Creative arts is mandatory for students from Kindergarten to Year 6.
In creative arts, students discover a variety of art forms through a study of dance, drama, music and visual arts where they learn to appreciate, compose, listen, make and perform.
Each art form has its own unique knowledge and skills, elements or concepts as well as a capacity to inspire and enrich lives.
Music
At Parramatta East Public School, we realise the value of music within our school community. Over recent years, we have been fostering an environment that supports music activities and the creative arts, as we recognise the enormous benefits of music in the lives of all students and in the life of the community. Music is enjoyable in itself, and the developmental learning benefits in children are profound. In addition, the ability music possesses to build a sense of community within our school is wonderful. We now have music in many forms available to our students which are:
- choir
- recorder ensemble
- band
- dance
- class music
- singing.
Class music
At Parramatta East Public School, every student has the opportunity to actively participate in music. As well as the many activities the students may participate in, each class also has a term of music lessons with a qualified music teacher. Class music is very practical, with every student learning to play an instrument. They perform on a variety of percussion instruments and participate in singing and dance activities. The students learn to read rhythmic notation and have the opportunity to experiment with creating their own rhythms and music. The orchestral instruments are studied, and the students listen to and participate in a variety of music styles.
Choir and singing
Our choir teachers do a wonderful job with the choir every week. Students are able to participate in choir from Year 2. They sing with such joy, enthusiasm and energy, it is a credit to them and to their lovely teachers. Every year the choir participates in celebrating the arts festival at the Riverside Theatres and perform with flair at the various concerts held during the year. Throughout the year, classes have the opportunity to participate in weekly singing, which is taken by our music specialist, and provides the students with a fun way of developing their music skills further. Each year the school participates in count us in, where the students sing a preprepared song with thousands of other students around Australia at a set time on the same day. We have a wonderful teacher who prepares the music, and all the class teachers rehearse with the students, who join in enthusiastically.
Recorder ensemble
The recorder program was initiated by the parents and citizens' association (P&C) in 2007 and has gone from strength to strength. It is now open to students in Years 1 to 6. Throughout the last few years, the recorder ensemble has had the opportunity to perform at many school events and large scale concerts. Additionally, every year since 2009, we have taken a group to perform as part of the instrumental festival at the Sydney Opera House, where we have joined with 700 other recorder players in a memorable concert event. We have also had students invited to perform recorder solos in this concert series.
Band
In 2011, we launched our concert band program. We have a growing number of students choosing to learn an instrument in the school band every year. Our band consists of:
- flute
- clarinet
- saxophone,
- trumpet,
- trombone,
- bass guitar
- drums.
Dance
Each year, there are a variety of opportunities for students to participate in dance activities. These include dance items in the celebrating the arts festival at the Riverside Theatres, bollywood dancing and class activities. In Term 4, the whole school participates in the footsteps dance program, and the students perform these dances in the presentation night concert at the end of the year.