MUSIC:           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.

“Without music, life would be a mistake”, Friedrich Nietzsche

Vision

At Freshfield, we understand that music is a universal language with creativity at its core. Our high-quality music curriculum aims to engage and inspire pupils to develop both a love of music and their skills as musicians. We provide children with a range of opportunities to cultivate their cultural understanding and develop their musical competencies, such as appreciating and understanding a wide range of music from different traditions. As our children progress through our curriculum, we also teach them to engage critically with music, allowing them to compose, and to listen with discrimination to music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians. By the time our children leave Freshfield, they have been equipped with this knowledge and understanding as well as having an appreciation of a breadth of musical forms. We know that by providing regular opportunities to actively engage with music we can increase our children’s self-confidence, creativity and sense of achievement. There is a clear link between music and wellbeing and we value the power sharing music can have on our mood and our feelings

As children 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.

5 Key Elements in Music

1. Learn to sing and play musically with confidence and control
2. Develop an understanding of musical composition, organising and manipulating ideas within musical structure and be able to reproduce sounds from aural memory
3. Listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory
4. Play a tune on a variety of musical instruments, understanding staff and musical notations
5. Appreciate and understand a wide range of live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians, as well as developed an understanding of the history of music

Substantive and disciplinary knowledge in Music

Substantive knowledge in music is based on the developing knowledge of the nine interrelated dimensions of music.  All music learning is built around the interrelated dimensions of music.

Substantive knowledge focuses on developing children’s skills and knowledge required for them to develop as musicians.  This is achieved through deliberate practice and allows children to develop and demonstrate fluency of knowledge.  It involves learning about music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians.

Disciplinary knowledge in music is the interpretation of the interrelated dimensions of music and how this knowledge is used when singing, playing instruments, improvising and composing, to develop creative and original pieces and performances.  Children work independently and collaboratively to interpret and combine

the dimensions of music to create a specific and desired effect.

How we plan for and teach music

Across the school, we adopt the Singup music scheme. The Singup scheme provides our music teacher with week-by-week lesson support for each year group in the school. It provides lesson plans, assessment, clear progression, and engaging and high-quality resources to support every lesson. Singup supports all the requirements of the National Curriculum for music.

In the Early Years (EYFS), music and movement is part of every-day learning. The children are taught new songs and dances linked to the topics they are learning by their class teachers. During their time in Nursery and Reception, our children build a repertoire of familiar songs and ways of dancing. Additionally, the children are encouraged to explore a range of percussion instruments, both with an adult and independently. As the children progress into Key Stage 1 and throughout Key Stage 2, each class has a weekly music lesson. As part of the KS2 curriculum we offer whole class ensemble tuition (previously known as Wider Opportunities) which provides children with the opportunity to learn to play an instrument under the tuition of a visiting music teacher from Sefton’s Sky Music Hub.

At our school we are committed to providing a range of musical experiences for our pupils, alongside the music curriculum. As part of our extra-curricular offer we have a Junior Choir and have strong links with Formby High School’s Music Department.

Assessment in Music

Assessment in music is done through continuous assessment for learning through monitoring the individual’s progress against the year specific expectations within a unit of music.  Summative assessments are made observing children’s final pieces of music and through half termly discussions with the music teacher.  Digital evidence is taken to support teacher observations and assessments of children’s progress.

Paper copies of the individual year group progression documents for 2022-23 are available upon request from the School Office.