Music at St Laurence's

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

Music lessons are taught using the Charanga scheme of work. This embodies all of the musical elements children will need in order to progress their musical abilities along with broadening their musical horizons.

 

End of Key Stage One Expectations

By the end of KS1 we aim for our children to begin developing a love of music. Children will begin to develop the skills of singing, playing a range of instruments and composing simple tunes. Children will also begin to have an understanding of the different elements of music and develop a sense of enjoyment in music.

 

End of Key Stage Two Expectations

Children continue to follow the Charanga scheme of work and further develop their skills of singing, playing a range of instruments and composing using appropriate notation. Children will explore many different styles of music and become increasingly independent in their choices of instruments, using both tuned and un-tuned.

 

Music Aims at St Laurence's 

• perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians
• learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others
• have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument
• use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence
• understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated, including
  through the inter-related dimensions: pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, structure and appropriate musical notations.

 

Intent

Here at St Laurence's it is our vision to engage, motivate and make music an enjoyable experience for all children. We believe that every child should have the opportunity to develop their music potential and we aim to nurture and encourage musical development across the school.

Music teaching aims to follow the requirements of the National Curriculum which ensure that all pupils

• Be taught to sing, create and compose music
• Perform, listen to, review and evaluate music
• Understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated.

We will provide a broad and balanced curriculum which ensures the progressive development of musical concepts, knowledge and skills.

At St Laurences the intention is that 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 as well as understanding the work of great composers and musicians.    

Our objectives at St Laurence's are to develop a curiosity for the subject, as well as an understanding and acceptance of the validity and importance of all types of music. 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..

Reading is at the heart of our school curriculum. Having access to a variety of texts enables our children to experience a wealth of vocabulary. Through music, children are able to read and follow lyrics, learning how a song/ music is organised. Through music children learn a range of musical vocabulary, terms and elements.

The music lead is constantly monitoring and evaluating our curriculum offer ensuring that all our children have the best possible start to their music education. We believe that our music curriculum is ambitious and all children will be given the chance to succeed in life, making the best start at Primary School level.

 

Implementation    

Our music curriculum is implemented through highly effective teaching. We support this teaching through a collaborative CPD programme for all staff enabling them to develop their own knowledge and skills of music transferring this back into the classroom and onto our children.

Our curriculum is monitored by the music lead each term through observations, scrutinies, learning walks and questionnaires. Evaluations and changes are made when necessary.  All evaluations are shared with our SLT and governing body to ensure that all stakeholders have an understanding of our music curriculum offer.

The music curriculum at St Laurence’s is designed and taught using strategies to enable children to embed their learning in their long-term memories. Clear and well thought out sequences of learning and ongoing assessments ensure that new knowledge and skills build on prior learning.

Music lessons 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. Music lessons allow children to develop new music skills, concepts, knowledge and vocabulary whilst also revisiting and embedding established musical skills and concepts.

Our teaching focuses on developing the children’s ability to understand rhythm and follow a beat. Through singing songs, children learn about the structure and organisation of music. We teach them to listen and to appreciate different forms of music. Children develop descriptive language skills in music lessons when learning about how music can represent different feelings, emotions and narratives. We also teach technical vocabulary such as volume, pitch, beat and rhythm and encourage children to discuss music using these terms.

Music teaching at St Laurence's will deliver the requirements of the National Curriculum through half termly topics and teachers plan lessons based on our knowledge and skills document and the Charanga scheme of work ensuring consistency and progression throughout the school

The Charanga scheme of work is used from Year R - 6 to ensure a wide exposure to different genres of music, with lots of practical opportunities to explore and develop as musicians and singers.

Each unit of work has an on-going musical learning focus and a unit specific focus to enable previous musical skills to be embedded.  Music lessons usually follow a specific learning sequence:

• Listen and Appraise
• Musical Activities (including pulse and rhythm)
• Singing and Voice
• Playing instruments
• Composition
• Perform and Share

Lessons typically involve a combination of the following; games, songs, challenges, listening to music and discussing music, playing a range of musical instruments, performing back, finding the pulse and composing music using notation sheets.

The school also offers a wider opportunities to all year 3 children who are currently learning to play the recorder on a weekly basis. From years 4 to 6 children have the opportunity to receive a weekly music lesson with a peripatetic music teacher playing either the keyboard, the flute, the clarinet or the violin.

Additional opportunities are offered in music, such as the key stage 2 choir which performs regularly in school and at events in the local community.

We also perform at Christmas and at Masses throughout the year, as well as class masses and hymn practices.

The progress of all children, including those with SEND and disadvantaged children is closely monitored and the curriculum is designed to ensure that any gaps are closed.

 

Impact: 

Our music curriculum is monitored regularly by the Senior Leadership Team and Subject Leads to ensure that all learners, including disadvantaged and children with SEND have:

• A depth of coverage of music
• Knowledge and skills are ongoing throughout each year group
• Consistent standards
• Engaged, creative independent learning
• Accurate assessment for learning
• Feedback moving the learning forward
• can confidently recall key knowledge from current and previous areas of learning
• are confident in using and applying vocabulary

The music curriculum is planned to demonstrate progression and building on and embedding musical skills,

Music assessments are completed at the end of each term with each child being assessed as SEN, WT and Expected. Music is monitored throughout the year using a variety of strategies such as lesson observations, scrutinies, photos and work in the music big book, along with pupil voice.

 

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