Music

Music Intent 

Across the federation our aim is to 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. We do this by providing the children with a varied and engaging curriculum where they, listen and respond to music , learn to play musical instruments and compose and transcribe their own music 

The music curriculum is planned in a bespoke manner to link into our key literacy texts and cornerstones, (communication language and literacy, city living, aspiration and celebrating diversity), covering the national curriculum content in a progressive way.  

The teaching of musical vocabulary is interwoven through the curriculum to help overcome the language barriers that can hinder progress. 

We aim to ensure that by the time the children leave they are confident musicians, who have a good set of musical skills to help towards the next stage of their musical learning. It is our vision that every child adopts an understanding and love of music which they can carry with them for the rest of their lives. 

As we link music lessons with our text-led topics, this provides all children with a creative and wide-ranging learning experience where they can apply language across subjects and therefore make meaningful links between them. There is also a focus on children using the correct musical vocabulary from the national curriculum, addressing our Communication, Language and Literacy cornerstone. Our City Living cornerstone is addressed as we are located just beyond Manchester City Centre and this provides us with a wide range of venues to visit that are easily accessible to the children. For example: MEN arena, Palace Theatre and Bridgewater Hall. 

We aim to make it clear that a career in music is something the children can aspire to and it is a career path that is open to them. To enhance these aspirations, we intend to invite local musicians into school, with a similar background or culture to the children, to talk about their own journey and to show that this is possible. Our school pedagogies enable us to teach music to the children at optimum challenge level ensuring children’s progression towards this.  

Celebrating diversity will be addressed through music by singing a wide range of songs, in different languages and styles. Links can be made with RE when exploring different faiths by learning about the music and instruments used in worship. 

Purpose of study

Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. A highquality 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. Aims The national curriculum for music aims to ensure that all pupils:

• 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.

Attainment targets

By the end of each key stage, pupils are expected to know, apply and understand the matters, skills and processes specified in the relevant programme of study.

Subject content

Key stage 1

Pupils should be taught 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

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.

Pupils should be taught to:

• 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