Minute of Listening
Minute of Listening is a creative learning project through which Sound and Music hopes to enable every child in the country to gain access to a huge diversity of music and sound and, for sixty seconds each day, to focus on the richness and enjoyment of the act of listening.
SAM, in partnership with EASS, Lambeth CLC, Westminster Schools Music Service, OCM and Music Cornwall, has recently completed a large-scale pilot of the project involving over seventy primary schools around the UK in the regions of Cornwall, Oxfordshire, Norfolk and London. Almost 20,000 children and their teachers engaged in a Minute of Listening each day throughout the Spring term, followed by group discussions and sharing their responses to the sounds they heard.
The following film was made at four primary schools participating in the Minute of Listening pilot:
Minute of Listening uses a custom-built piece of software to deliver one minute of music or sound to school classrooms each day. The project introduces children and teachers to a wide variety of recordings across many genres and from all kinds of sources. In a typical week during the pilot, classes might hear Matthew Herbert's 'An Apple a Day', followed by a field recording of an East London Market from London Sound Survey, before an extract from Beethoven's Symphony no. 5 performed by the Philharmonia Orchestra. The recordings used in Minute of Listening are sometimes exciting, sometimes challenging, but always aimed at arousing the classes' curiosity and capturing their imaginations.
MOL has broadened the children's experience of sound and music. It has developed their interest and inspired dance and music-making activities. It has introduced many unfamiliar sounds and instruments. It has given them the opportunity to talk about the unfamiliar, share their views and ideas.
- Primary teacher involved in the Minute of Listening Pilot
Each day, teachers and their classes are encouraged to follow the Minute of Listening with a short conversation as a class, beginning with the simple question: When you listened, what did you hear?
My class looked forward to it every day and it really brought them
out of their shell (sometimes the more reserved children were the most
expressive) and it brought some great class discussions about the sounds
and their drawing responses. For me, seeing the children feel free to
express themselves through drawing, movement and language was great and
created a great atmosphere in the classroom.
- Primary teacher involved in the Minute of Listening Pilot
Minute of Listening provides a stimulus for imaginative class discussion, reflection and opinion forming, encouraging children to verbally explore what they hear, and supporting speaking and listening agendas. The project also presents an opportunity for children to let their imaginations run wild, and we welcome the idea that there is no right or wrong response when talking subjectively about their individual impressions of what they heard.
The sounds that are used in the project are accompanied by additional supporting resources and material for teachers to use with their classes in a variety of different ways. During the pilot many teachers encouraged children to create visual responses to the sounds they heard in their 'sound diaries'. Others moved to the music, or created poetry and other literacy-based work inspired by what they heard. Sound and Music were particuarly excited to work with the Pitt Rivers Museum and the British Library Sound Archive’s Wildlife Sounds to create two special collections of recordings and resources that were made available to schools from the February half term.
Minute of Listening hopes to demonstrate how daily listening activities can be used to introduce a culture of curious, engaged and reflective listening in the classroom. It also aims to explore how music and sound can be used as a stimulus for analytical thinking and conceptual exploration, and as the basis for open and imaginative class discussion that supports the development of speaking and listening skills.
It's been a wonderful experience which has enriched the lives of the children. Our school is very multi-cultural with many countries and languages represented. The experience has helped to celebrate the world as a whole and has helped us to develop listening skills and music appreciation with the minimum of planning and preparation. A wonderful resource.
- Primary teacher involved in the Minute of Listening Pilot
The Minute of Listening pilot ended on 30th March 2012. The project was comprehensively evaluated by Felicity Woolf Associates, and an Exectutive Summary of the evaluation report can be read here.
Building on the extremely positive response to the project, SAM is now committed to developing Minute of Listening in order to make it accessible to more schools around the country, through a partnership approach that continues the relationships built up with music and arts services (now Music Hubs).
For more information about the project, to read the full evaluation report, or if you are a teacher interested in being involved in future phases of the project, please contact info@soundandmusic.org
