Intent:
Music is all around us. It brings people together and unites communities.
At Woodside Academy, it is our intention to introduce music to all children from Foundation Stage. Giving all children opportunities to learn and enjoy music. Our intention is to bring the love of music to everyone through singing, playing instruments, listening to a wide range of music, composing music and performing music.
Music is accessible to all regardless of age, gender or ability and it is our intention to adapt lessons to ensure everyone can join in and learn to love music. Music can also provide a valuable way for people to connect with each other, work collaboratively and develop new skills.
Implementation
We start to expose children to rhymes and simple songs from Foundation Stage and develop their singing through KS1 and KS2. As we develop our singing through KS2 we focus more on our understanding of pitch, dynamics and tempo; learning how we can control our tempo and the dynamics and change them following the lead of our teacher or peer leader. We work on increasing our vocal range to be able to sing songs with a wider pitch. As we learn more about rhythm and beat, we learn songs with increasing complexity.
We start composing music through use of musical instruments in Foundation Stage and develop this until children can write some of their own composition down on staves in Year 6. Throughout, school we expose children to a variety of music in music lessons and across the curriculum. Children are given regular opportunities to perform to their peers, their parents and- by Key Stage 2- a wider audience. We use peer feedback to develop their performing ability, alongside regular teacher feedback and assessment.
From KS1, we introduce simple notation and develop this through to KS2 and by the end of KS2 children will be able to read and write stave notation.
Every class will have at least one session of music a week, lasting for approximately 40 minutes. It will be delivered by the music teacher in school. In addition to this, Lower Key Stage 2 children will have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument through Whole Class Ensemble Teaching and there are wider opportunities to develop musical ability and interest through choirs and music clubs. The learning of musical instruments will be supported by learning to read stave notation.
We bring music into other subjects and make cross curricular links; for example, in history we play a piece of music that embeds the time period and puts the time period in a context. This helps children to make links between composers and what else would have been happening in the world at that time.