Spring 2020 Extra: Creative Home Learning
Wiltshire & Swindon CEP news
Well, these are unusual and challenging times due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and we hope you are all doing ok. This e-news focuses on some creative resources for staff, parents and young people whilst the majority are now at home, and some links to interesting reading to catch up on.
Creative and cultural activities are a fantastic way for anyone to support their wellbeing, learning and teaching, and so we'll keep bringing you inspiring stories and links. We also need to remember the self-employed artists, musicians, cultural workers and practitioners of all kinds, who will be some of the most affected by this crisis, and so we will be sharing ideas in future bulletins of how we can support these colleagues to continue to bring the arts and cultural learning to our young people.
We are sending all schools, arts & cultural organisations and practitioners, our very best wishes.
Stay well, the W&SCEP team
Open Fund Round 1 project profile: 'Living Language' at Drove Primary School
Drove Primary in Swindon, worked with Prime Theatre to offer 120 children across 4 classes in years 3-6, six weeks of drama workshops inspired by poetry or English set texts related to topic themes. This culminated in a performance to the wider school and parents. This project not only supported English learning, but also celebrated diversity across the school with 79% of students at Drove identified as having English as an additional language, and 43 different first languages spoken!
Assistant Principal, Scott James, gave an update on the project;
“All 120 have performed in front of parents, teachers and their peers this term, and said that they enjoyed the process which gave purpose to their work in drama. The project adheres to our whole school intent of providing children with a language rich education to overcome academic difficulties associated with high levels of EAL. Some children have really overcome their fear and embarrassment of talking and performing in front of others, and have become more confident and resilient as a result.'
As with each Open Fund projects, one of the W&SCEP Cultural Champions visits the school to see activity. Sharon Hodge from Ridgeway School visited Drove, and fed back on her visit; 'It was lovely to spend time with the young people participating in the project – they were superb advocates for the school. The energetic and enthusiastic way in which they were approaching both language and drama in ‘The Tempest’ was wonderful and they were so keen to share their learning and performance skills! It was a real privilege to be there.”
Creative & cultural resources to help stay sane!
There are some wonderful online resources being provided at this time, and more becoming available each day. Thanks to Meril Morgan, Arts Lead at Wiltshire Council, for these links!
For young people & parents:
Creativity Works have highlighted some free, creative resources for you to access from home:
Museum tours: Visit 12 famous Museums from your own home
The MARCH network has listed a fantastic and growing list of ways anyone can use creativity to stay well during self-isolation.
And Pobble.com have come up with 25 fun and meaningful activities that can be done at home to support independent learning.
For arts & cultural organisations and practiitoners:
A new website has been created to give freelance artists access to invaluable resources throughout these uncertain times.
The Creative Industries Federation has collated advice from across the sector to provide guidance to those in the creative industries who are affected by the Coronavirus and its fallout.
And keep updated on news at the Arts Council's website.
NB: The 'Let's Create' image actually relates to the Arts Council England's new strategy link below.
Catch up on some cultural education reading
In 2017, the Cultural learning Alliance (CLA) wrote; 'Children who engage in the arts are more likely to volunteer and to vote. We need future citizens who can engage with major global challenges – and we will need a diverse array of artists who can produce the art which will inspire and challenge us.'
There is no clearer time to see that the above statement is so true. Please do read the 2019 follow up paper to this from the CLA, called: ‘The Arts for Every Child’.
You can also catch up on their other important briefings, and see this overview of a recent talk given by Lizzie Crump, Co-Director of the CLA, titled: ‘What is the role of creative and cultural learning in a quality education?’
And finally for now, if you haven't seen it already, have a peruse of the Arts Council England's new 10 year strategy: Let’s Create. Focusing on Creative People, Cultural Communities, and A Creative & Cultural Country. Sounds good to us!
Stay in touch with the latest cultural news in Wiltshire
Visit The Arts In Wiltshire and its arts and education posts to keep up to date with developments and opportunities.
Get involved in the Cultural Education Partnership
The Wiltshire & Swindon Cultural Education Partnership (W&SCEP) will be bringing more opportunities for schools to connect with and develop cultural education for their students in 2020. If your school would like to be involved in future initiatives please get in touch.
Please pass on this e-news to anyone you think would be interested, who can then can sign up to the W&SCEP mailing list below.
