Every student has a voice: making music the ‘best’ subject in school.
Ros Mcmillan
Ask junior secondary or primary students for their favourite subject and why, and expect to hear words including “because I can do what I like, it’s different and fun”. A more honest way of saying this might be “because it’s about me”, indeed all students want their ‘voice’ to be heard and music-making is the perfect way for them to express themselves, while engaged in enjoyable learning.
Music curricula throughout Australia place much emphasis on students expressing themselves. The Victorian curriculum, for example, contains four strands of activities that students should undertake, the first being ‘Explore and Express Ideas’. Throughout each level, from Foundation to Year 8, students are expected to use their imagination to improvise, compose and arrange music to communicate their ideas, an ideal way to learn about music.
This workshop will consist of a variety of ‘hands-on’ activities where expressivity is central. They will range from mini-lessons of 5-15 minutes to theme-based units of work that may take 2-3 lessons to complete. The workshop will suit teachers from Foundation to Year 8 but participants will also be asked to name the level for which they particularly want ideas.
Empowering students to express themselves is an assured way of making school a place where they want to be, an essential aspect of 21st century life. Music is unique in its ability to allow students, both individually and as a group, to let their voices be heard. This workshop aims to provide resources for teachers to foster this.
2. Every student has a voice:
Making music the ‘best’
subject in school
Dr Ros McMillan
Senior Fellow in Arts Education,
University Melbourne
Beginning primary-beginning secondary
This workshop will consist of a variety of
‘hands-on’ activities where
expressivity is central. !
3. Dr Ros McMillan
Senior Fellow in Arts Education,
University Melbourne
2 units for level 1 and level 2 students.
• All Kinds of Weather (L1)
• Bicycles and Boats (L2)
Join Dr Ros McMillan as she shows us that
everything can be turned into a musical
experience. No experience is required for this
journey and all instructions, charts, music and
audio are provided.
4. EVERY STUDENT HAS A VOICE
Making music the ‘best’ subject in school
Dr Ros McMillan
rosmcm@aapt.net.au
5. EARLY YEARS (5-6yo)
• Quick Activity – What’s that sound
• Unit – Four Flapping Flamingos
1. Singing: ‘One More River’ (spiritual)
2. Composing: ‘Crocodile Beat’ – Gail Jorgensen
3. Science: Animalia (Graeme Base)
4. Composing: A visit to the zoo
5. Rapping poetry: ‘One wonderful wombat…..’
6. More themes for Early Years
Underwater Worlds
Singing: ‘Yellow Submarine’
Drama activity: Travelling in our submarine
Science: David Gallo – Underwater Astonishments (TED talk)
Here comes the Postman
Singing: ‘Parcel in the Post’ (Peter Coombe)
Social Science: Workers (also movement, e.g. painters, carpenters)
Composing: ‘Here comes the garbage truck’
All kinds of weather
Singing: It’s a lovely day today
Composing: A Thunderstorm
Movement: Let’s go to the beach
7. Middle / Upper Primary/Lwr.Sec
• Quick Activity – Calling all stations
• Unit – Stars and Planets
1. Singing: ‘Good Morning Star Shine!’ from ‘Hair’,
Rado, Ragni and McDermott
2. Science: Stars and Planets
3. Listening: ‘The Planets’ – Gustav Holst
4. Class presentation: ‘Festival of the Sun’
5. Creative writing: Shape poems
9. Good morning star shine!
Refrain: Good morning star shine, the earth says Hello!
You twinkle above us, we twinkle below.
Good Morning star shine, you lead us along,
My love and me as we sing
Our early morning singing song.
Verse 1: Gliddy glub gloopy, nibby nabby noopy
La la la low low,
Sabba sibby sabba, nooby abba nabba
Ley ley low low,
Tooby ooby walla, nooby abba nabba
Early morning singing song.
Refrain: Good morning star shine….
10. The Planets – Gustav Holst
• Venus – Peace
• Saturn – Old Age
• Mars – War
• Jupiter - Jollity
11. More themes for Mid/Upper
Primary/Lwr. Secondary
Space
Program music: Space movies (The Empire Strikes Back)
Composing: Advertisements
Performance: Journey to the moon – graphic notation
Machines
Drama activity: A Class Machine
Performance: The Chocolate Factory
Science: Mechanical inst’s (carillon, barrel organ, synth)
Food
Singing: ‘Food, glorious food’ – Lionel Bart
Composing: Food rap (common time) or limerick (compound)
Musical elements: The Ingredients of Music
13. Why music?
Music, perhaps more than any other subject, can contribute to the
development of the child in every way – emotionally, intellectually,
aesthetically and physically.
The argument usually put forward against giving music equal importance
with mathematics and reading in the primary school is that ‘there isn’t
enough time in the school day’, that time would have to be ‘stolen’ from
‘more important’ subjects.
However….research shows that classes where music was taught daily as a
core subject surpassed similar classes who received less frequent music,
surpassing them in the very academic areas that are generally put forward as
the reason for not having more time for music – maths and reading.
• Lois Choksy, 1986.
14. Champions of Change
The Impact of the Arts on Learning
It has been widely documented in the USA, Canada and Europe, including the UK, that
those students whose learning is embedded in the Arts:
• achieve better grades and overall test scores
• are less likely to leave school early
• rarely report boredom
• have a more positive self concept
than those students who are deprived of an arts experience.
Champions of Change (Fiske 1999) was a study of of 7 major independent research
studies including one of 25,000 US students showing that students involved in music
and drama achieved higher levels of success in maths and reading than those who
were not, regardless of their socioeconomic background. It was found the Arts also:
• provide ways of engaging those students who were otherwise difficult to engage
• connect students to themselves, to each other as well as the world
• transform the learning environment itself, and importantly
• challenge those students who were already successful.
15. Ros McMillan’s publications
Everything is Music – Musical Learning through any Topic
Music Room Workshops (DVD)
Available Bushfire Press at Conference trade display
A Score of Ideas
Twenty improvisation ideas for instrumentalists - $20
Available Reed Music (info@reedmusic.com) Free post t’out Aust.
MusicTime! Student and teacher workbooks with CDs
Available Ellaways and Hal Leonard at Conference trade display
- also Engadine Music (NSW) and Print Music Works (Vic)
MusicTime! Let’s Begin! Book 1 + CD (Foundation) [Teachers]
MusicDiscover Things! Book 2 + CD (Lwr/Upper prim) [Teachers]
MusicTime! (Book 5 – Year 7) [Students]
MusicTime Too! (Book 6 – Year 8) [Students]
MusicTime Teacher’s Book (Books 5 & 6 + 2 x CDs)
