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Music Statement of Intent
At Stanton Community Primary School our intention in Music is first and foremost to help children feel musical and develop a life-long love of music.
We focus on developing the skills, knowledge and understanding that children need in order to become confident performers, composers and listeners. Our curriculum introduces children to music from all around the world and across generations, teaching children to respect and appreciate the music of all traditions and communities. Our school population does not reflect a wide range of ethnic or cultural backgrounds so it is vital that our children understand and celebrate the huge culturally diverse influences in music, as well as recognise the successes of our local and national influences in music across the world.
In our school, children will develop the musical skills of singing, playing tuned and untuned instruments, improvising and composing music and listening and responding to music. In Year 4, the children are given the opportunity to learn an instrument via the Suffolk School Music Service and then carry this on into Year 5 and 6 if they wish to.
Our aim is that children will develop an understanding of the history and cultural context of the music they listen to and play. Children also learn how music can be written down.
With nearly 40% of our children identified as in need of support with SEN or emotional wellbeing at our school, we cannot overlook how music can be an outlet for expression, a way to connect with others and a pathway to calm and relaxation. Susan Hallam, from the Institute of Education at the University of London, said “Music should be central to the school curriculum because it improves children’s health and wellbeing.”
Through music, our curriculum helps children learn transferable skills, such as working in a team, leadership, problems solving, decision making and presentation and performance skills. These skills are essential to support our children’s development as learners and have a wider application in their general lives outside of and beyond school.
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Music in Early Years and Foundation Stage
The EYFS framework is structured very differently to the national curriculum, as it is organised across seven areas of learning rather than subject areas. In EYFS Music is predominantly woven through 2 areas of the curriculum: Communication and Language and Expressive Arts and Design. Below are the most relevant statements from Development Matters (2020) in the EYFS statutory framework. Throughout children’s learning in our Nursery and Reception Class children are encouraged to learn all of the following to form the foundation for their later learning in the national curriculum.
3-4 year olds
- Sing a large repertoire of songs.
- Listen with increased attention to sounds.
- Respond to what they have heard, expressing their thoughts and feelings.
- Remember and sing entire songs.
- Sing the pitch of a tone sung by another person (‘pitch match’).
- Sing the melodic shape (moving melody, such as up and down, down and up) of familiar songs.
- Create their own songs, or improvise a song around one that they know.
- Experiment by playing instruments with increasing control to express their feelings and ideas.
Reception
- Listen carefully to rhymes and songs, paying attention to how they sound.
- Learn rhymes, poems and songs.
- Create collaboratively, sharing ideas, resources and skills.
- Listen attentively, move to and talk about music, expressing their feelings and responses.
- Sing in a group or on their own, increasingly matching the pitch and following the melody.
- Explore and engage in music making and dance, performing solo or in groups.
By the end of EYFS, the Early Learning Goal is that children should be able to Sing a range of well-known nursery rhymes and songs and Perform songs, rhymes, poems and stories with others, and (when appropriate) try to move in time with music.
An overview of our Music Curriculum
We chose to follow “Kapow” planning for Years 1-3 and Years 5-6, to enable children to build their confidence and develop a genuine interest in music. It also exposes children to a broad range of music from around the world and through the ages, which links exactly with our Intent. It offers National Curriculum Mapping which shows which units cover each of the National Curriculum attainment targets, as well as each of the strands within them. A clear Progression of Skills shows the skills that are taught within each year group and how these skills develop year on year to ensure attainment targets are securely met by the end of each key stage.
Children have regular discrete Music lessons and have frequent opportunities to perform in class and at Musical Assemblies. In Year 4 Children are taught by a specialist Music teacher from the Suffolk County Music Service and also learn to play an instrument. They perform for their families and peers at the end of each term. The SCMS curriculum builds on what children have already learned. It continues to cover the required skills and National Curriculum attainment targets for this Year Group, along with the strands within them. It also leads towards further development of children’s skills and knowledge in Years 5 and 6.
| Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 3 | Year 4 | Year 5 | Year 6 | |
| Autumn | Superheroes(Pitch and Tempo) | Musical Me | Indian Music(Traditional Instruments and improvisation) | Exploring SoundsFirst notes on my instrument and singing and playing together | South and West Africa | Film Music |
| Spring | The Snail and the Mouse(Classical Music, dynamics and tempo) | African Call and Response Song | Chinese New Year(Pentatonic melodies and composition) | Improving my playing. Reading music and learning new notes on my instrument. Singing and playing as a team | Blues | Music of World War 2 |
| Summer | Under the Sea(Musical Vocabulary) | Orchestral Instruments | Ballads | Playing with confidence and good technique from memory and notation. I can sing and play as part of an ensemble | Looping and remixing | Pop Art(Theme and Variations) |