Music
Our approach to the Music curriculum ensures that it is taught discretely to ensure depth and rigour. Underpinned by the accelerated learning approach to teaching and learning, the Summer Lane music curriculum document supports the progression of substantive content and concepts, which have been carefully selected and well-sequenced, so a child should know more and revisit knowledge and concepts to ensure depth and rigour over time. The key concepts, principles and themes have been developed from the National Curriculum into a range of progressive knowledge and skills through which the children are helped to grow and develop to succeed in 21st century Britain. This progressive curriculum allows a purposeful way of teaching and learning, enabling us to provide a more meaningful and sequential approach to the schema for Music.
Our music curriculum sets out pathways for progression that enables pupils to develop their musical knowledge. As a result, the progress of children in music requires them to develop musically across 3 pillars that interrelate in musicianship: ‘Technical’ development for pupils to translate their intentions successfully into sound. ‘Constructive’ development for pupils to understand how musical components come together both analytically and in the creative process. ‘Expressive’ development to allow children to focus on the more indefinable aspects of music: quality, meaning and creativity.
At Summer Lane, we have segmented these pillars further to scaffold and support pupils development in music into 6 key areas: singing, listening, composing, musicianship, performing and musical history.
Our musical curriculum content supports pupils in developing these 3 essential pillars, which in turn support the activities of performing, composing and listening. As a result, the Music curriculum we offer is designed to meet the needs of all our pupils. It is rich, varied, imaginative and ambitious and meets the needs of individual learners by can easily be adapted for pupils with additional needs.
The intent of our Music curriculum is to provide a comprehensive and engaging musical education that aligns with the Model Music Curriculum (MMC) introduced in 2021. Our aim is to ensure that all pupils have the opportunity to perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a wide range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of great composers and musicians.
Through a structured and sequential approach, we will develop pupils' skills in listening and appraising, fostering a deep understanding and appreciation of diverse musical genres throughout history. Each half term will culminate in high-quality end outcomes, allowing students to showcase their musical growth and creativity. By incorporating the three pillars of technical development, constructive development and expressive development, we will provide a robust and direct music education that not only meets national curriculum standards but also nurtures a lifelong love and appreciation for music in all its forms.
The Accelerated Learning Cycle, based on the work of Alastair Smith, is applied in all lessons. It stems from the idea of a supportive and challenging learning environment. The cycle has active engagement through multi-sensory learning, encourages the demonstrating understanding of learning in a variety of ways and the consolidation of knowing.
A gather, skills, apply approach to planning and delivery of lessons is taken across school to ensure children develop a deep understanding of specific skills and are able to apply these in a range of situations.
Our curriculum is designed with a core focus on retrieval practice, recognising its pivotal role in helping students know more and remember more. This intent is done through a dual approach: integrated retrieval within individual lessons and a structured, subject retrieval practice rota. In-session retrieval activities are carefully crafted to reinforce key concepts and knowledge, promoting immediate recall and application. Complementing this, our weekly retrieval practice rota systematically revisits content across various subjects, ensuring spaced repetition and interleaving of crucial information. This comprehensive strategy aims to strengthen neural connections, facilitate the transfer of knowledge to long-term memory and build increasingly complex mental models. By embedding retrieval practice as a fundamental aspect of our curriculum, we strive to enhance our pupils' ability to retain, recall and apply their learning effectively, thereby fostering deeper understanding and more robust academic progress.
Our curriculum is ambitious for all pupils, including those children with SEND. Curriculum designers and teachers have high expectations of what SEND pupils can achieve and the curriculum is not diluted or unnecessarily reduced for SEND pupils. Every pupil is different and so what works for each pupil varies. Pupil’s individual needs are considered and adaptations are planned to ensure the success of pupils in all subjects.
The way that our curriculum is designed ensures that chunks of learning are sequenced in a coherent way to enable all pupils, including those with SEND, to build on prior knowledge.
Where pupils are identified with having complex needs, it may be appropriate to provide a personalised curriculum which will be based on individual needs and will retain ambition for the pupil.
Where working memory is an issue for pupils, including those with SEND, we look to reduce extraneous load as much as possible as well as identifying key information when teaching. This helps pupils to pay attention to the content which they are expected to learn. Adaptations to support individual pupils will be recorded on personal school support plans.
Pupils specific needs determine the types of adaptations which are required. These adaptations are in how the subject is taught rather than the content pupils are expected to learn. Where appropriate, learning will be chunked into smaller steps and pre learning and consolidation time in planned in to support need. Adaptations may include supporting pupils to pay attention to key aspects as well as reducing excessive or unhelpful demands on working memory. Time is also planned to ensure pupils with SEND are pre taught instructions and vocabulary to support their understanding.
Formative assessment is ongoing throughout each lesson. It judges progress and enables teachers to make flexible adaptions to their planned teaching. Through this regular ongoing assessment, tasks are matched to the ability of each child through adapted activities and including adult support, providing a level of challenge that is stimulating for pupils and questioning skills.
The curriculum document for music is regularly reviewed to identify any gaps or misconceptions to be addressed. This allows children to acquire complex skills that depends on the fundamentals of their prior knowledge in a well-designed curriculum sequence.