Hello and welcome! It's taken a pandemic lockdown to finally get around to starting up the blog posts on my website and I suppose the first thing I should do is introduce myself and what I do.
I am a trained primary school teacher specialising in Music. I have been fortunate enough (in my opinion!) to have been able to sidestep mainstream primary teaching for the most part, spending the majority of my 18 years since qualification teaching music within a whole host of contexts, including being the permanently employed part time teacher of music within a Co. Down for ten years up until 2018.
Funding within the education sector seems to have always been an uphill struggle, particularly within the Arts so it came as no surprise that my post became a luxury my school could no longer afford (not that by any stretch of the imagination do I believe that music education is a luxury but at the time the school had a lot of very difficult decisions to make).
So not wanting to put my experience, talents and strengths to waste, I set myself up with this website and have been available to schools to book me as an experienced music educator in whatever capacity they required ever since. Some of my work is on a weekly basis, some is booked as one off music workshops and most recently I have been providing teacher support on
staff days and also within the classroom to help develop the confidence and independence of mainstream teachers to deliver regular music sessions to their classes. Whatever the booking, my aim is to instil the idea that music matters, education through music matters and regular engagement in music for every single child matters. Music should be available as a medium for all and shouldn't solely be measured by the outcome of the tasks or the level of skill attained (although these measures have their place in other areas of musical achievement, absolutely). I believe that human beings, blossom and bloom through music within the countless contexts it emerges.
When I think back to my time in that permanent post in Co. Down, I ponder over the pupils I didn't get to engage with, but I am determined now to be available to provide the potential for many other boys and girls around the country to have the opportunity to have their education in primary school enriched by making myself available and willing to come and visit, support and educate in whatever capacity a school sees fit. All it takes is the belief by the school that music has the potential to provide very real and far reaching benefits for all who engage in it.
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