- Published on
Time for a new adventure
by Liz Dunbar
In 2021 I uploaded my first post to the @HuntSchoolMusic website.
At this point I'm supposed to say that it feels like yesterday - but it doesn't - it feels like a really long time ago because so much has happened in the past three years.
What began as an online collection of blended-learning materials for KS3 and GCSE students, has grown into something much bigger.
2024 is my final year at Huntington and so a new adventure begins.
I've set the ball rolling by gathering and augmenting some of the stuff I've written in recent years.
To inform the process, I've talked to a lot of music teachers and cover managers who work in a range of school settings.
The following requests have come up, time and time again:
- Decent quality 'musical' cover lessons that can be delivered by non-specialists
- Examples of high-quality schemes to use as models
- Elements driven teaching resources for GCSE
- Meaningful, musical homeworks
- Twilight training sessions
Site content in the first phase:
A growing collection of......
- Specialist KS3 teaching resources, non-specialist cover, GCSE Practice Questions materials.
- Commissioned KS3 schemes for the David Ross Education Trust, the Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust and the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.
- GCSE specialists teaching resources, non-specialist cover, GCSE Practice Questions materials, some of which are specific to the AQA course, and some which are pertinent to all KS4 courses.
- A-level research materials, playlists, skeleton scores and essay practice questions, specific to the Pearson Edexcel course.
- Bach chorale exercises, relevant to any course. I'm not going to try to repeat or replicated the great work of Alex Aitken or Tom Pankhurt - their resources and knowledge are knock out. I'm simply sharing the exercises I've created for students and describing how I teach with them. I've lived that life in the early days of teaching - scrabbling around, trying to find the perfect chorale melody for a lesson that's happening in 10 minutes. Now you've got time to nip to the loo instead. Just open the exercise in a new tab, project it onto the whiteboard and you're off.
- A blog - that I would like to grow with the help of guest writers. I want it to be useful above all else - a collection of thoughts, articles, teaching approaches, links to associations and organisations - stuff that might save you a bit of time or provide a bit of insight.
- Diagrams and illustrations that I've drawn over the years which can be projected full screen, added to student workbooks or printed for displays. I'm very much of the William Morris school of thought when it comes to classroom displays.
And if this thing takes off and people like it, then I'll respond to requests and shape future resources around what teachers tell me they need most.
How you can contribute to the early stages of the website's development
Take a look and tell me
- How intuitive the website is to navigate
- If something's not working
- Where I've made mistakes
- What you'd like more of
- Anything else you'd find useful
If there's something specific you'd like to commission me to write for your department or organisation, then please do get in touch.
Thank Yous:
- Buffy Breakwell, Tim Burnage and Ian Wilson, aka @huntschoolmusic. You have supported me and kept me sane through thick and thin. I can't thank you enough.
And a whole bunch of fabulous people who have provided great feedback, advice and inspiration:
(in no particular order...)
- Simon Toyne, Don Gillthorpe, Asha Bishop, Liz Gleed, Lewis Edney, Patrick Johns, Alex Aitken, Martin Suckling, Rob Carr, Robert Hollingworth and Jan Marshall.
And thank you for reading....
Liz