Intent
The intent of music teaching at Trinity Road is to inspire and develop a love of music and maximise opportunities for children to be creative and have the knowledge and skills to compose, perform, evaluate and celebrate their talents and achievements. It is rooted in ensuring a clear understanding of the interrelated dimensions of music (musical elements) of timbre, texture, pitch, duration, dynamics, structure and tempo and engaging children to be confident to apply this to exploring and composing their own ideas. We take great pride in belonging to a bigger group, enabling us to rehearse and perform to an audience. Children in KS2 will also learn to play a pitched musical instrument and read music. We also place high value on ensuring that our children have an ongoing opportunity to listen to, experience and talk about a range of music of different styles, cultures, genres and by important composers in musical history. We teach children to form their own opinions about music and value and respect those of others. Developing the concepts of Respect, Achieve, Belong play a key role in music.
Implementation
Music is taught once a week in all classes. The curriculum is organised into half-termly foci based on the interrelated dimensions of music (musical elements) of timbre, texture, pitch, duration, dynamics, structure and tempo. In KS1, music is planned by the subject leader and then taught by the class teachers. In KS2 music is taught to all classes by the subject leader. During music lessons, children learn musicianship skills and to be creative composers and performers. Working collaboratively and respecting each other in order to achieve and celebrate success is also key.
During the course of the year, all children are taught to understand and use each of the musical elements to improvise, compose, perform and evaluate and refine their ideas. Children in Year 3 and 4 learn to play the recorder and children in Year 5 and 6 learn to play the keyboard/keyboard of a glockenspiel. All children in KS2 are taught to read music.
Music lessons are planned using the progression of skills and vocabulary documents to ensure that skills taught in each year are built on in the following years.
Performing to an audience is a very important part of music. Children are encouraged to take on the role of confident performers and respectful audience listeners within music lessons. This also provides the opportunity for them to listen, evaluate and refine using a critical ear.
We look for opportunities for our children to be able to perform to a wider audience. Music is a strong feature in our Harvest, Christmas and Easter services at Trinity Church, where audiences are treated to high quality performances from; whole school singing, the choir, percussion orchestra and recorder clubs. All year groups take turns to lead and feature in services throughout the school year.
Further performances to the wider community and audiences are:
EYFS – Nativity and singing at the Christmas Service
KS1 – Taking part in the Infant Music Festival
Years 3 and 4 – Taking part in the Junior Music Festival
Years 5 and 6 – Taking part in Young Voices concert.