Carousel of Activities

1. Carousel of Activities Lesson 1

2. Music Carousel: Lesson 1 Plan

3. RESOURCES/TEACHERS’ NOTES: • A selection of CDs for children to look at the covers. • Resource sheet 1: Album Covers • A piece of music of your choice for listening (suggestions: Saint-Saens – Aquarium or Vaughn Williams – The Lark Ascending). This icon indicates when music needs to be played. • A glockenspiel • A drum, for counting a steady beat (See slide 12) • Resource sheet 2: Bug Rhythm Cards, laminated or copied onto card if possible and cut out. • Resource sheet 3: Listening Challenge • Resource sheet 4: Composing Challenge • Resource sheet 5: Pitch Challenge • Ocarinas/recorders • Children need to be grouped into groups – six group names have already been included on Slide 7. Children’s names need to be filled in on this slide before the lesson starts. • The ocarina practice group is best led by a Teaching Assistant, preferably outside of the classroom in order to promote a quieter learning environment. • The plenary of this lesson is very short today; if you can, end on a song! There are some great song ideas on the jess-music.com website.

4. Learning intentions: - To listen with attention to detail and appreciate high quality recorded music. - To learn key vocabulary and concepts to be visited this term. Success Criteria: - I can listen to a quality recorded performance and discuss questions related to it. - I can understand some common musical terms.

5. Key Vocabulary • Appraise – to say what you think about something. • Compose – to make up your own piece of music. • Dynamics – the loudness or softness of the music • Listen – to carefully hear and pay attention to something • Melody – A tune. • Notation – the symbols we use to represent music • Perform – to play a piece of music • Pitch – how high or low a note is • Rhythm – a musical pattern • Scale – A series of notes played one after the other. • Staff – A set of five lines and four spaces on which notes are written to show their pitch. A clef at the beginning of the staff tells which notes are on which lines. • Steady beat or Pulse – the regular rhythmic pattern • Tempo – the speed of the music

6. Design a CD Cover! • Talk to your partner: • What CDs do you have at home? • What is on the album cover? • Why do you think the cover shows what it does?

7. Look at the range of CD covers on your desks. • Talk to your partner: • What has been included on the front cover? • Why do you think this has been used? Many album covers are designed to describe the music to the listener. As you listen to this piece of music, use your Album Covers sheet to draw a picture that you think best describes the music to the listener. What does the music make you think of?

8. MUSIC CAROUSEL • In our Music lessons we will be working in small groups on different activities: • Vivaldi – (insert pupil names) • Haydn – • Beethoven – • Mozart – • Bach – • Wagner – A little homework! What can you find out about your group’s composer?

9. Activity Centre 1: Listening • Talk to your partner: • What questions could we ask about a piece of music? • Think of three questions to share with the class. • Did you think of these? .... What instruments can you hear? Is the music fast or slow? (tempo) Is the music loud or soft? (dynamics) Who might have composed this piece? When might this piece have been composed? What does the music make you think of? Is the music being played by a small ensemble (group) or a large orchestra? Or is it being sung? Do you like this music? Why/why not?

10. Activity Centre 1: Listening • Let’s keep our questions for our listening times. They will help us to appraise the music we hear. • In the Listening Centre, you will be listening to a piece of music and answering questions about it.

11. You can record your thoughts and feelings about the pieces you hear using this sheet: You must remember to explain your answers as fully as you can – don’t just write ‘yes’ or ‘no’!

12. Activity Centre 2: Rhythm Challenge • How do musicians know what to play? • Much of the time, musicians use notes to help them. • Notes tell us what pitch to play (high or low), and also what rhythm - pattern - to play. • Each note has a different value. This means whether they are played for a short or long time. • Look at these notes: These are quavers. A quaver lasts for half a count: there are two quavers in every crotchet beat. We can use the word: These are semiquavers. A semiquaver lasts for quarter of a count: there are four semiquavers in every crotchet beat, so they are played quite quickly! We can use the word: This is a crotchet. It lasts for 1 count, just like the word: Spider! Worm! Caterpillar!

13. Activity Centre 2: Rhythm Challenge • Now we know some note values, we can use our note value cards to make up a rhythm for our partners to clap back to us. This is the rhythm challenge! • You must make sure that your partner is clapping steadily to the beat and making sure that the quavers and semiquavers are quicker than the crotchets. Say the words as you clap. • Here is a rhythm as an example. Start off by clapping a steady four beats, then try clapping and saying the rhythm to your partner: Worm Spi-der Cat-er-pil-lar Worm

14. Activity Centre 3: Pitch Challenge • We learnt how musicians use notes to tell them what pitch to play: whether they play high or low. • Notes are placed on a staff. A staff is made up of five lines on which notes can sit: • This is a staff: • (A treble clef means that the notes should be played on the top half of the piano!)

15. Activity Centre 3: Pitch Challenge • These are the notes of the musical scale: • Each note has its own letter name. • (Don’t worry that the notes are clear! We will look at this note value another time).

16. Activity Centre 3: Pitch Challenge • Now that you know the note names, see if you can work out the names of the notes in this melody: This means rest for 1 beat! B A G A B B B See if you can find these notes on a glockenspiel. What is the tune? You have just completed your first pitch challenge!

17. Activity Centre 4: Composing • What is a composer? • A composer creates pieces of music. • In Activity Centre 4, it’s your job to compose your own rhythm. • Remember our bug cards? We’ll need them for this activity too!

18. When you compose, you will use your bug cards to help you to create a rhythm. • On your whiteboards, choose some notes now. You may wish to draw the crotchet, quavers and semiquavers on their own: • Or you may want to draw the bugs or the first letter of their names (W, S, C) to help you.

19. Now clap your rhythm to your partner. Are you keeping to a steady beat? • Next, you need to make some changes to your composition. What changes could you make? • Make it longer? • Make it shorter? • Change the order of the cards around? • Include a rest ( ) for one beat? • Make your piece faster or slower? • Make your piece loud in some parts and soft in others? • You could even use a glockenspiel to choose a different note to play for each card.

20. You can record your ideas on your Composing Challenge resource sheet:

21. Activity Centre 5: Ocarina Skills • In this centre, you will work with me on your ocarina skills. We will look at how to hold the ocarina, how to play the notes of a scale and how to play different pieces.

22. Activity Centre 6: Ocarina Practice • In this centre you will be working as a group to practice your ocarina. Work on getting a smooth, even sound at first. After that, you can begin to practice the notes and pieces you’ve worked on during Ocarina Skills!

23. What have we learnt today? • Let’s review our success criteria. Show me a thumbs up, middle or down to show your understanding of each one: • I can listen to a piece of music and discuss questions related to it (appraising). • I can understand some common musical terms.