Topic plan: 'Spread a little singing' activities (KS2)

Celebrations activities

Resources to help your school make more of National Sing Up Day

We hope that every school will celebrate National Sing Up day, not only by singing, but by taking every opportunity to make ‘Celebrations’ the focus throughout the KS2 curriculum.

Starters

Speaking and Listening activities to launch the topic ‘Celebrations’

• Talk about special dates celebrated by the children and their families. Make a class calendar, matching each celebration to the relevant month. Some festivals, such as Easter and Islamic festivals are ‘moveable’, so encourage the children to check the exact dates for 2011 before adding these to the calendar. Invent new celebrations to add to your chart, such as the day the school Christmas tree arrives or ‘taster’ days at secondary schools for Y6. Sing one of the relevant songs from the Sing Up Song Bank as each festival comes round eg. Chanukkah, Chanukkah, Dreidel song, Purim Day or Sakura.

• Talk about famous people whose lives we celebrate and remember for their particular gifts, courage, convictions or reforms eg. Guy Fawkes, Mary Seacole, Florence Nightingale, Martin Luther King or Lord Shaftesbury. Encourage the children to work in small groups to research material to deliver as a mini-talk to the class.

• Collect a list of favourite celebratory foods and encourage the children to talk about the occasions for which they are prepared. Discuss the fact that food for special occasions is often rich, very sweet or spicy and usually takes a lot of time to prepare eg. a wedding cake or the special food enjoyed at Passover. Make a list of rituals attached to celebratory food preparation such as stirring the Christmas pudding mixture and making a wish.

• Talk about ‘New Year’ and what this means to people of different faiths, comparing the celebrations and looking for similarities, such as fireworks, as well as differences. Research five key features for each type of New Year celebration and combine artefacts, drawings, photos and written reports to create a display. Sing New Year songs: Auld lang syne and Apples and honey from the Sing Up Song Bank.

• Talk about the power of friendship. Invite a grandparent who has maintained friendships for decades to talk about how these long-standing relationships have lasted. If your school is not already connected to a setting overseas, make a commitment to set up a link. Encourage the children to talk via email to pupils in other parts of the world about their celebration events, and collate the information for a presentation in an assembly. Sing friendship songs from the Sing Up Song Bank, such as: We all shine for each other or Winter nights.

Instant ideas

10 quick and simple ways to connect ‘Celebrations’ to curriculum activities

• Make a display of the word ‘Celebrations’ written in as many languages as possible, getting everyone in the class to contribute a word.

• Divide the children into pairs and allow them just five minutes to choose 10 items to go in a ‘Cool Celebrations Kitbag’! What do they consider absolute essentials? Balloons, jelly, clothes, chocolate, friends, music?

• Use the word CELEBRATIONS to create acrostics, for example:

  Candles
  Everyone
  Laughter
  Enjoyment
  Biscuits
  Rich food
  Aunts and uncles
  Talking
  Invitations
  Oh! No!
  Neighbours
  Surprise!

• Create a class celebration song using the resources on the KS2 ‘Spread a little singing’ songwriting sheet.

• Design a party hat using only one sheet of newspaper, scissors and a glue stick.

• Write a formal invitation in a Literacy lesson asking a real person in the community to join your class for a celebration assembly: be sure to sing something appropriately impressive for them!

• Celebrate physical skills and team work by encouraging the children to work in groups of four to invent PE challenges in the playground, using small equipment such as hoops, ball, and ropes.

• Learn a simple celebratory country dance such as the Circassion circle: it’s fun to participate in a group dance and an excellent way to feel the beat in your feet!

• Create a celebration montage of the class. Take digital photographs of everyone in the class, plus pictures of the classroom and create a large picture from all the overlapped and juxtaposed images. Sing We are the champions from the Song Bank.

• Celebrate Healthy Eating by singing the humorous and ironic song: Don’t be a couch potato! from the Singing Breakfast Club pack. The pack of 30 songs and vocal activities is free to download from www.continyou.org (ContinYou is an Associate Partner of Sing Up). The song has lots of scope for actions, drama and props and really needs an audience, so entertain another class with your performance! You could also try Five portions a day or Make it me-sized from the Sing Up Voice Box.

Big ideas!

5 longer projects to connect 'Celebrations' to curriculum activites

Celebrate your peers

• Encourage children to write celebratory 8-line kennings about their friends at school: they work really well as pen-portraits. Can other members of the class guess the subject of each kenning? Sing We’re all in this together from the Sing Up Song Bank.

Celebrate Red Nose Day

• Celebrate ‘Red Nose’ (Comic Relief) day by designing your own Red Nose PLUS. This entails creating an additional facial feature: red nose plus… moustache, beard, eyebrows, ears, hair etc. Charge a nominal fee to everyone for entering the Red Nose PLUS competition and offer to lead a grand parade at the school gates at home time, charging the parents for the privilege of watching. Send the money to Comic Relief and be sure to sing the song Make someone happy from the Sing Up Song Bank.

Celebrate with a story

• Ask the children to think of a celebratory moment in a book or film and to re-write the occasion with a comic twist, as if they were present eg.
  
  ‘The prince looked that the two ugly sisters and their huge feet and asked: ‘Are there any other ladies in the house?’
  
  ‘Yes!’ answered Buttons, ‘there’s Cinderella and Kayleigh’.
  
  ‘Kayleigh?’ shouted the two ugly sisters, in surprise.
  
  ‘She’s just popped in from next door to borrow a dustpan from Cinders!’ replied Buttons.
  
  Just then the two girls entered the room. ‘Hi!’ said Prince Charming, ‘come on, Kayleigh, try on this glass slipper.’ Incredibly the shoe fitted, although it looked a bit strange with her St. Mark’s grey tights and school blazer.
  
  ‘Marry me, Kayleigh!’ begged the prince as Cinderella burst into tears and the two sisters fainted!’

Celebrate with Black History Month

• Discuss the importance of Black History Month and the key people whose lives we celebrate. Organise the children into small groups and ask them choose an aspect of Black History to research and to decide on how they wish to present their findings: a talk, a PowerPoint presentation, a display, a dramatic performance etc. Use a wide range of reference materials including ICT, books, and museum resources. Invite another class to share the resulting work and give feedback. There is a range of songs in the Song Bank that would complement this project: Joshua fit de battle of Jericho, Kum ba yah, Michael, row the boat ashore, My God, Oh, happy day, Rock-a my soul and Swing low, sweet chariot.

Celebrate with a party

• Use Food Technology sessions to design and prepare a celebration lunch or tea party for a group from your local community, such as a local playschool or residents from a retirement home. Conduct research into the sort of food that would suit your guests and plan the event carefully. Things to think about:
  
  o menu and drinks
  o crockery and cutlery
  o hygiene
  o how to set the tables and chairs
  o table decorations (placemats, serviettes)
  o serving the food

• The entertainment afterwards is a big part of the event, so use the Sing Up Song Bank to find the most appropriate material to sing.