“Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything.”

Plato

 

INTENT

At Barnburgh Primary Academy, we intend to make music an enjoyable and memorable learning experience. We encourage all our children, no matter their attainment, to participate in a variety of musical experiences, in an aim for them to become creative and reflective musicians who can express themselves fluently and confidently.

The teaching of music focuses on developing the children’s ability to listen to, compose and perform different forms of music, including developing the understanding of rhythm and following a beat, understanding the structure and organisation of music and appreciating a range of genres. We teach children about the history of music including well-known composers, instrumentation of historical periods and links to significant historical events and periods of time.

Our children develop descriptive language skills in music lessons, when learning about how music can represent different emotions and narratives. We also teach technical vocabulary and we encourage children to use these terms when discussing music.

Our Core Values provide the platform on which we have built our curriculum offer at Barnburgh Primary Academy. Our Music curriculum is underpinned by our Core Values in the following ways;

COURAGE

• To know that it’s ok to make mistakes when participating in a music activity and to understand that mistakes are part of the process to reaching a high-quality outcome.
• To have the courage to express themselves musically and to voice their individual opinions and thoughts about a wide variety of different music.
• To be experimental in creating music by taking risks.

PERSEVERANCE

• To develop the ability to stick with something, to continue working, to try harder and to never give up, even when it may be a new skill that is proving difficult.
• To understand that the perseverance and attentiveness needed to complete a music project, leads to personal pride and gratification.

AMBITION

• To do their best work and then to push themselves beyond what they consider to be their best. 
• To develop a desire to achieve something brilliant.

RESPECT

• To respect the music of others, including the work of other musicians and their peers.
• To respect musical instruments and other music equipment.

INDEPENDENCE

• To develop confident musicians who are not afraid to ‘have a go’.
• To develop musicians who have the confidence to think independently and share their ideas or music with others.

 

BEYOND THE SUBJECT

We want our music curriculum to help children to;

• Think creatively in all aspects of their life
• See the world from different perspectives
• Increase their empathy
• Observe and look closer at the world around them
• See connections in the world

 

 

IMPLEMENTATION

Our Music curriculum has been designed to cover all of the skills set out in the National Curriculum. The National Curriculum states 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.

 

At Barnburgh Primary Academy, our children will learn that music is a universal language, which embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. Our lessons will inspire pupils to develop a love of music and develop their talent as musicians, in turn, increasing their creativity, sense of pride and achievement and ultimately their self-confidence.

Our Music curriculum has been structured in a cross-curricular way, where possible, to effectively facilitate this and to provide maximum inspiration to our musicians. Music projects will be linked to class topics to enhance the pupils’ understanding of the key historical or geographical concepts covered. Where appropriate, music may also be linked to a community or cultural issue to engage our musicians in the world around them and to help them understand the role that they play as an individual.

At Barnburgh Primary Academy, music learning is recorded through floor books. These show the learning intention and a brief written overview of the lesson, photographs, QR codes of performances, a sample of written compositions and examples of children’s voice.

School visitors and trips are facilitated, where appropriate, to enhance the pupils’ musical understanding and skills further. Pupils in Key Stage 2, are offered the chance to be part of a recorder ensemble and the school choir. Opportunities are given to perform in class, in whole school assemblies and at events in our local community. There are opportunities for children in Key Stage 2 to access peripatetic music tuition which is offered in school by Doncaster Music Service.

 

 

IMPACT

Ongoing music assessment is used to inform teachers’ planning. Due to the nature of this curriculum area, music monitoring takes various forms. A key component of this is pupil voice. School leaders use pupil voice as an effective tool to ascertain the pupils’ embedded musical knowledge and skills as well as their love for learning the subject. Music floor book monitoring throughout all year groups also takes place once a term to compliment this, allowing leaders to ensure our musicians have the opportunity to develop their skills fully and showcase their talents.

 

Please find the music progression document below. This is a working document.