You can find on our YouTube channel a number of short videos introducing Learn Your Scales and Arpeggios, a course of clarinet lessons online for download, and the worksheets to use for this are available from www.planzmusic.com. Most of us are stuck at home more or less all the time at the moment, but students still need some structure in their lives. Now is a good time to get properly on top of this tricky, but essential aspect of learning.
The seriousness of this pandemic must not be underestimated, and many lives depend on us all isolating ourselves, probably for a considerable period – nobody can predict how long. But, in a civilised society, education must continue.
A well-run school music department is a community, a complex network of interactions: successful music-making at all levels is essentially tied up in collective endeavour. For this reason, the necessity for the lockdown has potentially been devastating for music in schools. But we owe it to our children to ensure that they come out of this experience more resilient and more optimistic for the future.
Many schools have stepped impressively up to the mark, putting in place facilities for remote learning, keeping in contact with their students, maintaining the structure of the school day, monitoring work closely. This has been a challenge for instrumental teachers such as myself because our lessons need to be conducted face-to-face. Achieving this while ensuring that all the usual safeguarding measures remain in place requires careful planning and, for everyone’s wellbeing, must be closely monitored by school leaders.
There are a number of platforms for video link-up. My schools have variously chosen Teams or Zoom which can be logged into using approved school email addresses. The signal is not always great, and there is a time lag which prevents providing accompaniment or counting along to keep students in time. Many adjustments are required to make lesson delivery work, but, even after just two weeks, I can see and hear that real progress is being made.
Now is the time for teachers and learners to explore the many online resources that are available to assist home learning. I have always stressed the importance of self-directed learning. And, despite our best endeavours to deliver online teaching, this has never been of greater importance.
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