The Musselburgh Grammar School Guitar Hero Transition Project – Background Information and Timeline

 

I’m trying to pull information together about our Musselburgh Cluster Guitar Hero Transition Project. I’ve not been very good at writing about it as the project progresses but I will eventually pull everything together and document the complete project over on the Edubuzz Guitar Hero Site. I know that Derek is also keen to write up the project as a model of good practice over on the Consolarium website.

The project has three distinct stages:

• Using Guitar Hero as a Context for Learning in      P7 between Easter and the Summer 2008.
• Bringing all P7 classes together for Virtual      Battle of the Bands in June 2008.
• Follow up work related to the context for      learning in some secondary subject areas up until the September holiday      weekend 2008.

Here’s a small time line to demonstrate how the project has progressed until the implementation of stage one of the project.

• I was impressed with Case Study of the pilot      project that occurred up in Aberdeen and also keen to improve the flow      between primary and secondary education within the Musselburgh Cluster. I      was also keen to build relationships between primary and primary and primary      and secondary colleagues.

• In October 2007 I suggested at a cluster head      teachers meeting that Games Based Learning might be an area we could take      forward as a cluster. I offered to source the funding for such a project      if all of the schools came on board.

• By November 2007 I had scrapped together enough      funding from a variety of sources to buy each of the associated primary      schools a PS2, Guitar Hero Three and an additional Guitar Remote Control.      I also found funding for a copy of Buzz the Schools Quiz for each of the      schools.

• By January 2008 all of the funding had arrived and      we were in a position to order the equipment. The first wave of equipment      arrived at the end of January, however we had to wait for our additional      guitar controllers until the end of March.

• On the 25^th February 2008 we held our      first meeting with P7 teachers. Despite the message not quite reaching      some of them from their HT’s that they were going to be participating in      this project some very enthusiastic P7 teachers embraced the technology      and embraced the challenge!

• During the Easter Holidays a huge amount of      planning was done by many of the associated primary schools. These plans      will be shared shortly.

Project Implementation Stage One

Between the Easter and Summer 2008, Stage One of the project took place. Stage One of the project was use Guitar Hero as a context and stimulus for learning. During the term a huge amount of learning took place in each of our associated primary schools using the game and the theme of rock music. Each school was given ownership on how they took the project forward but some examples of the work included:

• Creative writing on fictional bands
• Character studies on fictional and real band      members
• Band animations
• Learning to DJ
• Disco and rock dancing
• T-shirt design
• Marketing and learning about profit and loss
• Making models
• Learning and playing music
• Geography through the use of the world tour
• Venue and city studies
• And loads more!

As part of our planning two of our schools also put on a fantastic showcase. Which I have written about previously.

Project Implementation Stage Two

I will tackle this in a separate post -  which I have already half written!

 

 

Comments

[Moira Thompson]

Heard about this down in Gateshead. Look forward to the stage 2 info. Some amazing stuff on the site.

Moira

[Learning Guitar]

Nice