Friday, March 22, 2019

The Spring Equinox Ceremony


The spring equinox happens once a year and it is when there is equal day and night , this happens due to the earth tilting so that the sun shines directly above the celestial equator (EarthSky, 2019). The celestial equator is “the imaginary line in the sky above the Earth’s equator – from south to north” (TimeandDate, 2019). The spring equinox signifies the start of spring, where it starts to get warmer and plants and flowers begin to grow once again, plants need water, light and warmth in order to grow therefore spring is the best time for this to occur as there is more daylight each day and the rainy weather gives the plants water to grow (BBC news, 2019).

This year the Spring Equinox is: WEDNESDAY 20TH MARCH 2019 and it occurred at 9:58pm
According to Google (2019)


As part of AOLE 2, me and my seminar group participated in teaching a group of pupils to carry out a musical ceremony for the spring equinox using music and dance. We got them to do a warm up where they had to run/fast walk around the dance studio then stop and either point, do a gesture, jump or spin when one of us shouted it out. This enabled them to do some physical activity and have fun at the same time and it also enabled them to form a bond with us before we started the spring equinox musical ceremony with them. After the warm up we split the group into a musical group and a dance group, the children chose what group they wanted to be in as it was child led. As the session was child led, it enabled us to watch the children explore, discover and invent a ceremony through music and dance in relation to the spring equinox (Nature Play, 2017) which was really interesting. I was with the musical group with around 9 pupils. We got the children to clap along to a beat of 8 in order to match the beat of the dancers so that when it all got put together at the it would match match up and fit in with each other. After they were familiar with the beat they were able to choose the instruments that they wanted such as drums and bird whistles. We got them to think about the sounds of spring and how they would play it on their instruments such as bird sounds and earthy sounds due to flowers growing. The children could choose how they played their instruments as long as it felt to them as they were celebrating spring and what it was all about. They rehearsed it multiple times to get it perfect and correct any mistakes throughout in order to improve. This could be linked to authentic learning as this session included reflection (metacognition) as they reflected on what they did in order to improve, collabteration with other pupils to make the ceremony and a polished product when the music and dance group got together to make the whole ceremony complete together (Lombardi, 2007). When the music and dance group had completed their rehearsals, it was put together. The end result was magical. The children looked like they were really enjoying themselves and they were able to see what they had achieved and experienced all together.


By experiencing this musical ceremony as a class it could be seen as they felt a sense of Communitas. “Communitas may be found when people engage in a collective task with full attention” and they may experience “flow” whilst doing an activity, communitas also means that everyone is equal when bonding over the task (E. Turner, 2012, p.4). Whilst the children were participating in the musical ceremony for the spring equinox there was music in the background to support them for the warm but for the actual ceremony the children made up their own music which brought the music and dancers together in harmony. “Communitas is revealed through the flow of music and harmony, often the way the joy of the community is communicated” (E. Turner, 2012, p.10). Turner (2012) also said that when music is being played everyone is altogether in the sound and everyone is one, this is what happened during the ceremony, every pupil felt like they were a part of each other and the wider community.


“Participants relate to musical sounds, to each other and to the physical context in which they interact.” (Small 1998, pp.183–184). This is true as when the pupils were listening to the music they created and looked at what the dancers created so they were able to relate to each other and understand each other without using words to make a special musical ceremony. The children who were doing the music would listen to each other and build upon it each time so that they would not repeat themselves too much and to also make the music as good as they possibly could. This is also backed up by what Small (1998) said which is that 'musicking' is an important component in understanding yourselves and the people around you and understanding the relationships with other people and creatures that share our planet. The children were able to do this by reflecting on what spring is all about and what happens such as new animals being born, flowers growing and warmer weather, they were able to see how important the planet is and their role in it.

To improve this session for future reference, it could have been performed or made outside in the wooded area in the University to make them be out in nature when they were doing their ceremony to connect them more to nature. However, due to the weather conditions this could not happen. The children would have been able to use natural resources to aid their learning and performance (The Druid Network). Also, by going out in the wooded area for the spring equinox ceremony it may have given them more ideas with the music or dance as being in nature can improve creativity (Roots of Nature, 2018). For example, the children could have used the sticks to bang the drums or used leaves on the floor during their dance routine to include nature in their dance as they linked spring equinox a lot with nature and flowers when they were explaining what it meant to them. It may have also made the children feel more connected to nature if they were doing it outside. Edgington (2002) suggests that being in the outdoors changed the sort of learning experiences that children have, Waite and Davies (2007) adds to this and says that free-play and child-initiated exploration of the natural environment engages children to a greater extent more than adult-led activities. Therefor, if the children were outdoors doing the musical ceremony there would have been a chance that they would have engaged more and enjoyed themselves more than they did doing it in the dance studio.

References:

  • Edgington, M. 2002. The great outdoors. London: Early Education.
  • Lombardi, M. (2007) Authentic Learning for the 21st century: An Overview. Educause Learning Initiative, (1) 1 - 12
  • Small, C. (1998) Musicking. New England. Wesleyan University Press.
  • Turner, E. (2012) Communitas. The Anthropology of Collective Joy. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Waite, S., and B. Davis. 2007. The contribution of free play and structured activities in Forest School to learning beyond cognition: An English case. In Learning beyond cognition, ed. B. Ravn and N. Kryger, 257–74. Copenhagen: the Danish University of Education.


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