Youth Music - BongoClub.org.uk

Splat!

Early years music specialist Sue Buntin talks to Bongo Club about her involvement in running Perry Beeches Spat! club for 0-5 year olds. Splat! clubs were started around Birmingham by artSites and give parents and their children the chance to explore music together.

How long ago did Splat! start up?
artSites Birmingham started the Splat! clubs some years and they were funded by Sound Futures. They had quite a few Spat! clubs around Birmingham, based in schools. Perry Beeches is one of the artSites Splat! clubs and Splat! is the name they gave to the early years creative work that they do.

How often does Splat! run?
The Splat! clubs are for 0-5 year olds, so some of them run during school time on a weekly basis, but they also have Splat! weeks that they run during the holidays. The main focus with Splat! has been the weekly, term-time clubs.

How did you get involved with Splat!?
The reason I got involved was because I was doing a project just down the road from the nursery school that was hosting Splat! When that finished, someone else was doing the Splat! club and the attendance wasn't very good. Because I had a thriving afternoon community club down the road, it was suggested that I take over the Splat! club at that location. That was in 2004 and it became the Perry Beeches Splat! club.

How did the sessions work?
Splat! ran in two separate hour-long sessions. Originally the first session was advertised for 0-2 year olds, and the second session was aimed at 2-4 year olds. I never adhered to that because you had some parents that might have a 3 and a 1 year old, so the age grouping could put people off. It made it more difficult for me as I had a more diverse age range, but getting parents to come rather than not, was better than restricting participation because of age range. The only thing that I did ask of parents was that they stick to the same group each week, to try and maintain some social continuity for the children.

What happens in the Splat! sessions?
I always open with the Splat! club song, which I composed. There's a little paint brush logo for the Splat! clubs, called Sammy Splat! I found that people were saying "Oh we're going to music" when they came to the sessions and I really wanted to push the name of Splat!, so I involved Sammy Splat! in what I did. Another song we do is called the 'Hello song' and my laminated sticker of Sammy Splat! comes out and ends up on the wall, or the ceiling sometimes, depending on where the children want to put him! It's like using a puppet really and Sammy Splat! is involved in a lot of the songs. In a session, I'll include two other songs or rhymes and then we'll start exploring instruments with my box of percussion instruments. I always try to encourage the parents to join in with the children and come and play with the instruments as well. I see it as a very interactive music session when it comes to getting the parents involved, because I want to give them something that they can go and do at home. I try to heighten their awareness of how music helps with so many aspects of general child development.

How many people come to the sessions?
Normally there are around 12 children and 12 adults, plus myself all crammed into quite a small room!

What do you think the parents get out of it?
When you first get someone coming to the Splat! club, they don't really know what to expect. Sometimes people are a bit wary of what their role might be. I've got a regular group of parents that come to the sessions and I say to them sometimes "you know you sound like a choir!", because they sing really well together. It can be quite a daunting thing to come in and be expected to sing in front of stranger. I always point out that whilst they may not know any of the songs that we sing, they're very simple and we repeat them lots of times. I'm Kodaly trained, so the songs that we choose for the children are very appropriate i.e. quite short with only a few notes. I find that children who have been coming along on a regular basis know the routine really, really well. It's nice when parents start talking to other parents too.

What do the children gain from the sessions?
I think and hope that they gain an enjoyment of music and participating in music. It's also a chance for them to do something with their parents. Quite often the parents will mention that it's the only time they get to do things together. I've got quite a few regular grandparents and child minders that come as well! For the child minders it's really nice for them to come and do something with the children so that they're not in the house all of the time. For the children, there are all the different social skills that they learn along with sharing, waiting and listening!

Funding for music activities

If you're a practitioner looking for funding for music activities, your project could be eligible for funding from Youth Music's First Steps programme.

MusicLeader