An attitude-changing performance

What did the school want to achieve?

School improvement

The school's main aim was to improve the attitudes to learning of a group of year 8 pupils who caused constant low-level disruption in lessons. It wanted to break this cycle of behaviour and improve the quality of the pupils' learning experience.

Many of the pupils in the target group had little self-belief and the school felt that taking part in an arts performance might raise their self-esteem. By giving them a 'taste of success', the school hoped to achieve a radical shift in the way they viewed both themselves and the school.

In particular, the school wanted to see more positive interaction in and out of the classroom. It focused on developing positive working relationships with peers and staff as part of PHSE. At the same time, lessons looked at the effects of drug-taking on young people and considered ways of resisting peer pressure.

Pupils' arts education

The school wanted to raise pupils' attainment in the arts by giving them the opportunity to develop new skills in music and drama and to share arts experiences through performance. In particular, the school wanted pupils to:

Music

• understand how hip-hop and rap relate to the time and place in which they are created and heard;
• create their own songs using chord sequence, hook lines, lyrics and musical software;

Drama

• understand how theatre can explore, and express ideas about, important issues;
• create their own performance using dramatic dialogue, story telling, episodic scenarios and other dramatic conventions.

In both music and drama, the school wanted pupils to be able to perform with confidence.