Kaupapa and Performance

Overview

This is lesson 4 of 10 in Sound, Story, Identity. Students investigate the kaupapa of “Karanga, Karanga” through selected moments from live and official video performances. They connect musical and visual choices with identity, relationships, values and purpose, then apply their understanding by mapping the structure and recreating a short musical feature.

Learning intentions

• WALT identify musical and visual choices in “Karanga, Karanga”.
• WALT explain how performance choices communicate kaupapa and identity.
• WALT compare how live and official video performances shape interpretation.
• WALT use aural and performance skills to recreate a short rhythmic or melodic feature.

Success criteria

• I can identify specific musical and visual features and describe their effect.
• I can explain a relationship between a performance choice and the work’s kaupapa.
• I can map the work’s structure using evidence from the music.
• I can perform or recreate a short feature with accurate rhythm, melody, or expressive detail.

Curriculum links

• Music: demonstrate understanding of music in relation to cultural, historical and social contexts.
• Music: use aural, technical and musicianship skills in a music style.
• Music: apply musical elements, expressive devices and culturally grounded practices appropriately.
• The refreshed curriculum’s Understand, Know, Do structure: students build knowledge through listening, interpret meaning in context, and apply learning through performance and explanation.
• Key competencies: thinking; relating to others; participating and contributing; managing self.

Lesson structure (45 minutes)

1. 0–5 min · Reconnect and focus. Teacher opens with the hook and learning intention slides and briefly revisits the previous lesson’s ideas about sound, story and identity. Students respond individually to the question: “What can a performance communicate that a written explanation cannot?” They share one idea with a partner.

2. 5–12 min · First listening: kaupapa clues. Teacher plays a carefully selected, age-appropriate excerpt from the official video performance without giving extensive interpretation, using the official video listening prompt. Students note two musical choices and two visual or performance choices, such as vocal delivery, rhythm, texture, movement, camera framing, spatial relationships, costume or setting.

3. 12–20 min · Compare performances. Teacher plays a contrasting excerpt from a live performance, pausing at one or two agreed moments and using the comparison prompts. In pairs, students complete the comparison section of the performance analysis and structure worksheet. They identify one similarity, one difference, and explain how the difference may affect the audience’s interpretation. Encourage evidence-based language: “The use of ___ suggests ___ because ___.”

4. 20–28 min · Map the structure. Teacher models how to divide the work into meaningful sections, listening for changes in repetition, melody, rhythm, texture, dynamics, vocal roles, movement or visual focus. Students work in two groups of three to map the excerpt or whole work on the performance analysis and structure worksheet, labelling sections with short descriptors and approximate timings. Groups compare maps and justify one structural decision.

5. 28–38 min · Recreate a feature. Teacher selects a short, appropriate rhythmic or melodic feature that can be learnt aurally or from a simplified notation/recording. Students choose roles suited to their confidence: perform the feature, keep a pulse or drone, lead a vocal response, or direct an expressive detail. Each group rehearses, then performs the feature once. The class listens for accuracy and for choices that reflect the original performance context. Do not imitate culturally specific practice without explaining its context and purpose; use only teacher-approved material and acknowledge the source appropriately.

6. 38–43 min · Interpret and evaluate. Teacher displays the evaluation discussion slide and asks: “Which performance choice is most significant in communicating the kaupapa, and why?” Each student gives a short spoken response using a musical or visual example. Peers respond with one precise agreement, question or alternative interpretation.

7. 43–45 min · Exit reflection. Teacher returns to the final reflection prompt. Students complete: “One relationship between a musical or visual choice and the kaupapa is ___; this matters because ___.” Collect worksheets and note each student’s contribution to the recreation.

Resources

• Device, speakers and projector
• Official video performance of “Karanga, Karanga”
• Teacher-selected live performance excerpt
• the Sound, Story, Identity lesson deck
• the performance analysis and structure worksheet
• Instruments, keyboard, percussion or vocal space
• Headphones or individual listening devices, if available
• Whiteboard and markers
• Timer

Assessment

• During listening, check whether students identify specific musical and visual evidence rather than general opinions.
• Confer with pairs and groups while they compare performances and map structure; prompt students to explain relationships between choices and context.
• Assess the short recreation formatively for aural accuracy, purposeful expression and respectful engagement, then use the exit reflection to identify whether students can draw a supported conclusion.

Differentiation

• Provide a word bank on the worksheet with terms such as rhythm, melody, texture, dynamics, repetition, movement, space, camera focus, identity, relationship, value and purpose.
• Offer a partially completed structure map, replayed excerpts and sentence starters for students who need support. Allow spoken or recorded responses where extended writing is a barrier.
• Students may demonstrate the feature through voice, body percussion, an instrument, pulse-keeping or directing, while still explaining their performance choice.
• Extend confident students by comparing how the same feature changes across both performances and evaluating which version communicates the kaupapa most convincingly.
• Use correct pronunciation, acknowledge the work’s cultural context and avoid treating Māori concepts as decorative musical labels. Invite students to distinguish between what they can observe, what they infer and what should be confirmed through reliable contextual information.