Peter and the Wolf is a well-known piece of music often used to introduce music to children. It was written by Prokofiev in 1936 and has orchestral instruments telling the children’s story. Over the years it has been created into videos, ballets, books, etc. It remains a firm favourite and a useful music lesson to get children introduced to the orchestral instruments.
The following video, is the David Bowie rendition of the story, it is almost 15 minutes long. It is is very comical at times but the wolf is quite terrifying and it may be best to warn children that it ends happily before watching!
Primary Resources hosts these resources made by teachers for use when using this piece of music but the video shared above is a great starting point.
- A presentation by Kerry Parsons which is suitable for the very young
- A presentation by Gareth Pitchford which is better for KS2
- A worksheet by Angie Black to go with the story, children listen out for various instruments and mark when they hear them etc.
- Angie Black also shares a set of Peter and the Wolf Cards showing the characters and their instruments, these could be put up on the whiteboard before listening.
- There is also a lovely set of pictures in a zipped file shared by someone only marked as P.P. This is a beautiful set of pencil drawings depicting the story, I would use these to contribute toward a class book telling the story I think!