Performance Arts

The Arts have the capacity to engage, inspire and enrich all students, exciting the imagination and encouraging them to reach their creative and expressive potential. The Western Australian curriculum is written on the basis that all students will study at least two Arts subjects. It is a requirement that students experience a performance subject and a visual subject. Performance Arts comprises three areas: Dance, Drama and Music. At St Kieran Catholic Primary School, students from Pre-Primary to Year 6 work with a specialist teacher for one hour a week studying both Dance and Drama. Kindy students are engaged in a 30-minute lesson every week.

 We strive to provide engaging learning tasks where all students at St Kieran’s can participate in Dance and Drama in a fun and safe environment. They practise teacher instructed routines to build their self-confidence and broaden their repertoire of movements. Lessons include opportunities for students to create their own dance sequences and contribute to group performances. A primary focus is to be active and develop gross motor skills and coordination. Our students benefit from opportunities to practise fundamental locomotor and non-locomotor skills in the lower years and progress to more complex combinations of movements in the upper years. Activities are tailored to suit developmental needs and incorporate body and spatial awareness, improving strength, balance, and control. We promote healthy habits that encompass physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing.

 Our students learn that Performance Arts have a purpose to entertain, inform, challenge, and encourage responses. Learning activities are designed to facilitate reflection, discussion, and explanation of both their own and others’ performances. Students across all year levels explore the meaning of dance and drama as creators, performers, and audience members. They develop their capacity to take direction, demonstrate leadership and think flexibly to complete tasks and work as part of cooperative teams. These lessons also require concentration, memory, recall and persistence – all valuable life skills which extend far beyond performing on a stage.

 The inclusive nature of Performance Arts is a characteristic we hold in high regard at St Kieran Catholic Primary School. We believe all our students benefit from participating with their peers, being active and moving their bodies while experiencing Dance and Drama as a creative outlet for their ideas and energy. This learning area is integral in building confidence and resilience in our students at St Kieran’s, while also fuelling their imaginations and providing them with opportunities for self-expression.