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Year 7 ICreate Curriculum

Year 7 Autumn term

Music

This term learners focus on the basic musical elements that are common to music of all genres. They learn the basics of music notation using 'Body Percussion'. In performance they are encouraged to have an underlying awareness of these elements as they play / sing. Following a theme of 'Hope' that will be covered across the ICreate disciplines, they will form their own 'bands' and devise their own 'cover' version of the song 'This is Me' from 'The Greatest Showman'. During the second half of the term, learners will prepare for the Year 7 Service of Nine Lessons and Carols, held at Holy Trinity Church, Ystrad Mynach.

Drama

During the autumn term, learners will be reflecting on the work that they are doing in the other iCreate subjects and making links. They will explore their initial responses to the theme ’Hope’ and look at ways of expressing this through Drama techniques (developmental and performance). Initially, they  concentrate on vocal and physical skills to improve their confidence. They look at the Greek Chorus and explore the use of spoken techniques, look at group recitation, consider how they could interpret a modern poem/ advert "I am the impossible" and learn about a project developed to support mental wellbeing (Natasha Bedingfield and Philosophy). Later on in the autumn term, learners will look at Hope in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

Art

Learners are encouraged to make connections to the other creative areas of music and drama. They do this through exploring the visual elements which are common to producing all creative work. Following the theme of 'Hope' in the autumn term, learners will develop individual pieces of work using different two dimensional media. Later on in the autumn term,  learners will then investigate three dimensional techniques exploring ‘Hope’ through growth and the natural world. As we near Christmas and the end of the term, this work will then lead onto exploring how trees, including Christmas trees are symbols for hope.

Year 7 Spring term

Music

Personal Identity - Welsh Music. Students will learn to play the Welsh National Anthem (Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau) and will also learn about all things Welsh in music from the Harp to the Stereophonics.  There is a cross curricular link to Welsh where they are required to express their opinions/description of a Welsh Star of their choice.  Skills are built up over time through progressive tasks, quizzes, appraisal and project work. Where circumstances allow, students  will learn to sing the anthem from memory and there is always scope for those that learn to play instruments to have differentiated musical lines (where group work is allowed).  Activities will rely heavily upon building on prior skills. We continue to explore some traditional Welsh folk music (e.g. Ar Hyd y Nos) along with hymn tunes - especially those often encountered in high-profile sporting events such as the Six Nations Rugby tournament. These are selected from Cwm Rhondda, Calon Lân, Men of Harlech and Sospan Fach.

Drama

During the spring term, the students in Year 7 will be focusing on the theme common to iCreate subjects, Identity.  They will consider how they are seen by others and how this ties in with their own vision of their identity. They will create a performance poem where they think about how they are labeled and will explore, through the use of stories from around the world, how similar and dissimilar we are to other cultures. The key questions that they will answer are, 'Who am I?', 'Who are they?' and 'Who are we?'. We will continue to build movement and vocal skills and all lessons will be supported via Google Classroom; there will be a blended approach to learning including research and analysis tasks combined with practical work. The students will use a comprehensive range of resources and will be encouraged to share their work in a variety of formats.

Art

This term students  will explore the theme of identity which is common to the three creative disciplines of art, music and drama.  In art, students will be exploring issues such as ‘what do I look like? Why do I look this way? What makes me different? What makes me the same? How do I want to look?’. They will explore these concerns through developing skills in drawing a portrait using proportion before moving onto more creative work involving mixed media processes.

Year 7 Summer term

Music

Major & Minor TRIADS and TONALITY are introduced through the whole-class singing The Drunken Sailor. This Sea Shanty is then learnt on Keyboards and/or pupil’s instrument of choice (within reason). Personal Identity: Learners then compose a song about themselves and their own lives in a Sea Shanty style. Pupils learn the concept of a SCALE in music. Use of octopus/octave analogy for oct- word stem to help them remember C-C, D-D etc. They learn to play a C Major scale ascending and descending using the correct finger pattern 1,2,3, 1,2,3,4,5. Pupils move on to sing ‘Do-Re-Mi’ from The Sound of Music in two parts. This reinforces the concept of the scale as well as making pupils aware of the Tonic Sol-fa system of pitch labelling. Keyboard activity in pairs (ensure swapping around takes place): One pupil plays Do-Re-Mi melody, the other plays chords.

External provider: It is hoped that Year 7 will be working on an African Drumming project with an external provider at some point during the summer term. This will tie in with the African Punu masks from Gabon and the Republic of Congo work covered in Art lessons.

Drama

During the summer term, the students in Year 7 will continue to focus on the theme common to iCreate subjects, Identity.  Exploring stories from around the world, we will consider how similar and dissimilar we are to other cultures. The key questions are, 'Who am I?', 'Who are they?' and 'Who are we?'. We will think about the way that we communicate ideas to audiences through vocal and movement skills and adapt stimulus stories into performances suitable for a younger audience.  We will look at the components of performance considering confidence, energy, group dynamics and explore production techniques that support and enhance performances.  All lessons will be available in Google Classroom; there will be a blended approach to learning including research and analysis tasks combined with practical work. The students will use a comprehensive range of resources and will be encouraged to share their work in a variety of formats.

Art

During the summer term, learners in Year 7 will continue to focus on the theme common to iCreate subjects, Identity. In this term we will be turning our attention to explore how other cultures portray their identity through performance and mask making. We will do this by concentrating on exploring Punu masks from Gabon and the Republic of Congo. These masks represent idealised beauty and are carved only by men. We will think about the way the makers of Punu masks communicate ideas to audiences about beauty and compare this to the way in which these ideas are  portrayed in our Western society through advertising and social media. Year 7 learners will make a creative response to this through creating their own three-dimensional mask which shows their ideas about how beauty should be represented.

External provider: It is envisaged that Year 7 learners will be working on an African Drumming project in music during this term with an external provider. This experience will help students to make connections, deepen their understanding of how rich African culture is as well as how it differs from our own Western experiences.