Magazine Article - Sing Up - Let's get the whole place singing!

Educating children is one of the most challenging and rewarding vocations; and the greater the challenge, usually the greater the reward.

For those who work with children who have special educational needs (SEN), the working day can be even more challenging and rewarding. The frustration experienced by many children with SEN can often lead to low self-esteem. It can take much time, work and patience on the part of children and teachers to address issues of confidence, self-worth and emotional wellbeing.

SEAL/PSHE

Ask children to bring photographs of themselves with important people in their lives, or doing things which are special to them. Use these as a stimulus for brainstorming the question “Who am I?” Help children to draw round each other on paper to create life-sized outlines and stick their photos inside. Encourage them to add information such as:
– a self-portrait
– a piece of work, such as an acrostic on their first name
– a map or photo of where they live
– a fact file – birthday, eye/hair colour, etc.
– magazine cuttings of favourite pop stars or sports personalities.

Brainstorm feelings, and look at pictures of facial expressions of people in a variety of moods. Suggest scenarios and ask them how they would feel. Can they show you, using only facial expressions? What happens to our features when we are happy, bored, angry, proud or scared?
Support them if necessary in using mirrors to look at their expressions. You could take photos of the children modelling these emotions for display, to create a 'matching pairs' or bingo game. You can play online here.

CIRCLE TIME

Go round the group, encouraging children to take turns to say one positive thing about the next person along. This could be about skills, appearance, personality or a special memory.

MATHS/SCIENCE

Link the subject of the song, ie. being ‘OK’, to the Healthy Schools initiative, one theme of which is Healthy Eating. Provide a variety of healthy foods and let the children sample each. Ask them how they will determine the most popular food type – they might suggest a survey, a show of hands or a secret ballot.
Once they have the results, ask them how they could represent their data. In groups, get them to show the information by producing large pictograms, charts or graphs for display outside the classroom.

LITERACY

Ask children to keep an emotions diary, and to write each morning and afternoon about how they’re feeling. Tell them that, although the diary will be read by an adult, it will be up to them to decide whether they wish to discuss the content, and with whom: an adult or a classmate. For those who find writing difficult, provide another means of recording work, eg. a laptop, voice-recognition software or a scribe.

MUSIC

Reinforce the idea of beat and rhythm, while encouraging children to maintain a part within a group performance. Split the class in half: Group 1 marks out the beat by patting alternate knees with hands (left-right-left-right), while Group 2 claps the rhythm of the words. This would also work with instruments: guiros could define the beat (low-high-low-high), with other percussion, eg. claves, playing the rhythm. Once secure, this idea could be extended: split the class into three parts and add the ‘I’m OK (rest-rest)’ rhythm as an ostinato – a short, repeating idea. Promote development of independent performing skills by asking children to work in smaller groups, with one or two to a part.

SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL ASPECTS OF LEARNING

Use the SEAL ‘Good to be me’ materials for KS2 (yellow and green sets), which can be freely downloaded from the national strategies website. There are lots of relevant activities in this resource, including:

– Feeling good about myself
– Being assertive
– Hiding feelings
– Mixed feelings
– Making choices
– Agreeing and disagreeing
– Peer pressure
– Understanding my feelings.
Some children will benefit from the activities in the KS1 materials (blue set). In addition, teachers would do well to familiarise themselves with the silver set, aimed at small groups of KS1 children who need additional support in developing their social, emotional and behavioural skills, but which can be modified for those in KS2.

SPEAKING & LISTENING

Ask children to discuss their strengths and weaknesses. What are they good at? What might they improve at if they practise? What might they always find difficult or impossible? Ask for volunteers to make a short presentation on this theme to the class.

ART & DESIGN/ICT

Promote development of social skills and teamwork by engaging children in a creative whole-class project. For example:
– Ask children to collect photographs and magazine cuttings of favourite things, ie. foods, sports, musicians and places. They then work together on a collage. This would be great if displayed in a public place within the school.
– Find an area around school where children can create a ‘hall of fame’ with their handprints. You could use paint, but wet cement is far more rock ’n’ roll! Don’t forget to add names.
– Take a tour of the outside of the school. Look at and discuss photographs of the buildings, including an aerial view if possible. Check out Google Earth for a satellite view.
Once the children have a clear sense of the school’s structure, get them to make a model of the school by reusing cardboard boxes and other thrown-away materials.
– What do the children think are the most positive aspects of the school? Get them to make and present a film or a podcast aimed at promoting the school in the community. Why not include a film or audio recording of them singing?

DRAMA

Empower children who have low self-esteem by using role-play, which allows them to make decisions as someone else, rather than as themselves. Discuss different scenarios with a moral issue, eg. ‘Some children are calling your friend names.’ Develop each scenario through drama procedures such as hot-seating and thought-tracking, and then use further activities, such as conscience alley, to reach a conclusion. Visit the Drama Resource website for explanations of these and other drama techniques.

Andy Brooke is a teacher, songwriter and freelance writer on music education. He has taught music to all age ranges from nursery to sixth form. He now combines the role of primary school music coordinator with that of SENCO.