Helen Tomlinson from Carlton Minniot Primary School, Thirsk, and Mary Arthur, Burlington Infants and Nursery School, New Malden, report on the installation of musical playgrounds. Such spaces offer children in the Early Years wonderful opportunities for play and experimentation with sound. They are not only seen to support delivery of the Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum, but they foster a positive and wholly inclusive approach to music making.
Carlton Minniot Primary School
Once an area had been designated for development as an early years/foundation/K.S.1 area at our school an ‘outside classroom’ soon appeared complete with stage, climbing wall, play house, willow tunnel; you name it we had it. Then the early years coordinator, Gill MacVean suggested we didn’t quite have everything because, characteristically, she wanted the children to be able to make music outside; to experiment with sound and generally complete the area artistically. Gill thought it would be nice if my older children could create something for her younger children and we both realised this could be a unique learning opportunity.
Armed with examples on D.V.D. and articles from this very magazine we looked at how we could inspire our children to create their own musical environment.
I began in the classroom (school hall) by encouraging my yr5/6 class to find their own sounds, experimenting with their environment and bringing objects in from home which they felt made interesting sounds. We used the sounds in improvised pieces listening critically to the sounds, but also the silences. Progressing from this we set about writing down the properties and qualities of sounds we could make from different categories of instruments within school; the usual percussion(metal/ wood/tuned/un-tuned), strings, brass, wind. Setting them up in a circus meant that small groups of children could move around with clipboards and we also had a group outside drawing plans of the area to determine the best place for our ‘instruments’.
This was rapidly becoming a cross-curricular project, linked with Design & Technology but we were able to facilitate this without losing the music focus during ‘music’. The children responded with enormous enthusiasm to the plan, I think for various reasons. It included music, art, mathematics, science, literacy, history geography… need I go on. We could develop this in every area of the curriculum as necessary and the older children also got a kick out of developing something for the younger ones (a strong impact on citizenship education here) whilst leaving something for the school to remember them by, and, when I’m teaching music in the hall and I hear reception children beating on the big tin cans I certainly remember that yr5/6 group!
We had a trip to the local furniture factory of Treske to look at different ways of using wood and to discuss types of wood which may be useful for our local weather pattern. This made some children think carefully about the materials used and what effect could be achieved. Again, this was to ensure both subjects, within the cross-curricular project, were supported in terms of subject knowledge.
Nearing the end of the summer term we had many written and drawn plans, some as simple as making wind chimes to hang in trees to other magnificent designs for metal barrel glockenspiels. Clearly some plans would not be realised as they were beyond our scope in terms of skill of construction and availability of materials.
Our musical garden is moderate and consists of pipes, large cans, a frying pan, car suspension springs and other items we have been able to string up to be beaten by metal and wooden spoons. We have still to hang tiny bells in the willow to be hidden in the summer by leaves but discovered in the winter. We are proud of our garden, not only as a place for children to enjoy themselves experimenting with sound but also because of the inventiveness and care that went into the design by children that have now left the school. It drew together age groups and curriculum links and most of all gave, and is still inspiring, musical enjoyment for lots of children.
Helen Tomlinson
Burlington Infant & Nursery School,
A while ago I read a very interesting article in Primary Music Today about a Musical Playground that had been installed in a Primary School in Ramsgate. I felt that this would be a brilliant resource for our large multi-cultural Infant and Nursery School in New Malden, Surrey, and got in touch with the person behind this outstanding resource, Eliot Baron, in Pembrokeshire. Eliot sent details of all his instruments with photographs and articles of recent installations in schools throughout the country.
Several months later, after deciding which instruments we would like for the first phase we were ready to place an order. We had been fortunate to secure generous funding from our Parent Schools Association and won a grant from Canbury Music Awards after submitting an application to this local music charity.
While Eliot was making our instruments we were getting together a team of dads to help with the installation. We had chosen
· A three way musical play design with chimes, marimba and gongs
· 5 aluminium slit tubes in an oak frame
· 5 slap tubes in oak framework (we had great fun collecting together different “slappers” for this instrument - old flip flops, cork mats, table tennis bats, plastic trays - all making different sounds while hitting the ends of the pipes).
So to the installation day - a rather wet and muddy one in January, but our team of strong dads were not deterred and worked hard, ably assisted and patiently directed by Eliot.
After it was installed our children learnt a lot about the instruments – how they worked, how the sounds could be made and changed and enjoyed making wonderful music together in Eliot’s workshops.
I composed a special song for the Grand Opening of our Musical Playground when Eliot returned as guest of honour in April to cut the ribbon and listen to the beautiful sounds the children had composed on his fantastic instruments.
We had an idea that a few more instruments with different timbres could be added to an existing pergola on the Musical Playground, so Eliot has recently returned to install a set of twelve touch chimes, xylo bars, aluminium chimes and a hard wood marimba.
We have added a tree bark surround so the children can now use it not only at play times but during music lessons, after school music club and when Foundation Stage have their Outdoor Learning week. We are all enjoying using this fantastic resource ( all made from re-cycled materials) and thank Eliot Baron for sharing his wealth of experience with us and commitment to the success of our project at Burlington.
Mary Arthur