Are you looking for No Cost Solutions for Extra Curricular? Budgets are tight for us all and we all need to think about ways to get more students involved in our extra curricular programme. This blog will consider ways in which you can get more students involved without spending loads of money. It will hopefully give you new ideas that will boost what you already offer.
Solution 1 – Making the Extra Inclusive
If you want more students involved, then make your choirs, bands and ensembles inclusive. There is no need to have entry requirements for all your groups, just let students take part. now of course, you may want to have some auditioned ensembles, but make sure that they aren’t all like that. It costs nothing to open up your choir and orchestra!
Solution 2 – Music Society
In January 2022 I started a music society at one of the schools I work for. Quite simply I gathered students together on Mozart’s birthday and told them why Mozart is great. From this starting point we have now had sessions every week and they are led by students, for students. We have had an introduction to opera, grime and musical theatre. We have had students present on their favourite bands, genres, styles and songs. Staff have led sessions, students have Brough along sweets and it is now a regular part of the week. It is inclusive, fun, random and completely free to run.
Solution 3 – Choir
Singing is free and everyone, give or take, can do it. If you want to boost your extra curricular programme without spending any money, then start a singing group. Call it what you want, and sing what you like, but it can be completely free. You don’t need sheet music, you just need lyrics. Students can look the lyrics up on their phones and you can stick to pop and rock songs where you play the chords and come up with the harmonies. Of course you can build more of a choir if you wish, but this is a no cost solution to get you started.
Solution 4 – Composition Club
Composing is free. All you need is an instrument and ideas. A composition club can therefore be completely free and utterly wonderful. Students can bring along their instruments (okay I know they aren’t free) and start making and creating music. It is an extra curricular club that works with anything from 2 to 200 students – although I agree, 2 to 20 is possibly more manageable. If you want to start something new and enhance what you offer, then get students in at lunchtime creating music.
Solution 5 – Listening Party
A similar idea to the Music Society, but this is where students simply come to listen to something. It could be an album, a symphony, opera extracts or a musical. Anything really, but they come along and listen to something and then maybe have a brief chat about it at the end.
Solution 6 – Chair Drumming
I am cheating slightly here because you will need chairs and potentially drum sticks. But I am sure you have both of them in the music room. Chair drumming is where a load of students use chairs to drum – complicated I know! The thing is, it is really fun, loud, but fun. And a chair has several parts to it that all make a different sound. Before long you will have a percussion ensemble that is packed full of students who are having a great time, and you can easily expand from there.
Solution 7 – Use what you’ve got
Take students into your music room, rehearsal room or instrument store. Look at what you’ve got and make music with it. You don’t need to buy new stuff or get sheet music. You just need to use what you have to make music, and again, this can involve any students.
No Cost Solutions for Extra Curricular
If you are looking for new ideas that cost nothing, then hopefully some or all of these will work for you. I think the key thing is that these ideas can also be inclusive and involve any students in your school. These no cost solutions for extra curricular are designed to also enhance what you currently offer and could easily be student led. We want to ensure that as many students as possible are coming into the music department every week. And it might be that this is the starting point on their musical journey and they move on to learning an instrument.