Music

Intent

Music can be unique and powerful and can change the way people feel and think. It combines creativity with emotion, and can inspire self-confidence, personal expression and a sense of self-worth.

The National Curriculum for music aims to ensure that all children:

• perform, listen to, review and evaluate music from a range of genres and historical periods
• are taught to sing, create and compose music
• understand and explore how music is created, produced, and communicated

At Saint Francis de Sales Primary School, we aspire to offer our children a rich, varied and broad music curriculum, enabling them to gain a firm understanding of the subject. We aim to provide children with the skills and knowledge required to be successful musicians. Children will leave Saint Francis de Sales Primary School with joy and an appreciation of music, a love for singing and having experienced a range of different musical experiences and skills.

We use the music scheme ‘Charanga’ across the school. Each unit of work that children encounter is clearly planned in terms of progression. These units of work reinforce the interrelated dimensions of music, beginning in the EYFS, working upwards to represent an ever-increasing spiral of musical learning. The units of work in each year group enable children to understand musical concepts through a repetition-based approach to learning; they will learn about the same musical concepts through different musical activities resulting in a more secure, deeper learning and mastery of musical skills. From Reception to Year 6, the learning consists of six half-termly units of work with the final unit allowing for revision and extension activities.

Implementation

Music is taught weekly by the class teacher and is clearly timetabled for each year group. In addition to this, children are exposed to ‘Music in the Mornings’ with a new song or piece of music to listen and appraise each week. Weekly ‘Music Led Worship’ is also timetabled for each key stage.
At Saint Frances de Sales, children are exposed to a wide range of musical styles, traditions and genres and given opportunities to dissect music through listening, appraising, performing and sharing. In the classroom, children learn key aspects of music through units of work that emphasise styles as well as cross-curricular links.

Teachers provide engaging lessons where children are given the opportunity to listen to songs that cover a wide range of historical periods to the present day. They play games to embed the interrelated dimensions of music though repetition, always beginning with the foundations of musical vocabulary (Pulse, Rhythm and Pitch) and then adding new dimensions as they progress. Children learn to sing, which is the heart of all the musical learning, and have opportunities to play tuned and untuned percussion instruments. All children learn to perform and share their music.

Alongside our scheme of work for music, children are also given opportunities to listen and appraise a wide range of music and songs during our ‘Music in the Mornings’. As we are a Catholic school, all children in each Key Stage are given the opportunity to participate in Music Led Worship each week, learning to sing topical songs primarily from ‘Out of the Ark’ as well as many well-known hymns. As children progress to Upper Key Stage 2, they also have the opportunity to participate within our school choir. Singing is also encouraged within assembly and Mass times, and many of the songs we learn in Music Led Worship are sung here.

During the Early Years our children encounter a curriculum rich in opportunities to explore music, following the guidance from the Early Years Foundation Stage document. As children enter our Nursery, they learn ways to identify specific sounds and use verbal and physical language to describe what they hear. They are encouraged to sing nursery rhymes and songs that are known to themselves and their family, and make and use various resources such as carboard tubes to produce vocal sounds. Children at this stage begin to understand the difference in loud and quiet music, for example, and are encouraged to make their own music through the use of various instruments or body percussion. As children progress into Reception, they are introduced to the first dimensions of music and are encouraged to talk about these when they listen to songs, rhymes and instruments.

The emphasis on play is extended into Key Stage 1 as children enter the Primary National Curriculum. Years 1 and 2 children are exposed to a wide range of musical styles and begin to develop new musical skills and learn new musical concepts. They are encouraged to use improvisation using their voice, bodies and, in some units of work, instruments. Children also have the opportunity to compose their own music in some units of work increasing their confidence, imagination and control.

In Key Stage 2, children sing songs and play instruments with increasing confidence, expression and control. They are developing an increasing awareness of their contribution to a group or class performance and are also learning to play and perform solo. As children progress through this key stage, they gain more fluency and accuracy to improvise and compose for a range of different purposes using the interrelated dimensions of music. They are developing an awareness of self-expression through exploring their own thoughts and emotions to a variety of music from different times, cultures and contexts. By year 6, children will be learning to use and understand musical notations. 

Impact

The teacher assesses children at Saint Francis de Sales Primary for their ability to talk openly and freely about the genres of music they have been exposed to.
They can talk about:

- how it makes them feel;
- different instruments used;
- the key vocabulary assigned for each year group

We identify children who are working at greater depth and advice for teachers is supplied by the Charanga scheme. In year 2, for example, children working at greater depth may be able to create their own rhythms and/or identify and understand that songs have different musical styles.

Children perform and share what has taken place during lessons. This is important for assessing as the continuing process helps to engage and create relevant discussion, assisting in formative assessment. Teachers are encouraged to video the performances and children learn that it is all about the creative process rather than the final outcome.

Staff and pupil voice is heard and celebrated. Questionnaires are given out to pupils to ascertain their feelings about the music they are exposed to as well as gain an understanding of children’s knowledge about the subject. Staff are also supported and encouraged to fill out questionnaires that can support with next steps: these are carefully thought out and feed back in to insets and staff development.