collected the children as we usually board the Djembe Train but this time we were marching ants. We had a leader with a smaller drum who led the marching ants to the djembe circle (this activity acts as a metronome (kind of) so the children can start to hear the beat… Continue reading Djembes; minibeast rhythms
