Week 1: 8th May-
Introductions:
- Go around circle and say your name and your favourite sound, this could be anything at all, from the sound of your front door to the sound of birds tweeting.
This exercise really got the group thinking about sounds as opposed to music. It also got them to consider the sounds we hear everyday and may not always notice.
Starter:
Hand out drums to everyone.
- Everyone bang the drum as hard as possible
- As quietly as possible
- Tap your drum (demonstrate)
- Rub the skin on the drum.
Simon says with the drum:
- Bang Loudly
- Bang quietly
- Tap the drum
- Rub the drum
I improvised during this part of the session and used hand actions to signal the group when to change from playing loudly to quietly. I then pointed at individuals when it was their turn to have a drum solo.
This part of the session took less time then I had anticipated so I improvised again by teaching the group 2 simple drum beats and getting them to change between the 2 beats, I then got the group to play the 1 beat while each individual got to play a drum solo of their choice.
This worked very well and showed me that the group has got good rhythm and can hold a beat. All the group got involved and seemed to really enjoy the task.
I did get feedback from the group after the drumming that it had tired them out, I need to bare this in mind next time and make sure that the drumming session is perhaps slightly shorter.
Main Task
- Listening task: Listen for 1 minute to the sounds around us in the classroom. What did everyone hear?
- Does anyone have any favourite sounds they like in the classroom?
- What would make a good noise in the classroom? Explore sounds around us.
- Ensure everyone has a sound they can make in the classroom
- Go around and listen to individual sounds (record on handheld recorder)
Homework: To bring in something small from home that they like the sound of eg, spoon, pen, pot.
I’m really happy with how the first session went and got some good feedback from the teachers, careers and from Emma who is running the project.
Things which I need to work on for the next session are, to make sure that the class are quiet and listening before I begin explaining a task. To ensure that I do run through tasks to quickly, take time to ensure the class understand the task they are being asked to do, explain everything thoroughly, go into detail about the equipment we will use eg. names of drums or recording equipment.