Nativities, Musicals And Making Christmas 2020 Special!

13/10/2020

Christmas is such an important time in the school calendar – and this year more than ever. We all need something to look forward to and the school nativity or Christmas musical is a highlight of the term. Whether your school is singing in bubbles large or small, inside or outside, recording, streaming or planning a safe live performance, our uplifting nativities and musicals can still take place.


Each year in Newcastle, a rather lovely tradition has taken place for several years now – long before covid19! Inner city schools have ventured down to one of our local city farms and performed our musicals outside in the farmyard, with accompanying hens pecking around. Yes some of the angels sported warm anoraks under their sparkly wings, and the shepherds might have had woolly hats tugged down over their proudly worn tea-towels, but the festive glee was palpable, to the delight of parents as a hugely appreciative outdoor audience. 

Could your school similarly perform at a suitable local outdoor venue this Christmas? What about performing your musical outdoors in your playground? So far in Newcastle we’ve ALWAYS been lucky with the weather during our outdoor inner city farm performances! 

If your school doesn’t feel that a school performance is appropriate this Christmas, you can still use our musicals and children can still enjoy them. Why not simply read the story of the musical to the children – and play them the songs to listen to? (Our stories are all written to stand alone perfectly!) Our nativity musicals for the youngest of children have lots of repetition in the simple storylines. They might enjoy joining in with the repetitive phrases! And the stories in our Christmas musicals for older primary children are gently humorous, always with an underlying message. There’s more to them for children to enjoy than initially meets the eye (or ear!)

It's lovely if your school feels able to sing safely. Some schools sing outside; others open their windows wide to create good ventilation, and feel comfortable with children singing (more quietly) in small bubbles. Some sing with children aligned back to back (interesting sound!) Other schools, for all sorts of reasons, do not feel that they can yet sing safely. If this your school, children can still have the experience and joy music making. 

But how to do it? To start simply, children can really enjoy just listening to our songs. Each of our CDs or downloads come with Katy, our singer, singing the songs to beautifully arranged tracks. Grumpy Sheep songs come in every style and mood, with lyrics that are interesting, fact-filled, or just plain fun! 

Keeping to a wintry Christmas theme, you can play our songs to calm children and encourage a peaceful atmosphere perhaps at story time or at the end of a school day. Just For You for example, is a lovely serene lullaby! You could use our songs to excite interest in a special wintry theme (such as Arctic wildlife) with our Arctic Fox song, or listen to the songs (and their lyrics) to start classroom discussions and encourage thought eg Be More Snowflake.

Want to do more without singing? Children can make up actions to our songs, and dance to them too, perhaps taking it in turns to dance in small groups or make up a special dance routine! How about Scruffy Shepherds?! They can sign to the songs, clap the rhythms as they listen and perhaps add (safe and appropriate) percussion instruments or body sounds.

There’s lots you can do with our musicals, stories and songs to make your Christmas 2020 celebrations in school even more special and memorable for children and their parents. We hope you feel inspired to do it!

Just click here to see our much-loved musicals and nativities to help make Christmas 2020 special in the very best way possible.
 
#CanDoMusic #LetMusicLive