Music
Subject Leader - Miss Wakefield
At Banks Road Primary School, we work closely with Resonate, Liverpool's Music Education Hub. Their expert teachers deliver music lessons to all classes throughout the week.
All children from Nursery to Year 3 have a 45 minute singing lessons each Friday, delivered by a Resonate singing teacher.
All chidren from Year 4 to Year 6 have a weekly 45 minute lesson, delivered by a Resonate music teacher, learning either the cello, the viola or the violin.
Resonate 'Let's Play'
Each week, children in Year 6 are given the opportunity to take part in the Resonate Let's Play ensemble orchestra.
Intent
At Banks Road Primary School, music is everywhere. The children gain a firm understanding of what music is through listening, singing, playing, evaluating, analysing, and composing, across a wide variety of historical periods, styles, traditions, and musical genres. The Charanga Musical School scheme enables the children at Banks Road to understand musical concepts through a repetition-based approach to learning. We believe that learning about the same musical concept through different musical activities, enables a more secure, deeper learning and mastery of musical skills.
Implementation
The Music Curriculum ensures children sing, listen, play, perform and evaluate. At Banks Road Primary School, this is embedded in both the classroom activities, as well as through a plethora of live concerts which the children attend throughout the academic year. These concerts consist of both live interactive webinars, as well as in-person concerts, which are organised and led by professional musicians as part of the Resonate Musical Monday’s School’s Concert package. In the Summer term, the children at Banks Road are given the opportunity to attend a concert in the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, to experience first-hand experience of live music.
Through the musical programme Charanga, the teachers at Banks Road Primary School are able to produce inclusive lessons for all children to access the Music Curriculum in a fun and engaging way, further promoting a love of learning. Charanga lessons are planned in sequences to provide children with the opportunities to review, remember, deepen and apply their understanding. The elements of music are taught in classroom lessons so that children are able to use some of the language of music to understand how it is made, played, appreciated and analysed.
Each Unit of Work from EYFS – Year 6, comprises the strands of musical learning which correspond with the National Curriculum for music:
- Listening and Appraising
- Musical Activities
- Warm-up Games
- Optional Flexible Games
- Singing
- Playing instruments
- Improvisation
- Composition
- Performing
At Banks Road Primary School, the children are also provided with opportunities beyond the National Curriculum to explore music. The Key Stage 2 children at Banks Road Primary School have participated in the Young Voices Concerts for the past four years. The children are currently rehearsing for the 2024 concert, which is scheduled to take place in February 2025.
Impact
Music enables children to develop an understanding of culture and history, both in relation to children individually, as well as ethnicities from across the world. As a School of Sanctuary, this is something that we value in our curriculum. Children have the opportunity to discuss and share their own thoughts, opinions and ideas, by acknowledging and respecting that these may vary, and that this is positive.