Music

Have you ever wondered why children love to have the same story read over and over and over to them or they will sing a song they love over and over and over at home, driving everyone in the house nuts???! In the past few years, teaching Music at Oatlands, I have had numerous older brothers and sisters, parents and class teachers come up to me and say their child constantly sings songs they have learned in Music over and over again. While this may be annoying to those hearing the same song constantly, it is very normal in human development. Zig Ziglar said "Repetition is the master of learning, the father of action, which makes it the architect of accomplishment." The next time kids ask you to listen to the same songs over and over, remind yourself that it's a good thing! It's good because repetition provides the practice that children need to master new skills. Repetition helps to improve speed, increases confidence and strengthens the connections in the brain that help children learn. The most effective way for children to learn is to engage the visual, auditory and kinesthetic pathways to the brain.

The Grade PREP, One, Two and Three children have completed an excellent Term 3 in Music and yes, I was asked to sing songs and perform chants the children learned in Music last year; Repetition occurs constantly in Music classes!

The Grade PREP and One children have learned about non tuned percussion instruments and have used some of these to demonstrate Beat in songs. We have used traditional fairy tales as our provocation and then listened to these same fairy tales put to Music and then played our instruments along to these musical fairy tales focusing on Beat and Rhythm. We have done lots of singing and chanting and movement to Music, resurrecting some of our favourites from last year.

The Grade Two and Three children have also done lots of singing and chanting and learned lots of new songs using the SING vocal Programme. The Grade Two and Threes love singing from these books and using them has helped to teach many of the elements of Music including Form - Verse and Chorus! The children just love the joy that using these books and singing with them provides. They are a very popular component of the Music Programme. 

We also focussed on Indigenous Australia, MUSIC classes looked at traditional Indigenous Instruments, Dreamtime Stories and Indigenous Dance and how all these

performing ARTS components tie in together so closely with our First Nations Peoples.

Have a Wonderful Term 3/ Spring Holiday, Happy Holidays Everyone

Fiona Jamieson