Evaluations

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Content

The programme is based on five modules that make use of the interactive capabilities of computers and incorporates different learning styles. The lesson plans outline the methodologies and these include:

• watching and listening to colourful animations
• reading words and phrases
• reading age-appropriate lyrics
• completing interactive activities on screen
• improving attention and memory skills
• colouring activity sheets
• singing along to audio and backing tracks, etc. (to list but a few).

The songs are interesting, age-appropriate and relate to other areas of the curriculum as outlined above. The award winning animations are stimulating, humorous and include characters of different gender and race. Each animation introduces the song, practices and reviews and each module progresses at the same level.
The children are continually learning without even realising they are learning. 

The extensive teacher’s section is password protected and contains plenty of invaluable resources. In the Teacher’s Area, you can view the whole group summary and individual learner’s summary which allows you to monitor progress. The teacher can also delete names and access the resources quickly. There are also shortcuts to each section of the animation. The real benefits of the software are accessed through the lesson plans for each module. There are six lessons for each of the five modules. They provide aims which can be used when teachers are planning their music schemes. Each lesson has the following headings: aims, introduction, activity, closing, differentiation and assessment. When you click on each heading, for example “activity”, there are suggestions for teaching the module and also shortcuts to the relevant CD resources to go with that step. I found this invaluable as you could link directly to any song, animation or activity sheet suggested.  As you become familiar with the software, this feature may be used more often.