Performing Arts

News from Music

And just like that, we are at the end of another term in the Performing Arts department. 

In the Music class, the Year Two and Three students have continued exploring the components of music, especially with regards to notation, rhythm, and pitch.  Every Remote Learning session commences with a review of all these attributes, as well as practicing the skills of identifying notes on the virtual piano keyboard.  

A few classes ago, the students were introduced to a few online musical applications that allowed them to play Music through a different approach.  During their Remote Learning, the students have continued exploring the rhythms via the online drum machine, creating different patterns, often quite complex, and investigating meter ambiguity by placing the rhythmic emphasis in various parts of the bar. 

Unknowingly, they were creating a “Rhythmic Hemiola,” which is effectively an ambiguous pattern that uses a ratio of three to two – This is a topic that is part of the Music Class in much higher levels of education.  

Recently, the Music students have started expressing their creativity online, either by posting some recordings of their performances on our Schoolbox page, or by volunteering to perform on our WebEx meetings. We were extremely astonished by the level of courage, creativity, and talent our students have shown. Our final lesson for this term was an online concert, with at least 20 students performing in each class.  

News from Dance

As we come to the end of Term Three, we congratulate the students on persevering through a challenging term with all the current setbacks, while staying disciplined, focused, and determined week in and week out.  In dance we had a goal to complete for our Year Four, Five and Six students to perform our assembly dance to the entire school, which has already been partially achieved. The students have been amazing and consistent in their actions especially during our weekly Webex sessions, and have completed the initial task set out. 

Unfortunately due to restrictions we have been unable to perform this live to everyone as yet, however we have created other options such as pre-recording our combined group performance and showing the final edit to the school, and Saltwater community. This will be set out and achieved once we all return in Term Four, and restrictions have eased throughout.  We have also been working on different sounds in music with a range of different grooves and movements, while expanding the mindset and musicality with the combinations set out. Students enjoyed the various change in the class routines requesting to add on and keep going. It was so great and refreshing to see everyone so engaged online and having fun while working up a sweat! More fun classes to come! Aladdin rehearsals have been progressing at a rapid pace, with students embracing the show, choreography, and contents, and applying themselves enthusiastically throughout. 

The routines are taking great shape as students enjoy the creative process while eager to do more as we progress. We can’t wait for you to see the final result that all the students and creative team have been working on. Victorian State School Spectacular was scheduled to be performed last weekend on the 11th September. Unfortunately due to the cancellation of this amazing event, our VSSS Dancers sadly missed out on the opportunity to perform live with other combined schools in front of the 10,000 strong audience. After the long rehearsal process over the weeks, we didn’t want all the dancers hard work to go to waste and not achieve what we set out for in the first place. In return we have decided to reconstruct and remix the set list of songs and choreography the dancers have learnt, and then create a compilation of all their work for the students to perform and record as an alternative ending and performance. This will help us to achieve our initial goal in a slightly different manner, as well as create some amazing memories for the students to hold onto. 

The “Pass The Dance” dance video has also had a great feedback and created so much fun amongst the Saltwater students and families. Many have been learning the fun dance online and recording themselves and their performance, and sending their videos in also! It’s been so good to see everyone participating and having a little family fun at home and look forward to seeing more videos to come!  Thank you to all the students for being amazing especially throughout this challenging term and time, and congratulations to all on a job well done! Have a safe break and look forward to seeing you all soon in Term Four! 

News from Drama

Prep and Year One students have shown a fantastic amount of diligence and perseverance towards their Drama classes. Term 3 has been all about strengthening the skills of analysis, vocabulary, interpretation, and recognising the elements of Drama. This all sounds a little technical, but we approached it all through playing games!  

For example, ‘treasure hunts’ were used to formatively test and stretch the class’s ability to interpret words. When students were asked to find ‘something that holds other things’, it was fantastic to see the range and variety of creative ways to fulfil that brief. Students would of course bring back bowls, containers and bags etc. But it was great to see students to think outside of the box and bring back things like paper towels or even simply hold up their own hand.  

The strongest example of the students’ progression over the term was their ability to analyse short films and identify the elements of Drama. At the beginning of the term, the students would largely view the films as light entertainment, but after being introduced to the ideas of plots, twists and morals, the students could enjoy the films but also give detailed accounts of the story as well as defining the moral message contained.  

Most of all, it was the infectious enthusiasm with which the students would turn up to class every week which was the most wonderful example of how they were going with their Drama tasks. 

Students would turn up early to hear a story read to them and they would often stay back at the end just to share stories and have a chat. This was not only a wonderfully fulfilling learning experience, it was a valuable, positive weekly bonding experience.