For the
past 30 years obesity in England has been increasing and the
British Government has this week published Healthy
Weight, Healthy Lives, a cross-government strategy for
halting the increase in obesity and supporting the creation
of a healthy society. The new THRASS SING-A-LONG Family
Reading Project, to be launched next week, uses 44 songs to
help teach children to read and encourages parents and
teachers to move and dance with children. It has the
potential to make a significant contribution to meeting the
aims of this new strategy by helping children to develop a
healthy, active life-style.
Everyone knows just how important it is for children to
develop sound literacy skills from an early age and it is
widely accepted that parents can play a very important role
in helping them to do this. However, many parents, and also
teachers and teaching assistants, are not confident with
identifying the one-, two- and three-letter spelling choices
in English words and saying the sounds that they represent.
It
is also widely accepted that music, and in particular
singing, can have a wide range of benefits for children: it
can accelerate learning and improve the memory and, when
combined with movement, it can also help to combat obesity
and increase general physical fitness.
Mindful of this, British educational psychologist, Alan
Davies, an expert in synthetic phonics who has pioneered the
extremely successful THRASS (Teaching Handwriting
Reading And Spelling Skills) phonics programme, has been working
with Janine Plunkett, a music specialist in South Africa, to
develop the THRASS SING-A-LONG Family Reading Project. The
Project revolves around 44 songs that teachers and parents
can sing with children to explain and help them understand
the 44 sounds and 120 main spelling choices of English, and
encourages
teachers
and parents to sing and move to music with the children to
help them read and spell.
The 44
songs, which are featured throughout all the THRASS
SING-A-LONG Family Reading Project resources (a 96-page
hard-back book, an interactive book, an audio CD and a
colouring book), have been written so that they will be real
fun for both children and adults to sing and will also
encourage
teachers
and parents to move to the music and dance
with children. They all have wonderful imaginative titles
such as “The moon fell out of the sky”, “A great big
gorilla” and “You don’t get pandas in Africa”, and really
memorable tunes in different musical styles and dance
rhythms from around the world: African Round, blues,
Charleston, Hawaiian, Irish Dance, jazz, ragtime, reggae,
twist, waltz and many more.
In
addition to accelerating learning, improving the memory,
helping to combat obesity and increasing general physical
fitness, singing can also benefit children, and adults, in
many other ways and there are many reasons why it is such a
great activity for them. Group singing is particularly
powerful in its ability to create a sense of shared purpose,
social unity and collective enjoyment. It is also good for
their emotional well-being, as it can help them express
their emotions, and increase their confidence and
communication skills. Singing also improves circulation,
breathing and posture.
Singing
and moving to music will not come easily to some parents and
teachers so, to make this easier for them, Alan and Janine
have also created MOVE-A-LONG WITH SING-A-LONG one-day
workshops to give parents and teachers group experience of
singing, dancing and performing actions to the 44 songs.
They will be
running THRASS MOVE-A-LONG WITH SING-A-LONG workshops in the
UK, South Africa and other countries, and a MOVE-A-LONG WITH
SING-A-LONG DVD will be available later in the year.
The
THRASS SING-A-LONG Family Reading Project, which in
South Africa will be sponsored by Absa Bank,
a member of the Barclays Group,
and Pritt,
will
be launched on 31 January at Holy Rosary School in
Johannesburg. At the launch, children from 12 schools will
give the world premiere of the SING-A-LONG songs and the
event will be attended by VIPs and international delegates
to the THRASS Absa TalkTogether Conference being hosted by
the University of the Witwatersrand on 31 January and 1
February. Together with parents, teachers and children from
schools in the area, they will have the chance to see the
tremendous potential of the THRASS SING-A-LONG Family
Reading Project.
Everyone who has heard the SING-A-LONG songs has been really
impressed and reactions to a pilot MOVE-A-LONG WITH
SING-A-LONG Workshop held recently were extremely positive.
The children rehearsing for the concert to mark the launch
of the project have all been enjoying the songs and movement
so much that their parents have reported that all they hear
at home is the SING-A-LONG songs!
In
England 18 per cent of two – 15 year olds are now clinically
obese and a further 14 per cent are overweight. One of the
five key elements of the British Government’s new strategy
is therefore the healthy growth and development of children,
with increased participation in physical activity. The
THRASS SING-A-LONG Family Reading Project will certainly
have the potential to make a significant contribution to
reducing obesity by helping children to develop a healthy,
active life-style from an early age through making singing
and movement part of their daily lives, while at the same
time improving their literacy skills.
The THRASS extensive picture-based training website for
schools and parents with easy access to a wide range of
resources and support materials and extensive evidence of
the widespread success of THRASS is at
www.thrass.co.uk
To read about the THRASS SING-A-LONG resources in advance of
the official launch, visit
www.thrass.co.uk/list2008.htm
For
more information about the THRASS Absa TalkTogether Project,
visit
www.talktogether.co.za and
www.thrass.co.uk/talktogether.htm
For
details of THRASS Professional Development Courses that are
held regularly in the UK, Europe, West and Southern Africa
and elsewhere, visit
www.thrass.co.uk/courses.htm
Issued by: THRASS UK News Media Centre
www.thrass.co.uk/nm.htm
Mike Meade, Media Director, +44 1829 741413 Mob: 07970 151
738
mikemeade@thrass.co.uk
Chris Griffiths, International Development, +30 266 203 1207
chrisgriffiths@thrass.co.uk
