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KEY
STAGE 1
Use Playtime to find three songs you know well. Choose three by different
artists and with a contrast of mood or speed.
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To do this, in the home page, simply type the title of your chosen song:
For example: Love me do
Tick the box next to title?
Your results should show The Beatles, Love Me Do.
Add this to your cart by clicking the icon
Do the same with two other songs. |
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By
adding these songs to your cart you have created a playlist to play to
your class. You can save these songs to your desktop and use them whenever
you need to without having to search for them again.
Active Listening and Appraisal
In class, have a discussion about music and how it can make you feel. Ask
your class whether listening to music ever makes them want to dance, or if
it has ever made them want to cry.
Play the first track to your class and ask them to listen carefully. It
may help them to close their eyes and really concentrate. If their
attention wanders simply fade the song out, they don’t need to hear all
of it.
Listening is a skill that deserves practise. It is easy to hear something, but to concentrate and really listen is a very different and much harder skill. Here are some tips to make listening easier for your class:
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Encourage your class to sit comfortably and quietly perhaps with their eyes closed |
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Show your class, perhaps in smaller groups, how to play the tracks through the computer themselves. They can then
listen on headphones during quiet times, or as a treat. |
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Encourage them to imagine a story in their mind as they listen. What are their imaginary characters doing? |
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Ask them a tricky question before each listening so that they really have something to listen out for. |
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Ask
your class how the song made them feel. Were they happy or sad? Did they
want to sing along, dance or just sit still and listen? You might like
them to discuss their answers in smaller groups before writing them up on
the board.
Do the same activities with your other contrasting tracks and ask your
class to compare each new song to the last. Finally ask your class to pick
its favourite song.
You could use this song as a ‘class anthem’, playing it at the end of
every day or as a treat.
Performing and composing
When your class have become familiar with their song, explore the sound of
it a little further. Ask your children to identify the instruments on the
track, is it a man singing or a woman, or perhaps it is several?
Write their suggestions on the board. You could explain that songs are
often made up of the following ingredients:
A melody or tune
Rhythm
A bass line
A chorus
See if you can create a diagram of the song as a class. Who is playing the
bass line? How many times does the chorus come? Who sings the tune?
Ask your class to tap along with the beat of the song. Explain that this
is called the beat or the pulse and it is similar to a ticking clock or a
heartbeat that is always present. Explain that all songs have a beat -
some are fast some are slow. (You could search the collection for further
songs to emphasise this).
When your class can tap along confidently, ask them which instrument
should play the beat. They’ll probably say a drum. If you have some
small drums, hand them out to a few children and encourage them to tap
along.
When this is really strong ask the class to see if they can fit another
rhythm to the beat. A rhythm in this context is simply a repeating pattern
of shorter beats that fits to the main pulse. You could demonstrate a few
to the class that are already present in the song.
By splitting the class into smaller groups and handing out a range of
unpitched percussion, you can begin some
simple composition with your pupils.
· Ask each group to appoint a pulse person and to experiment with fitting
new repeating rhythms to the pulse.
· When this is achieved listen to the results and ask the rest of the
class to comment on what they hear. Pay particular attention to the speed.
Can they perform their piece without getting faster?
· Finally encourage your class to try and perform their rhythmic pieces
whilst the original song is playing. Can they stay in time and not drown
it out!
· Perhaps you could try all the groups playing at once (quietly!) and
with the original.
You could set a further challenge to see if anyone can find on Playtime
another version of their song. This could open up a discussion about what’s
different and which is the best and lead to some recomposing of the
rhythmic pieces.
Your pupils have all now responded to the music, performed along with it
and begun to compose their own music. You can do these activities with any
track from Playtime. You might like to experiment with more unusual music
by doing a genre search and looking under the headings of Jazz, Classical
or World music. Almost every type of music has some pulse underneath it.
For different pulses, try a wild card search using the words Waltz or
Mambo.
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