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Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. A high quality 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.”
Music, is a subject which provides children with vital opportunities to develop their understanding, make musical judgments, apply their new learning, develop their aural memory, express themselves aesthetically and creatively, both physically and emotionally, and through discussion and create their own musical ideas, using a wide range of materials and instruments. There are four specific areas of music provision that we focus on at St John Fisher Catholic Primary School: Performance, Appraisal, Listening and Composition.
Where possible, specialist teachers are brought in to give their expertise, using, for example, Coventry’s Performing Arts service or members of the community. Key stage 2 children are given the opportunity to have subsidised lessons. Special workshops and performances are often arranged to showcase their abilities. Extra-curricular opportunities such as joining the school choir and music club, are also made available for as many children interested to take part as possible.
Our Children have the opportunity to sing a variety of songs in unisons and in rounds during weekly musical praise, hymn practice sessions. Additionally during these sessions, children are encouraged to play a range of both tuned and un-tuned instruments. Children frequently perform to an audience, in their classrooms and to larger audiences, to their key stage or whole school.
Children are exposed to music throughout their daily routine at school. During music lessons we analyse and evaluate the creations of famous artists and musicians, in order for children to develop their own appreciation towards different genres of music.
Throughout school, composition takes place in a variety of ways. Children in the Early Years Foundation Stage are strongly encouraged to explore sounds and rhythms through their surroundings as part of their ‘expressive arts and design’ developmental stage in the Early Years, Development Matters Curriculum. Whilst both KS1 and KS2 use designated music lessons to compose and experiment with sounds and instruments.
St John Fisher teaches music throughout a topic based creative curriculum and where possible will make musical links to these topics. Links to our Music Programme of study for Key stages 1 and 2, can be found on the National Curriculum in music programmes of study.
Pupils will 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.
Pupils will 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.
