Intent:

In line with the 2014 National Curriculum for music, we use Charanga to support our music teaching, this is an online music scheme provided by Essex Music Services with lots of visual aids and interactive resources to support your children's learning about music. We take every opportunity to encourage a love for learning within all of our pupils, based around a resilience for learning and achieving greatness.  It is our aim that all children will develop a love and appreciation of music through playing instruments and singing; listening and appraising; and performing and sharing. We want all children to know they are musical beings and to give them opportunities to find their musicality.

Implementation:

By following the Charanga scheme of work the children can have access to a growing library of songs, topics, instrument courses and creative apps.

As soon as children start at our school, they learn to sing and sing to learn.  They count, learn shapes, colours, days of the week, develop their phonics, sequence familiar stories and learn about the world around them through songs and actions. This learning journey will be built on and be enhanced throughout their time in EYFS. Our younger children are given opportunities, both teacher-led and through continuous provision, to explore the elements of music with hands on experience of musical instruments.

KS1 children build on these skills with curriculum led music teaching and learning which offers many opportunities for cross-curricular links, for example; English and Stories, Geography and the Weather and Science and Our Bodies and others. Building on skills from previous learning, KS2 children learn to play the ukulele. Our school offers children the opportunity to sing in a choir. The choir has participated in ‘The Big Sing’ at London O2 as well as annual participation in the local infant and junior music festival. The children are able to participate in individual music lesson during the school day which currently includes; keyboard and guitar. Other instrumental lessons are available such as flute, clarinet and saxophone. Several classes have benefited from class based ukulele lessons.

Impact:

The children’s aptitudes and talents are nurtured from EYFS to the end of KS2 through musical activities including singing, listening and appraising and performing and sharing. Our approach is a mixture of developing musicality through curriculum coverage and the introduction of instrument tuition to develop skills in all the elements of music. As the children develop their knowledge and skills throughout the key stages their performances in and outside of school grow in maturity and confidence.  This is reflected in our termly assessment data as teachers see their students’ progress within a year and, in the long-term, throughout a key stage. Class teachers complete ‘I can’ statements to help inform future planning.  Subject and school leaders monitor the impact of our curriculum provision through completing regular monitoring, that includes listening to the voice of our children.