‘Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything.‘
Plato
Introduction
Intent
At Evenwood C of E Primary School, children gain a firm understanding of what music is through listening, singing, playing, evaluating, analysing, and composing across a wide variety of historical periods, styles, traditions, and musical genres. We are committed to developing a curiosity for the subject, as well as an understanding and acceptance of the validity and importance of all types of music, and an unbiased respect for the role that music may wish to be expressed in any person’s life. We are committed to ensuring children understand the value and importance of music in the wider community and are able to use their musical skills, knowledge, and experiences to involve themselves in music, in a variety of different contexts.
Cultural Capital
Children will engage in interactive lessons that enhance their ability to keep a steady pulse. They will be exposed to various media and be guided along their learning journey with bespoke lessons including a specialist music teacher.
Implementation
Our pupils will learn that music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. They will be inspired and engaged by music education. Music lesson will engage and inspire pupils to develop a love of music and develop their talent as musicians, and in turn increase their self-confidence, creativity and sense of achievement. As pupils progress, they should develop a critical engagement with music, allowing them to compose, and to listen with discrimination to the best in the musical canon. The Charanga scheme of work is used from Year 1 – 6 to ensure a wide exposure to different genres of music, with lots of practical opportunities to explore and develop as musicians and singers. Additional opportunities are offered in music, such as clarinet lessons provided by the local authority. The children also have many opportunities throughout the year to perform, including end of year productions and singing to the community.
The Foundation Stage
We teach music in reception classes as an integral part of the ‘Expressive Arts and Design’ work covered during the year. As the reception class is part of the Foundation Stage of the National Curriculum, we relate the musical aspects of the children’s work to the objectives set out in the Early Learning Goals (ELGs) which underpin the curriculum planning for children aged three to five. Music contributes to a child’s personal and social development. Counting songs foster a child’s mathematical ability, and songs from different cultures increase a child’s knowledge and understanding of the world.
Key Stage 1 National Curriculum Attainment:
Pupils should be able to:
- Use their voices expressively and creatively by singing songs and speaking chants and rhymes.
- Play tuned and untuned instruments musically.
- Listen with concentration and understanding to a range of high-quality live and recorded music.
- Experiment with, create, select and combine sounds using the inter-related dimensions of music.
Key stage 2 National Curriculum attainment:
Pupils should be able to:
- Pupils should be taught to sing and play musically with increasing confidence and control. They should develop an understanding of musical composition, organising and manipulating ideas within musical structures and reproducing sounds from aural memory.
- play and perform in solo and ensemble contexts, using their voices and playing musical instruments with increasing accuracy, fluency, control and expression
- improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the inter-related dimensions of music
- listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory
- use and understand staff and other musical notations
- appreciate and understand a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians
- develop an understanding of the history of music.
Additional music teaching
Children are offered the opportunity to study a musical instrument with peripatetic teachers. Peripatetic music teaching is organised by the Local Education Authority’s Music Service, and this school has chosen to participate in the programme. Parents who want their children to participate in the scheme must purchase or hire the instrument and pay the additional music lesson fees on a termly basis. These lessons are normally taught to small groups of children who have chosen to learn one of a variety of instruments, such as the guitar, violin, cello or flute. This is in addition to the normal music teaching of the school, and usually takes place during normal lessons, from which children are withdrawn for the duration of the instrumental lesson.
Music curriculum planning
Our school uses the National Curriculum for music as the basis for its curriculum planning. We have adapted the curriculum so that the topics that the children study in music build upon prior learning. While there are opportunities for children of all abilities to develop their skills and knowledge in each teaching unit, the progression planned into the scheme of work means that the children are increasingly challenged as they move through the school.
Using ‘Charanga’, we carry out the curriculum planning in music in three phases (long-term, medium-term and short-term). The long-term plan maps the music topics studied in each term during the key stage.
The medium-term plans, which we have adopted from ‘Charanga’ give details of each unit of work for each term. The subject leader is responsible for keeping and reviewing these plans. As we have some mixed-age classes, we do the medium-term planning on a two-year rotation cycle. In this way we ensure that children have complete coverage of the National Curriculum, but do not have to repeat topics.
Our music planning is geared to three aspects of progress:
- increasing breadth and range of musical experiences;
- increasing challenge and difficulty in musical activities;
- increasing confidence, sensitivity and creativity in the children’s music-making.
Impact
The intended impact of our Music curriculum is that children have had experience of listening to a wide range of musical genres which they may not have had contact with on an everyday basis. The children will also develop appraisal skills to discuss genres critically. They will be confident when performing to a range of audiences.
Impact is monitored through:
- Teacher assessment
- Lesson observations
- Learning walks
- Work scrutiny
