Music
At St Wilfrid's our children are...
Intent
Our aim is to create successful music makers and foster a love of music that will continue to inspire our children throughout their future. We want children to recognise the importance of music in their daily lives and understand how it can support their own sense of identity and wellbeing. We encourage the children to feel confident and creative when singing and playing instruments and develop their performance skills, both individually and in small or large groups. We aim to develop skills such as reading music, improvising, performing, and composing and promote an overall enjoyment of all aspects of music both in school and at home. By exposing children to a wide variety of music from different periods of history and genres, we hope to inspire children to appreciate and enjoy a range of different music styles and develop their capacity to express ideas and feelings through the medium of sound.
Implementation
Our music curriculum is ambitious, progressive and meets the needs of all learners, ensuring that they are equipped with the skills and knowledge they need for further music study. In all our lessons children are actively involved in using and developing their singing voices, using body percussion and whole-body actions, and learning to handle and play classroom instruments effectively to create and express their own and others’ music. Through a range of whole class, group and individual activities, children have opportunities to explore sounds, listen actively, compose and perform skills and are given chance for collaboration through composition.
In EYFS and Y1 pupils use the Charanga scheme to explore the sounds of their voices and bodies and play some percussion instruments. Music is a great way to develop children’s physical development and communication and language skills in a fun and engaging way. From Y2 to Y6 our music is taught by a Specialist Music Teacher – Fran Sixsmith of Medley Music. Children learn how to read and write music, and play instruments such as hand bells, the ukulele and keyboard. In doing so they begin to understand the creation of notes and rhythm, as well as how to read basic music notation. They also learn how to compose, focussing on different dimensions of music, which in turn feeds their understanding when listening, playing, or analysing music.
Children develop their musical vocabulary from EYFS, learning musical terms such as pulse, pitch, duration, dynamics, structure, timbre, rhythm and melody. Musical terms are used in every lesson so that the children become familiar with them and are confident in their use.
Children’s work is mainly recorded through photographs and videos taken to evidence children’s progress through school. In addition children have the opportunity to participate in a variety of musical activities and performances. These include: the Reception and Year 2 Nativities, the Year 1 Christmas Concert led by ‘Singing Simon,’ KS2 concerts and the Y6 Summer production.
Impact
Through dynamic teaching of an engaging and inspiring music curriculum children leave St Wilfrid’s with a range of new skills as listeners, creators and performers. Their confidence and communication skills are boosted by participating in productions and services and they embrace the performance element of music. Children develop an appreciation of different musical styles and understand the role music has to play in culture, diversity and everyone’s daily life.
