Ruth Thompson
Music education has been at the heart of Ruth’s teaching career for over 30 years now. Initially trained as an Early Childhood Teacher, her love of music meant offering musical experiences in all her classrooms. Her career has led her into early childhood settings, infants and primary school and private colleges, as well as being called upon regularly to deliver music education to teachers. Taking up full time work as a Classroom Music Specialist in Qld in the early 1990s led her into further studies with University of Qld and Kodàly Music Education Institute of Australia. The philosophy of Kodàly, “music for children, music for life”, has inspired her own practice, undergirded ALL her planning and continues to inspire her teaching on a daily basis.
“Specialisation in early childhood and music education, has enabled me to deepen my understanding of the value of a sequential music program for children as young as babies, and the immense impact it has on their learning, language development, socialisation, physical and emotional well being, identity and self expression.” Ruth’s research based syllabus, aligned to the Early Years Learning Framework, is in place in her own specialised music school, Early Years Music School based in Orange, NSW. It has also inspired a new digital offering, Teachable Music, providing teachers and staff in the early childhood sector an expanding library of videos that aims to make music teaching easy for those feeling ill equipped in this space.
Day 3
| Time | Title |
|---|---|
| Session 2: 11.00 | Joining the Dots – creative ways to utilise quality repertoire across the early childhood sector |
| With early childhood educators needing to teach across a huge developmental range (0-5 years), this workshop is based upon tried and tested repertoire examples, that are developmental, sequential and link to the Early Years Learning Framework. Repertoire will include indigenous music, and Australian composers, appropriate for the early years. I will show you how I take a song, rhyme or recorded music piece and use it across 5 age groups, with or without props, using percussion where appropriate and a range a movement experiences. This workshop will be lots of fun, very active and applicable in your own teaching contexts. | |