"Music is a fundamental form of expression, both personal and cultural... By making, sharing, and responding to music, students contribute to the cultural life of their schools." NZC

Music is one of the four branches of "The Arts" in the New Zealand Curriculum (alongside Visual Arts, Dance & Drama). It is then broken down into four aspects; developing the arts in context, developing practical knowledge, developing ideas & communicating and interpreting. 

So far this year at Māpua school this has been explored in a number of ways: 

The Intermediate Team spent time exploring drumming, using a program called Rad Rhythm. This involved exploring different sounds, rhythms & performance elements. This programme also highlighted drumming from a cultural perspective. It looked at different types of music around the world, with a particular focus on drumming. 

This term the Seniors have been exploring the basic elements of music: beat, rhythm, pitch, tempo, dynamics, and tone colour. We have added sound effects to fairy tales to enhance them, listened and responded to music, discussed how the composer / writer has used different elements to tell a story or create an emotion. We have explored sound scapes, and learnt basic ukulele chords. Recently Manuka students performed "Rip Tide" at assembly after just 2 weeks of learning the ukulele - no mean feat! A crowd favourite has been exploring online music creators such as Incredibox and Chrome Music Lab. Students have really enjoyed making their own music and have been proud of their creations.

The Middle & Junior school have focused largely on singing; waiata and songs with actions to them. Since Strike visited school Harakeke has been doing a lot of drumming in their learning through play in the morning. They have also looked at different rhythms and repeating rhythms.  

Whole school or syndicate singing are a regular feature in all programmes, exploring a range of songs, new and old.

At Māpua we also offer a few extra curricular opportunities for students to pursue music in a variety of ways, with choir, kapa haka, school bands and guitar lessons. Our school bands a ramping up preparation to perform at the upcoming Rockfest at Broadgreen Intermediate early next term. Keep an eye out for their practice performances at school before they head over the share what they have prepared with all the other primary schools bands from Nelson.