REMOTE LEARNING EXAMPLES

A Fast Penguin - Music by a Grade 5 student

On Site Examples

Students played instruments and made vocal sounds to tell the penguins story.

They are editing the soundscape in remote learning.

Developing A Process For Composing

The examples on this page demonstrate a process of reading the story, discussing the themes and then creating musical compositions.

Since these compositions have been posted we have also added other dimensions to the compositional process which include multimodal experiences which result in a wide variety of emotional paths. These compositions will be posted soon.

How these videos were made

Each grade created a four movement suite based on the story of Migaloo.

They created these four sections which are concise summaries of the story.

First Movement

The Birth of Migaloo

Second Movement

Migration of the Humpback Whales

Third Movement

Predators and Danger

Fourth Movement

Antarctica

The students divided into small groups and worked on one movement each. They created compositional guidelines using adjectives which described their section. They then chose instruments and created a movement which brought that section of the story to life using music. See examples below.

MIGALOO SONG GRADE 3

First section

Smooth, gentle, calm, talking about Migaloo’s birth

Beach washy foam.calm meditation. Happy, Relaxing and Quiet

Second Section

Go deeper, still gentle and calm though, because now we are talking about the whale song changing and taking the whales on their journey. Their migration. Start soft and gradually get louder.

Third Section

Louder, deeper, jumpy, scarier, frightening, sharks and giant waves, storms, danger, catastrophic, fast music talking about the dangerous part of their trip. Crashes and bangs.scary drama/dramatic out of control, slapping tails.

Fourth Section

Deep south, Antarctica. Calm, plenty of water, icebergs, food, other sea creatures, friends. Smooth. Soft volume for relaxation, Change of instruments, peaceful, calm and gentle. Relieving sounds. time like a clock.

MIGALOO SONG -GRADE 3

First Section

Calm, gentle beat, times with silence, slow and soft, smooth, medium at times, up and down in pitch, feel quite, happy, relaxed, voices making the whale sounds, waves moving softly, cheerful, low temper(not angry) peaceful and use glockenspiels softly and fast but slow, splashy, wooshy sort of sound fast bat not to fast

Second Section

Waves are starting to crash a bit more, a bit excited, maybe a little nervous too about the journey, crescendo, echoing sounds, tiring, building up towards not too loud not too soft.

Start doing whale sounds.

Third Section

Jumpy, loud, high, low, fast, dangerous, crashing, deeper, scary, wavy, desperate, anxious, drums banging, shaking, rumbling, darker, frightened, cloudy, rough, violent, hear a big smack, thwack, dern, dern, dern (but not too loud)

Fourth Section

Change of instruments, safe and calm, gliding, crackly slow beat, icy cold, peaceful, soft, sounds that we haven’t used before, as doing mediation, happy relieved happy back to start icy relaxing glad excited amazed

MIGALOO GRADE 5

Migaloo being born - A new start

Calm, slow- lento, soft- piano, gentle, quiet like meditation music, peaceful, beautiful, thumb piano, chimes

stay loud

Movement

Migration People / Time to move

Piano, not too loud and busy, a little jumpy-staccato, fast - presto, ecstatic, adventurous, happy, anxious, hopeful, whale song that repeats as a theme in this music, red boomwhacker for whalesong, overwhelming

Boomwhacker up for Cooper’s calls

Movement

Sharks! Danger! Whalesong / Not so safe place

Percussion instruments drum bangs to start, dark, fast and loud, getting faster, and stopping/pauses/interrupted music, whalesong calling for help, going up, boomwhackers, nerve-wracking, cymbals, piano/keyboard

No keyboard at the end, Big bang, ff, Spread out for recording, Keyboard P at the start, CRESCENDO, Oliver

Fourth Movement

Arriving in Antarctica / A Whole New World

Joyful, happy, relaxed, safe, cool waters, ukelele, xylophone/glockenspiel, new, calm, excitement, tropical, home, comfortable, fresh, peaceful, harmony, meditation like, bells, chime bars.

Lose boomwhackers, and add maracas, triangles and cymbals, alternate loud and soft, individual sounds then find a time to bring it all together

BIRTH OF MIGALOO

The Birth of Migaloo

Joy, soft - piano, happiness, high pitched, long and legato, content, classical, safe

Get rid of the cow bell

Two wooden xylophones and one Glockenspiel, pp,

Second Movement

Migration of the Humpback Whales

Changing, waves changing, calm and soft changing to a little bit rough and crashing, whale calls strong and loud, low pitch alternating with high pitch

same sounds over and over again [ change it a bit]

When the bells come in it's a bit loud.

Do the pattern twice mix it up then repeat.

Triangle soft sounds. Two whale calls not one.

Too long, it doesn't make sense.

Third Movement

Predators and Danger

Loud, high scream-like, fast, banging sounds, accelerando then deccelerando, crescendo and decrescendo, staccato, thrash

Lose egg maracas

Fourth Movement

Antarctica

Soft wind blowing, piano sounds, smooth sailing, gentle whale calls, ukelele, violin heaven sound, bells, bar chimes

Student song idea #1

Listen to the song idea below.

Can you create a new part to the song?

Which character in the story do you think could sing this song?

Listen to the song below by Annie Kwok.

Choose some words from the list which describe the mood of the song.

celebration lonely hopeful reckless angry peaceful

remorseful lazy chaotic smooth bumpy still

playful dark bouncing flowing spinning friendly