Music

Curriculum Intent

The Music Department intends to instill a lifelong love of music through a broad and balanced curriculum that inspires and nurtures all students whatever their ability.  We aim for students to develop into well-rounded musicians across the three strands of the National Curriculum – performing, composing and appraising – who are increasingly self-reflective and who aspire to be the best musician they can.  The design of the curriculum is ambitious to prepare students for future musical study, potential careers as well as an understanding and appreciation of the music they hear.

Open Evening Flyer

Aims

Our aims within the Music Department are to:

• Give all students the opportunity to learn to play a musical instrument and the confidence to perform in public 
• Increase student understanding of musical concepts within a range of musical genres and develop appraisal skills 
• Give all students the opportunity to compose their own music and develop their own sense of musical style 
• Develop students’ independent learning skills (focus, self-management, metacognition) through individual and group work 

Learning Journey

Our learning journeys give a visual overview of the curriculum content covered in each subject. They will help you understand how students make progress in different topics over the years they are with us.

Music Learning Journey

Key Stage Three Overview

All students receive one 50 minute lesson per week.  The curriculum is split into four or five topics each year where the knowledge and skills learned in one topic are built upon in the next (a spiral curriculum) so that those that want to study music at KS4 have all the knowledge and skills needed. 

In Year 7 students will learn rhythm and notation before learning to play keyboard.  They will explore Blues Music the music used in video games. 

In Year 8 students will develop their composing skills by looking at Silent FIlm before learning to play guitar, studying Reggae music and forming their own band. 

In Year 9 students will follow a version of the Musical Futures program where they will learn to learn like professional musicians – choosing their own music to perform, composing their own songs and appraising the success of their music.

Key Stage Four Overview

We currently follow the Eduqas syllabus for GCSE Music.  The course is divided into three strands – performing; composing; listening and appraising.   

Students choose their instrument for the performing elements of the course and develop their skills performing solo and as part of an ensemble.  They will be encouraged to participate in school music groups and concerts.  The other practical part of the course is composition.  Over the two years students will create two original pieces of music with one being to a brief set by the exam board.  These two strands are assessed through coursework. 

The final strand of GCSE Music is listening and appraising which is assessed through an exam.  Throughout the course students will hone their listening skills to be able to aurally identify musical instruments and other musical features in a range of musical styles.  They will also study two set works which are currently ‘Badinerie’ by JS Bach and ‘Africa’ by Toto. 

Key Words

We aim to support students in their literacy across all curriculum subjects. We provide key word lists as a teaching and learning tool to support student understanding of the technical vocabulary needed to articulate their learning about a particular subject.

Music Key Words

Trips and Extra-Curricular Activities

The most important extra-curricular offer that the Music Department offers is one-to-one musical instrument tuition.  These lessons are taught by a team of highly talented peripatetic music tutors.  Students can choose to study piano, guitar, voice, drum kit, flute, saxophone, clarinet, trumpet, cornet and trombone. 

There are regular concerts – a Christmas concert and a Summer concert and the music department works with drama to produce an annual school show. 

There are several music groups that students can join including a choir and a woodwind group.  Each year we look to see what other groups can be offered and students are welcome to suggest ideas and even run their own groups. 

Staff

Mrs D Scott- Leader of Music