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Voices of Experience - KS1-KS2 Workshop with Cyrilla Rowsell & Eva Vendrai
9/10 November 2002 by Betty Power (from BKA Spring 2003 Newsletter)

Mary Place hosted yet another pleasant, well-organised and most inspiring workshop this past Autumn in Godstone, Surrey. Cyrilla Rowsell opened the weekend with a demonstration of work with her own KS1/2 students from several difrerent schools, including the Guildhall. Her aim was to show parents of the students, as well as the observing teachers, how Kodály lessons involve a series of varied activities to develop rhythmic and melodic skills in a sequential way.

In the past, I have only delivered the Preparation Stage as a series of preliminary lessons in which new repertoire is introduced or old is reinforced before making conscious a new element. Cyrilla added a new dimension to this concept for me by preparing the children within the lesson for the next step of the lesson. This makes for a much more unified lesson rather than going from going from a Warm-up/ Greeting to Known song to Rhythm Work, etc, in an unrelated way. For example, before deriving the sol-fa to "Who’s That Tapping At the Window?" (tone set s-m-r-d with a d-s leap), students might first review the game and sol-fa to "See-Saw Up and Down" with the s-d leap on the final bar. This takes VERY CAREFUL planning, but definitely leads to a more thorough – and more successful – learning experience.

Cyrilla’s calm and steady manner, as well as her own excellent musicianship, is reflected also in the lovely blended singing tone of her students. It was indeed fortunate for the observing teachers as well as the parents to see the range of development in a model Kodály programme over 5-6 years’ time from the most simple s-m songs and games to "Play-Sing-Play" three-part work.

It is impossible to relate the wealth of methodological thinking and experience passed on to us by Eva Vendrai that weekend. Her discussions were based on over 30 years’ experience of training teachers in Hungary, the USA, Spain and Great Britain, and represented a crystallisation of deep thought and wisdom. A new idea for me was her analysis of learning activities for children in terms of multi-sensory strategies – how, in our planning lessons for children, we should always be thinking how to attract and engage the use of the aural, visual, oral, and tactile modes. Her own presentations were brilliant models in how to attract and engage discussion – thank you so much to Cyrilla and Eva for your profound insights.