Music News

Hey everyone,

Hope you’re all having a great week! Just wanted to share with you something a bit exciting in the music room. With the skills of our wonderful teaching aid Ellen and OGPS’s groundsman extraordinaire Mr Kev, I’ve got some beautiful new velvet curtains to make the room feel more organised and of course beautiful! “I feel like I’m in a theatre” has been the most common response from the kids! My teaching space is finally starting to feel like mine.

While I’m here I thought I’d give you a run down of what’s been happening in Music so far this term. My favourite terms are 1 and 4 because I can really play to my strengths as an instrumental musician.

Foundation: The Foundation kids are learning all about timing and rhythm. We are doing this through dance, small percussion instruments and singing silly songs which is always very funny!

Year 1: Our Year 1s are learning all about rhythm patterns and are playing them on the marimbas, xylophones and glockenspiels. We have learnt about the musical alphabet and we are finding notes that sound nice together and making chords.

Year 2: Our Year 2s have started their journey on the recorder. I always get a lot of questions about why I teach it. Here are a few reasons… they are small enough for little fingers, they teach a C scale, when played well they sound beautiful and they are cheap enough that every child can access one. The first couple of lessons are always a bit rough on the ears but we’ve now worked through the tips that help us to squeak less! The kids are also starting to read basic notation on the treble stave.

Year 3: Our Year 3s have started on the ukulele. We have learnt the simple chords of C, Am, F and easy G so far and we are focussing on trying to stay together when we play. We have had a little go at the song Riptide and Just the Way You Are.

Year 4: We have had a very excited cohort of kids in Year 4, they’ve started learning the guitar, bass and keyboards which on the whole they seem to be loving! My room has become a “jam room” most mornings with many of the Year 4s coming to visit for a play. They’ve been introduced to simple guitar chords, some are already playing full chords on the keyboard and we have some good little bass players coming up the ranks! We’ve learnt Fire and the Flood and Shotgun.

Year 5: The Year 5s have been making lots of rhythmical noise with the bucket drums. They are focussing on learning 4 different beats each lesson, splitting in to groups and becoming masters of that beat, then splitting in to new groups with one master of each beat and then attempting to play all 4 different beats at the same time. Very tricky but very rewarding when I can see that they can hear it fit together!

Year 6: The Year 6s are continuing their journey on uke, bass, guitar and keys. They have smashed out 5 songs already this term as a class and next week they break in to small group to try and replicate the songs we’ve learnt together in a small “band.”

Our school rock band “New Generation” are heading to camp in early March for a 2 day intensive rehearsal. With only 40 minutes a week to rehearse, it’s very difficult to make any progress as a band so this camp is imperative for their success and always a huge amount of fun!

I hope you’ve enjoyed the SeeSaw videos that I’ve posted so far. I’ll make sure each class has a group video out each term at least.

Big love,

Dallas 😊👍🏼💕🎶