2025 Documentation Award: Little Woodland Heights announced as third recipient

The Portal Team is delighted to announce Little Woodland Heights with Scoil Mhuire Eimhín in County Limerick as the third recipient of the 2025 Arts in Education Portal Documentation Award.

We’re thrilled to be working with the three recipients of our documentation awards over the coming months. Their projects will be featured and showcased on the Portal as the documentation unfolds—stay tuned!

Project Title: Little Woodland Heights

Little Woodland Heights is a programme of interactive music-making sessions for children aged 8-11 exploring connections between forest ecology and music. The programme was designed by composer and educator Nick Roth and has been delivered in schools in Ireland, Ukraine and the UK. Composer Fiona Linnane, soprano Triona Walsh and classroom teacher Nuala Dooly will deliver the project to students at Scoil Mhuire Eimhín in County Limerick – the first Irish presentation of Little Woodland Heights outside of Dublin.

In this programme, over the course of 10 weeks, children learn about biodiversity and the crossover with composition. They embark on a field trip to a forest where each child chooses their own tree to write a short piece of music about. Fiona and Triona will support the children to take sound recordings in the forest, to draw the tree and pay close attention to its features. These features are then connected to musical elements: the branch structure informs rhythm, the leaf patterns melody. At the end of the programme, children perform their compositions alongside planting new trees within their school grounds. This is a highly experimental project, taking the children and facilitators out of their comfort zone to present something out of their usual sphere.

The programme is supported by CoMA (Contemporary Music for All) funded by the Diaphonique Franco-British-Irish fund for classical contemporary music. CoMA’s mission is to create a culture of musical participation and collaboration. Their values call them to be playful, creative, ambitious, inclusive, collaborative and community-focused.

Fiona Linnane – Composer

Fiona is a composer whose practice centres on vocal music including opera, art song and text based works. Nature and the environment are recurring themes in her work. Fiona is the director of Limerick New Music Ensemble (an associate ensemble of CoMA, a participatory new music organisation based in the UK). Work in education and community contexts form a significant part of her practice. She is a TAP trained artist, Creative Schools Creative Associate and a member of the panel of experts for the Heritage in Schools Scheme. Work in community includes two Arts Council of Ireland Artist in the Community Projects – Bells Across the Burren (2013) and working with Limerick Bat Group (2021). Recent arts in education projects include The Irish Elk with Fedamore CNS which will represent Ireland at the Young European Heritage Makers Competition 2025. Fiona’s approach is rooted in inclusivity and joy in sharing contemporary arts practice in classroom environments.

Nuala Dooly – Teacher

Nuala is a primary school teacher with 23 years of experience. She is currently teaching 3rd and 4th class pupils in a multi-class setting at Scoil Mhuire Eimhín, where she is also the Deputy Principal. Nuala is TAP+ trained teacher. She has worked collaboratively with creative artists in the facilitation of both TAP and BLAST residencies within her classroom and the whole school setting. Nuala believes in creating an inclusive, supportive classroom where every student’s unique abilities and ideas are valued. Through hands-on experiences in the arts, she encourages students to express themselves, think critically, and develop problem-solving skills.

Tríona Walsh – Soprano

Tríona is an opera singer, collaborative artist and music educator. Her music education practice is rooted in the use of a child’s first instruments – the voice and the body- as a medium for expression, communication, play, and artistic exploration. Making music together provides children with a plethora of musical and non-musical benefits including building coordination and motor skills, resilience, empathy, and communication skills through co-operative objectives. Triona is a TAP trained artist and works regularly with Music Generation partnerships and Sing Ireland, leading group singing days and providing classroom-based projects in various primary, secondary and early years settings. Her philosophy is one of inclusivity, differentiation and accepting every offer as an artistic expression of the child. Having fun and making ‘mistakes’ are essential ingredients in her collaborative process.