School: Telarah Public School (NSW)
Partner: The Song Room
Telarah is a primary school of over 500 students located in Maitland in the Hunter Valley region of NSW. The school is situated in a low socio-economic community and a key challenge is to support and engage students and maintain their regular attendance.
The school saw the establishment of a viable and vital music program as a means of addressing these issues, in the light of international research which demonstrates that ‘children who learn music and art have improved educational, social and personal outcomes’.
The Song Room is a national not-for-profit organisation that provides opportunities for enhanced learning and development for disadvantaged children through music and the arts. Its 'Bring Schools to Life' program provides qualified teachers in the areas of music, dance and drama to schools for a period of six months. These teachers provide staff with professional development, materials, and access to visiting performers, and help schools to set up sustainable music programs.
The Song Room identified Telarah Public School as being in the low socio-economic demographic range and having no formal music program available to students. The school had a large number of musical instruments that were sitting in storage, deteriorating over time. The school had a thriving brass band in the 1970s, but, with the natural attrition of staff, the band had ceased to exist along with any sustained music program, although there was a struggling drumming group and choir. The 'Bring Schools to Life' program was offered to the school and was enthusiastically accepted. It began in Term 3, 2008.
The teaching artist engaged by The Song Room began by teaching demonstration lessons across the primary classrooms for one day per week for a Semester. He also began working with the drumming tutor to improve student engagement and generate enthusiasm among students generally. He arranged for the old brass instruments to be cleaned and repaired and set up a mentoring program to support one of the teachers in the development of a new brass group. A number of community performances were organised, and a music camp took place in Term 1, 2009. The Song Room assessed the school’s music resources and provided a $500 donation for the purchase of new instruments to support the drumming program and the classroom music program. The school organised a program for future music groups, using outside tutors, with a budget designed to keep costs as low as possible.
In 2009, the teaching artist focused on the infant department, visiting classrooms once per fortnight to deliver quality music education to students and to provide teachers with professional development. A regular Singing Assembly was introduced with the assistance of the teaching artist. During the last six weeks of the program, the focus switched to drama, with an appropriate teaching artist provided by The Song Room.
Data was collected during and after the program. It indicated that almost all students demonstrated greater engagement, enthusiasm, class participation and self confidence. Most developed more positive attitudes to the arts and improved communication skills. Eighty-four per cent showed improvement in literacy. Teachers are now much more confident in presenting music lessons and the purchase of new drums has allowed more students to participate. For the first time, a drumming group from the school has performed in public.
The school has set up a committee to promote music within the school and to make sure that the momentum provided by The Song Room is not lost. It is intended to secure the ongoing services of tutors in guitar, drums and brass, to continue with the weekly Singing Assembly for the infant school, and to purchase instruments to support the development of an Aboriginal music and dance group (the school has nearly 60 students of Aboriginal background).
The Impact Award money will enable the school to purchase instruments, continue with music camps, subsidise disadvantaged students to enable their participation in the school’s music program, and provide ongoing professional development and mentoring for staff.
