Blackfriars Primary School is a council-run school in the southside of Glasgow, Scotland. Blackfriars currently runs ‘Baby Strings’, a hands-off, external expert-led course that introduces children in early years settings to violins and sheet music. Due to the pandemic, progress in this course has not been as consistent as previous years had been. Soundbops was trialled for an afternoon in a P2 and P3 class to see how teachers and children responded to working with our new songs and educational resources.

After being introduced to the instrument, children were allowed to work through songs and try out different tasks from our ‘Soundbops on Safari’ project.

Class teacher Mrs. Macmillan felt that Soundbops and its resources offered a “great introduction to music, the fact that all the notes are there, and they can be playing all the notes, and they can put them into different orders, I think that’s a great idea.”

Mrs. MacMillan found that Soundbops acted as an accessible way for the pupils to engage in music. Children in both classes were drawn to Soundbops tactile pieces and bright simplified notation. “The kids were really engaged, especially the ASN children, and children who actually have difficulty reading, I could see that they were following the musical notes in the book.” She felt that across the board “they got a lot out of it today, really enjoyed it.”

As for accessibility for teachers, Mrs. MacMillan felt that the resources were more than competent for educational use “having had a quick look through the workbooks and things, it certainly is very comprehensive.” She remarked that she “wasn’t a musical teacher” adding that “I think it’s very easy for a non-musical teacher to pick up and run with.”