Music is an important part of the curriculum at Ratby Primary School. Pupils will perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great classical composers and modern musicians. Pupils will also learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others, have the opportunity to learn musical instruments, use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence. Pupils will 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.
Our music curriculum aims to ensure that all children:
- Sing with a wide range and with a variety of expression
- Sing confidently in parts
- Read staff notation
- Experience playing an instrument in a class ensemble
- Hear a youth or professional orchestra or band live
- Hear a youth, church or professional choir live
In addition, there are opportunities for children to be able to develop their musicianship through weekly singing assemblies, the school choir, instrumental lessons (through an external organisation) and performing as part of concerts, services and productions. Pupils in Year 4 will be taught to play an instrument, as a class, by specialist teachers from Leicestershire Schools Music Hub throughout the year.
Our whole school listening resource (Musician of the Week) develops the pupils’ listening skills and provides them with the opportunity to listen to and appreciate a wide breadth of different musical genres and styles.
Curriculum music is taught by classroom teachers using the Kapow scheme of learning. Kapow’s Primary music scheme allows teachers to take a holistic approach to music in which the following strands; performing, listening, composing, the history of music and the inter-related dimensions of music are woven together to create engaging and enriching learning experiences. Each unit of work combines these strands within a cross curricular topic designed to capture pupils’ imagination and encourage them to explore music enthusiastically. Children are taught how to sing fluently and expressively, and play tuned and untuned accurately and with control. They will begin to recognise and name the inter related dimensions of music – pitch, duration, tempo and timbre and use these in their improvisations and compositions.
At Ratby we follow a spiral curriculum whereby previous skills and knowledge are returned to and built upon.
