Vision

At The Grange Primary School, we believe that music is a unique way of communication and self-expression that can inspire and empower our children. Music is a natural and integral part of the school’s life in general as well as of the learning process whether it be Maths, Phonics, English, French or other foundation subjects.

Intent

Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. 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. (The National Curriculum)

In EYFS, Music is taught through Expressive Arts and Design activities. Among the skills that children develop are listening with attention, responding to what they’ve heard, singing at the right pitch, and playing instruments with increasing control.

In KS1 children learn to use their voices expressively, play instruments, listen to concentration, and experiment and create musical pieces.

In KS2, pupils continue to consolidate their skills and knowledge, additionally focusing more on history of music, improvisation and composition as well as understanding musical notation.

Implementation

At The Grange Primary School, the teaching of music is informed by the model music curriculum and follows the planning and teaching guidance as set out in Kapow for each half term, ensuring that 45 min of curriculum time is dedicated to the bespoke teaching of music each week.

We follow the Kapow music scheme, which takes a holistic approach to music. The individual strands (below) are woven together to create engaging and enriching learning experiences:

• listening and evaluating
• creating sounds
• notation
• improvising and composing
• performing

Each unit combines these strands within a topic designed to capture pupils’ imagination and encourage them to explore music enthusiastically.

Children are taught how to sing fluently and expressively, and play tuned and untuned instruments accurately and with control. They learn to recognise and name the interrelated dimensions of music – pitch, duration, tempo, timbre, structure, texture and dynamics – and use these expressively in their own improvisations and compositions.

Impact

Our Curriculum focuses on progression of skills and knowledge. Children repetitively have the opportunities to revisit (and thus consolidate) the previous learning and then, by facing the new, harder challenges, to progress further as performers and musicians.