Music

Music at Fox Hill

Intent

At Fox Hill Primary School, we aim to develop a life-long love of music and encourage the belief that anyone can be a musician! Children develop the skills, knowledge and understanding in order to become confident performers, composers and listeners. We achieve this through listening, singing, playing, evaluating, analysing and composing across a wide variety of historical periods, styles, traditions, and musical genres. We aim to provide an engaging music curriculum that reflects the world that we live in now, as well as educating children about musical styles and genres from around the world and throughout history. We are committed to developing a curiosity for the subject, as well as an understanding and acceptance of the validity and importance of all types of music, and an unbiased respect for the role that music may wish to be expressed in any person’s life.

Children will develop the musical skills of singing, playing tuned and untuned instruments, improvising and composing music, and listening to and responding to music. They will develop an understanding of the history and cultural context of the music that they listen to and learn how music can be written down. Through music, our curriculum also develops transferrable skills such as team-work, leadership, creative thinking, problem-solving, decision making, and presentation and performance skills. We are committed to ensuring children understand the value and importance of music in the wider community and are able to use their musical skills, knowledge, and experiences to involve themselves in music, in a variety of different contexts.

We will deliver a curriculum that:

• Promotes enjoyment, self-confidence and a sense of achievement through musical activities.
• Enables children to be aware of, understand and respond appropriately to the rich variety of sounds in their environment and particularly to those organised arrangements of sounds called music.
• Develops the children’s capacity to express ideas and feelings through the medium of sound.
• Acquires musical skills and understanding of musical concepts through primarily active listening then performing and composing.
• Is inclusive and supports children to develop and embrace their creativity whilst experiencing success and satisfaction in music.
• Meets the National Curriculum aims to ensure that all children perform, listen to and evaluate music; be taught to sing, create and compose music; understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated.

Implementation

Music is taught through a clear and comprehensive scheme of work, Kapow, in line with the National Curriculum and EYFS Framework. Kapow offers an integrated, practical, exploratory and child-led approach to musical learning through the interrelated dimensions of music (pitch, duration, tempo, timbre, structure, texture and dynamics) which are woven throughout the units to encourage the development of musical skills as the learning progresses through listening and appraising, differing musical activities (including creating and exploring) and performing. Kapow units of work enable children to understand musical concepts through a repetition-based approach to learning. Learning about the same musical concept through different musical activities enables a more secure, deeper learning and mastery of musical skills. Musical teaching and learning is not linear. The strands of musical learning, presented within the lesson plans and the on-screen resources, are part of the learning spiral. Over time, children can both develop new musical skills and concepts, and re-visit established musical skills and concepts, creating a connection between new knowledge and existing knowledge whilst working towards clearly defined end points.

A steady progression plan has been built into Kapow, both within each year and from one year to the next, ensuring consistent musical development. By using Kapow as the basis of a scheme of work, we can ensure that the children are fulfilling the aims for musical learning stated in the National Curriculum and EYFS Framework. Kapow includes many examples of music styles and genres from different times and places. These are explored through the language of music via active listening, performing and composing activities, which enable understanding of the context and genre.

Kapow 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 and are given the opportunity to collaborate through composition. Subject specific music vocabulary is explicitly taught, modelled by teachers throughout lessons and discussed in a meaningful context to enable the children to use it confidently within their music learning.

Although Music is taught within distinct Music lessons, as a school we feel it contributes strongly to other areas of the curriculum and we raise the profile of music wherever possible. Staff plan creatively to enable opportunities for music to be interwoven into their topics for that term and music is enjoyed throughout the day within listening and moving activities, mindfulness and other activities relevant to the children’s ages. We proudly celebrate the amount of musical opportunities that are offered at Fox Hill and that the children can enjoy which include: Rock Steady Lessons; In2Music Lessons delivered by Berkshire Maestros; after school choir club; performances with other local schools at Christmas; Junior Music Festival; weekly singing assemblies; end of year productions; orchestral performances; Pantomime; Christmas nativity; Harvest festival and Easter assemblies (often at the local church).

Teachers use highly effective AFL at different points in each lesson to determine a child’s level of understanding of the musical skills or concept being taught. Effective modelling by teachers ensures children are able to develop their musical skills, deepen their learning and move towards the mastery of those skills. Lessons are differentiated to ensure all children can access the learning and opportunities to stretch children’s learning are also provided within Kapow’s units of work. Knowledge organisers for each unit support children in building a foundation of factual knowledge by encouraging recall of key facts and vocabulary which they then independently apply to their music learning. The use of formative and summative assessment throughout units and at the end of units provides useful evidence of the progress that has been made. Parents are kept informed of their child’s progress and suggestions to support at home are given if needed.

Impact

Children will benefit from a high-quality music education which engages and inspires them to develop a love of music and their talent as musicians. It will enable them to be confident performers, composers and listeners who will be able to express themselves musically at and beyond school. Children will show an appreciation and respect for a wide range of musical styles from around the world and will understand how music is influenced by the wider cultural, social and historical contexts in which it is developed. As children progress, they will develop a growing musical vocabulary that allows them to critically engage with music; to discuss and share their own thoughts, opinions and ideas whilst acknowledging and respecting that these may vary from person to person. Teaching and learning of music is a reflective process for the children where opportunities are provided to assess themselves and their peers as well as celebrating their success and skills with their peers and wider audiences.

The music curriculum at Fox Hill will be demonstrated through teacher assessment, photographic and video evidence, including pupil voice which captures each child’s progress throughout the year.

Music KS1 & KS2 National Curriculum Requirements

Music Progression of Knowledge and Skills

The music progression of knowledge and skills gives an overview of the skills and knowledge covered in each year group and how these skills are developed in order to enable the children of Fox Hill to reach the end of key stage outcomes for Music, as outlined in the National Curriculum. 

As our Music curriculum develops and evolves, the information within this document will be updated to ensure it accurately reflects the content of our learning.

Performance opportunities and links with the wider community

Junior Music Festival 

Every year, Fox Hill children are offered the opportunity to take part in the Junior Music Festival, organised by Berkshire Maestros. The event takes place at the Hexagon in Reading and is a fantastic experience for all involved.

We are so proud of the children who took part in a choir of over 300 children from schools all across Berkshire, singing beautiful music relating to the sea, supported by an orchestra of Berkshire Maestros teachers. 

O2 Young Voices

Welcome to the largest Children’s choir in the world, Young Voices takes place at The O2 with over 120,000 excited singing school children aged from 6-13. We are proud to share that our children at Fox Hill attend this fantastic event and experience.

Community Christmas Choir Concert

On a rather chilly Saturday afternoon, a group of singers from Fox Hill joined other children from schools in Bracknell to sing a selection of Christmas songs to get local residents into the Christmas spirit. It was a spectacular afternoon!

Lambrook Key Stage 2 Choral Morning

Children from Year 4 were very fortunate to be invited to a choral workshop morning at Lambrook School. They were joined by other local schools to take part in warm up games, rounds and singing exercises which were led by a team of children's choral specialists. The children worked on a joint song as a whole group, specially written for the morning, and performed it as a finale to the morning.

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