Music With Jay!

Turn and face the school... ch-ch-changes!

Thank you David Bowie for this slightly tweaked lyric! We're finally heading back to school! Hooray! In our excitement, we can't deny the fact that there will be a few minor changes in the way we do things back onsite. So what do these ch-ch-changes mean for the Music Room?

We will continue just like we did in term 2 sanitising our hands as we entre and exit the room. This will keep our instruments and props nice and clean and keep all our students and staff safe! We know from past experience that our students are absolute pros when it comes to hand hygiene so let's all continue to keep our hands nice and clean and get back to the business of making music, learning and having fun!

One of the new changes that is being made in the Music Room is that we won't be singing as a whole school choir. As sad as this is, it is a very important step to keep everyone in our school community safe. Lunch time programs will still run, the emphasis will just be shifted away from singing so we can limit how many little particles entre the air. 

But what does this mean for our music classes across the school? 

Junior School students will be further developing their understanding of beat. This is a crucial element of music that really does underpin everything we do when creating, performing and generally enjoying music. Thanks to our incredibly generous local community, we have had enough "Beat Buddies" donated to enable all Lower Junior students to be allocated their own Beat Buddy for the remainder of the year! This means students won't be sharing their Beat Buddy with anyone else, another safety measure because we are all doing everything we can at Naranga to ensure school remains a safe space for all! And why not have fun while we're at it? 

You might be wondering how a hundred little teddy bears could help our learners gain a better understanding of beat. Here's how! These Beat Buddies love nothing more than a nice steady beat! They love to be bounced, rocked and swayed to the beat, otherwise they can get a little overwhelmed and scared. So we will be helping them stay calm and happy by moving them to the beat as we move around the room, play the gathering drums or even as we move to the sound of a lullaby. What a way to explore simple and compound time! I can't wait!

Have a look at just how generous our local community has been in making these Beat Buddy donations! Wow! I am so thankful to these kind and caring community members who were willing to jump at the chance to support our learners! 

Unlike in previous terms, we will be utilising some recorded music to help this work in the post-Covid Music Room. This weekend I will be busily recording songs, accessing recordings for use in class and generally thinking outside the box! 

Our Upper Junior and Senior School students will continue to develop instrumental skills, rhythm reading and identifying pitch by ear. I have no doubt that they will absolutely make the most of this term! In this week's Google Meets a number of students absolutely blew me away! Len is our resident rhythm reading pro! Alex A and Curtis R performed LIVE for their peers in our lesson this week! Curtis playing 'Purple Rain' on the electric guitar, and Alex, who is a big Bee Gees fan, played not one but two songs on his acoustic guitar AND he sang too! Patrick's vocal performance of 'Titanium' showed just how much he has grown throughout this Remote Learning experience. If this is what our learners can achieve online, imagine what they'll do this term when we're back on site! 

Whilst we can't sing together this term, there is so much more we can continue to do! Maybe we'll learn some songs in Auslan or perhaps we'll take a leaf out of the Silent Monk's book ("singing" using flash cards)! Now that's one way to get around not singing! 

Stay safe and get excited! School's back in session!!

Jay Pharaoh

Music Teacher