Music
Music Provision/National Curriculum Music
Our curriculum provides the children with opportunities to make music, play and perform with instruments and to begin to understand music theory.
In keeping with the 2014 National Curriculum, our class music lessons aim to ensure that all pupils:
- perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians.
- learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others.
- have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence
- understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated, including through the inter-related dimensions: pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, structure and appropriate musical notations.
At Pratts Bottom Primary School, pupils are taught to sing and play musically with increasing confidence and control. They 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.
Drama and Performance
All pupils will have the opportunity to take part in school performances during their time at PBPS.
- Reception and Years 1/2 are responsible for the Christmas and Easter assembly
- Years 3/4 are responsible for the Harvest assembly
- Years 5/6 are responsible for the Remembrance assembly and perform an end of year production, including in recent years, Aladdin and Oliver.
Here at PBPS we use Music Express to implement our music offering.
Music_Express_two-year-rolling-programme-
/docs/Music_Express_Skills_Progressiony1_6.pdf
Music Express fully supports the National Curriculum.
Music Express is:
- topic-based
- cross-curricular
- musically diverse
- fully resourced
- accessible to non-music readers
The essence of Music Express is to create a topic-based, cross-curricular approach to support children's learning in music and across other subjects through music. A steady progression plan has been built into Music Express, both within each year and from one year to the next, ensuring consistent musical development.
By using Music Express as the basis of a scheme of work, we can ensure that they are fulfilling the aims for musical learning stated in the English National Curriculum:
The English National Curriculum states 'That all pupils: perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians.'
Music Express includes many examples of music styles and genres from different times and places, including the classical Western canon. These are explored through the language of music via active listening, performing and composing activities, which enable understanding of the context and genre. Examples include vocal melodies from Medieval times, Tudor court music, Romantic ballet music, Twentieth century pop, as well as traditional and classical forms from across the globe.
The English National Curriculum states 'That all pupils: learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others, have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence.
Music Express provides a classroom-based, participatory and inclusive approach to music learning. Throughout the scheme, children are actively involved in using and developing their singing voices, using body percussion and whole body actions, and learning to handle and play classroom instruments effectively to create and express their own and others' music. Through a range of whole class, group and individual activities, children have opportunities to explore sounds, listen actively, compose and perform. In some age 7–11 units the class ensemble can be extended using additional scores which are available for those children learning to play non-classroom instruments.
The English National Curriculum states 'That all pupils: understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated, including through the inter-related dimensions: pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, structure and appropriate musical notations.'
Music Express builds experience and develops understanding of the dimensions (elements) of music throughout the scheme. Each unit has as its focus one process such as performance or composition, or one dimension, such as pitch, but the learning progresses within the context of all the inter-related processes and dimensions of music. A wide variety of notations, including picture, graphic, rhythm and staff notation are integrated, wherever appropriate, with practical music-making activities throughout the scheme. Notations are used progressively to promote understanding and use of the representation of sound in symbols by all children.