Crew Mcloughlin – Music

17th April 2024Sarah Mcglone

Today, we finished our work on ‘Twinkle Variations’. We began by recapping what we had previously discussed around variations and how they can be altered through tempo, rhythm and pitch. We were introduced to passacaglia, which is a repeating bassline and composers often use passacaglia as the basis for their variations. Working with a partner, we chose a short section of ‘Twinkle, twinkle, little star’ to use as the bassline. We spent time perfecting this short section on the glockenspiel.

We then looked at how we could adapt it further. We started by changing the rhythm to make it sound like a happy, dancing passacaglia. We found this quite tricky as it required us to play at a faster tempo and required more notes.

We then looked at adapting the same section, only this time taking away the rhythm and slowing it down to create a more solemn passacaglia. This was easier in terms of the amount of notes, however, it required us to think more carefully about keeping in time and remembering to rest between notes.

Once we had practised different passacaglia options, we split the class into 2 groups. One group played a passacaglia bassline whilst the other group layered an improvised piece. The group who were improvising were allowed to make their own decisions about what they wanted to play, however, they needed to consider fitting in with the bassline, playing at the same speed as the bassline, starting and stopping at the same time, and staying within the correct pitches.

Our Tower

17th April 2024Eleanor Pashley

For our experience lesson, Crew Godley, we read the story ‘Our Tower’ for our new writing unit then we discussed different scenes from the book. We then made our own towers out of different resources in the classroom and designed our own towers from looking at different types of towers.

Hooking in to expedition!

17th April 2024A Welburn

Crew MW have spent the morning hooking into their new expedition – ‘What happens where the sea meets the shore?’ The day started with us finding a basket in our classroom…

‘It’s a basket!’ – Hilaryanna

‘A picnic basket!’ – Harlow

Before we had a peep inside the basket, we thought about what you might find inside a picnic basket. These were our ideas: food, a blanket to sit on, sandwiches, bananas, healthy food like fruit and veg and a drink.

But it wasn’t picnic food that we found in the basket…It was items for the seaside! After exploring what we would take to the beach with us on our trip in a few weeks, we talked about what a beach was like. Some of us were a little unsure, so we decided to make a beach in the classroom! We had sand, water in the paddling pool, buckets, spades, shells, fish and nets…it was so much fun paddling in the water and catching the fish with our nets. We loved exploring the sand too and adding water to it to see what it would be like when the tide came in!

Marvellous Mayan masks

17th April 2024Kate Thompson

We have looked deeper into the Mayan civilisation and discovered that they used masks. They had event masks and death masks which were used for different purposes. Event masks were used for celebrations and special events and were vibrant and colourful. Death masks were made from Jade because it symbolises the soul. The people designed their own death masks and were buried with them. We designed our own Mayan mask and cut squares of card out to decorate it.

Crew Robson and Crew Godley – Music

16th April 2024Sarah Mcglone

We finished our unit on ‘Trains’ by layering up different rhythm notations to create a whole class piece of music that represented the movement of a train. We split into 3 groups, drums, shakers and guiros. Each instrument represented a different rhythm notation and we practised our individual rhythms before playing at the same time and creating a layered piece.

Crew Marsh – Music

16th April 2024Sarah Mcglone

We finished our unit on ‘Musical Conversations’ by creating whole class written notations to allow us to work in small groups using untuned percussion instruments to perfect a musical conversation. We worked really hard to ensure that everyone had a role, we even made amendments to the notations for those groups that had more/less children in them.