Our P6 class are taking part in this project for the first time so everything is new to us!
On our first day Fionnuala travelled from Dublin to meet us in our classroom. We had a very enjoyable and productive day learning about how to make music by using our body. We learnt about loud and soft sounds, coming in on different beats and we produced our own song as Fionnuala conducted.
Our first virtual session through Elluminate involved Fionnuala teaching the children how to use the tools on the whiteboard. She warmed them up by getting them to say hello to each part of their body, then she discussed the previous week with them and asked them to identify themselves in the photos she put up on the board.
After looking at the photos the children revised the sound their group had made the previous week and they all performed again with Andrew conducting this time. It was just as good as the previous week!
Fionnuala showed them how to write a musical score to represent their song. They really enjoyed this and were very impressed that their song could be written as a score.
During the second virtual session we listened to a piece of music that Fionnuala had created. The children then described what they had heard in the music and the pictures it formed in their head. They each drew a picture to represent the music and wrote a few lines on the back about their picture.
The following week everyone worked in groups putting their pictures together to create a story. A lot of time was spent discussing the order and how the story would go but everyone was very involved and really enjoyed it. They then told their story as a group for their peers and Fionnuala.
IPads were used in the next two sessions. Each child photographed all of their group’s pictures and put them in order using Keynote. On each slide they also wrote a sentence about that picture, building the story up as a slide show.
When they had finished they show they added a vocal recording of the story using Garage Band. Each child had to cup their hands and speak into the iPad microphone as they were all trying to record within close proximity of each other.
During our fifth session we looked at how other schools were recording their activities on the Class Journal page. Fionnuala showed us her blog entry and they discussed, with her, what they could write for their own blogs. Time was then taken to write out their blog entry and several of them read them out to Fionnuala before everyone typed them up on the website.
So far everyone has really enjoyed the sessions and learnt a lot about music and how it can affects our thoughts and feelings. We all look forward learning more and working with Fionnuala again after Christmas.