Music Curriculum aims

Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. A high quality music education should engage and inspire pupils to develop a love of music and their talent as musicians, and so 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.

Source: National Curriculum, 2014

Intent – What is the purpose of our Music curriculum?

At Evercreech CofE Primary School, the music curriculum ensures that students perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a wide variety of historical periods, styles, traditions and musical genres, including the works of great composers and musicians. They will learn to sing and use their voices, create and compose music, have the opportunity to learn an instrument, use technology appropriately and will be afforded the chance to progress to the next level of musical excellence through our extra-curricular provision.
We intend to:

– Promote a curiosity for the subject; an understanding and acceptance of the validity and importance of all types of music.
– Promote creativity and expression.
– Know and understand the key concepts of ‘Tradition and Culture’, ‘Quality’ and ‘Expression’ within music.
– Equip pupils with the following musical techniques. They will combine notes to play scales and chords, creating rich musical sounds; they will read musical notations, strum, strike and blow to match notation and create melody and will memorise through practice.

In summary, a high-quality music education should engage and inspire pupils to develop a love of music and their talent as musicians, and so increase their self-confidence, mental well-being, creativity and sense of achievement.

Our Children will:

•  Demonstrate a general awareness of sound both musically and in their everyday environment.
• Experiment with sound and identify sound from a variety of media.
• Listen to a variety of music with attention and understanding.
•  Recognise the inter-related dimensions of music such as pitch, dynamics and duration of sound.
• Imitate and recall simple rhythmic and melodic patterns through percussion instruments, body percussion and vocals.
• Join in as a member of a music-making group and play instruments.
• Create short compositions in response to given stimuli.
• Improvise using instruments, body percussion or vocals. Demonstrate highly positive attitudes towards the subject and be aspirational in their goals.
• Learn songs from memory and join in with a wide range of singing styles.

Our Teachers will:

• Teach a music curriculum providing quality, range, depth, progression, challenge and personalisation.
• Use the ICT based Charanga Music Scheme to deliver exciting, contemporary and relevant music lessons.
• Teach one musical focus each half term linked to the Artforms Progression in Music document, thus ensuring progression across Key Stages.
• Identify gaps in understanding and swiftly overcome these with precise teaching.
• Provide the children with a rich curriculum of carefully crafted lessons that ensures time for practise and consolidation.
• Provide opportunities for our children to: listen to, make and analyse music working both individually and collaboratively thus fostering an enthusiasm for music beyond the classroom.

Implementation – How do we do it?

The Learning Journey

The key elements of the music curriculum are taught in classroom-based lessons so that children can use the ‘language of music’ to dissect and analyse a piece of music. Our curriculum is progressive and starts from EYFS and interweaves through all areas of learning and development.
The music curriculum ensures that students: sing, listen, play, perform and evaluate. These activities are embedded in classroom practice as well as weekly singing assemblies, concerts and performances and the learning of instruments. The elements of music are taught in classroom lessons so that children can use the language of music, and understand how it is made, played, appreciated and analysed.  They compose with creativity and confidence, which, in turn, feeds their understanding when listening, playing or analysing music. Composing or performing, using body percussion and vocal sounds, is also integral to everything we do.
At Evercreech CofE Primary, we take pride in giving the children the chance to perform in front of an audience, giving them the will and the motivation to do so through a variety of opportunities which could include but aren’t limited to: nativities, performances and church services.

Assessment

• Short-term assessments aim to assess the children’s learning informally on a lesson-by- lesson basis and are key to our curriculum. These could include observations of groups, analysis of whole class feedback, the marking of work or short tests, either in written or oral form.
• Medium- term assessments are completed at the end of a term and the class teacher keeps a highlighted grid, to show progress within the age bands (EYFS do this utilising ‘Development Matters.’) These grids are kept in the assessment folders within classrooms.
• Long term assessments assess our children against national expectations. These are also used to provide extra information about individual children’s attainment and progress so that the teacher can report to the next teacher and the child’s parent. Furthermore, data will be used by SLT to brief the governing body and the staff on overall progress towards the school’s end of year targets.
To enhance upon the above, at the start of a chosen half term/Charanga unit of work, our staff film the children singing the song on their first attempt. At the end of the above half term/Charanga unit of work, staff film the children singing the song and performing with instruments. This provides us with clear evidence of pupil progress.
 

Monitoring

The Music subject leader will use their expertise to support other teachers through timely feedback, coaching and support. Completing an annual deep dive into Music, they will undertake: learning walks, pupil and teacher interviews and will scrutinise assessment data. Additionally, regular staff consultations and questionnaires are used to identify any areas for development. This information is used to develop the focus for future CPD in the subject.

Impact – What knowledge and skills are obtained?

At Evercreech CofE Primary School, every pupil will:
• Be given equal opportunities to fulfil their potential within music, regardless of ethnicity, culture, class, gender or special educational needs.
• Have access to a varied programme within which they will discover something that they enjoy, thus cultivating a starting point for a lifelong interest in learning.
• Complete each key stage with a high proficiency in each aspect of music.
• Believe that they are good at music and will have the resilience required to take part in all elements of the music curriculum.
• Be a listener, a creator and a performer and will understand the culture and history of music.
• Be exposed to meaningful, high-quality experiences and lessons that promote choice and independent thinking.
• Be aware of their own music strengths as well as areas for improvement.
• Be encouraged to develop a positive and lifelong relationship with Music and musical activity.
• Have an improved sense of achievement, pride, self-confidence and where relevant, improved behaviour and increased academic achievement because of the creative engagement of music making and team work.