VOICES OF NATURE
The Voices Of Nature School Music Program draws on a library of eco-songs created by ART since 1989–songs about oceans, rivers, forests, bears, salmon, climate change, endangered species, recycling and related social issues. They are not kids’ song per se, but youth invariably embrace the music and sing it with all their hearts!
Music is the medium.
Songs are the message.
Artists and children are the messengers.
The result is joyous and effective action!
Voices Of Nature is an integrated, cross-curricular, project-based approach to ecological learning through music. ART provides customized rehearsal CDs; students learn songs over 6-12 weeks. Holly Arntzen and
Kevin Wright arrive in the school for a 3-day Artist In Residency to rehearse with students. Students write about the issues raised in the songs, and what they believe people can do to help. The culmination is a professional concert for families and friends, where every child is put in a leadership role to sing out and speak up for nature!
The educational foundation is highly developed and effective. Teachers are given ART’s award-winning Educators’ Handbooks; they provide activities in many subjects that are linked to the song lyrics and fulfill Prescribed Learning Outcomes. Handbooks and CDs are available in English and French, and some are Provincially Recommended by the BC Ministry of Education. The 2017 release, The Watershed Handbook, supports the re-designed BC Curriculum (2016), and has a great deal of Indigenous content.
SONG WRITING COMPONENT
Schools have the option to add a song writing component to their program or they can simply have this component by itself.
(Costs will vary – please contact ART for a quote)
Here is a sample of a song that was written with the grade 5 students at Margaret Jenkins Elementary in Victoria, BC.
The class came up with a theme they wanted to sing about. Then they each wrote down a series of lines reflecting their thoughts on how the world could be a better place and what they might do to change it. Holly and Kevin worked on the music and then together with the class, chose the lyrics that would be included in the song, then pieced them together so they would rhyme and fit musically. And VOILA! The song was then recorded, performed at the concert and included on the concert CD.
