Music
Music development plan summary: Dame Ellen Pinsent School
Overview
This is a summary of how our school delivers music education to all our pupils across three areas – curriculum music, extra-curricular music and musical experiences – and what changes we are planning in future years. This information is to help pupils and parents or carers understand what our school offers and who we work with to support our pupils’ music education.
Music in the Curriculum
Children in all pathways have a weekly music lesson every other half term and we use and adapt Kapow music to support the delivery of this. In addition to this, children in Woodlands Pathway receive an hour of class violin lessons for a half term each academic year. Woodlands also take part in singing and signing as part of their weekly Star of the Week assembly. Children in Orchard and Seedlings pathway receive sensory music through Jo Jingles for 30 minutes each week and attend Singing and Signing assembly once a week. Music and Communication, Play and Communication (MACPAC) is also available to Seedlings and Orchard pathways every week as part of their continuous provision activities. This encourages listening to a wide variety of music from different genres, exploring instruments and everyday objects to create sounds and to encourage the use of their own communication methods, such as PECS.
In Seedlings pathway music is taught through our Expressive Art and Design curriculum which is taught for one session per week, every other half term. These lessons will encourage children to experiment with vocal sound, show a familiarity of a wide selection of songs, purposefully explore an instrument to different tempos and attempt to imitate simple rhythms.
In Orchard pathway music is taught holistically across the week and discretely every week, every other half term. Throughout these sessions children are encouraged to hold and explore an instrument, create intentional sounds, explore volume and imitation using instruments and anticipate repeated sounds.
In Woodlands pathway music is taught through subject specific lessons every week, every other half term. This is up to an hour per session. These lessons will encourage children to make different voice sounds in response to music, to show how a piece of music makes them feel, to accurately match instruments to represent a certain sound, listen to a wide range of music and identify instruments they hear and compose a simple piece of music that they can explain.
Extra-Curricular Music at DEP
Violin club is offered to a small group of Woodlands children every year for half an hour on a Thursday. This is a free service the school provides. Woodland’s children also have the opportunity to perform in iconic concert venues, such as The Bradshaw Hall (Birmingham Conservatoire) Workout Wednesday, which involves moving to a variety of music also happens every Wednesday lunch time for Seedling and Orchard pathway.
Children at DEP take part in weekly singing assemblies (as previously stated). Woodlands pathway also incorporate music into their class assemblies (e.g. Diwali, Chinese New Year, Eid), as well as Harvest, Christmas and Easter services.
Some of or violinists are given the opportunity to perform once a year at the Birmingham conservatoire. At DEP we have built strong relationships with music organisations across the city such as Rocksteady and City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.
Children at DEP enjoy being audiences to these wonderful organisations when they visit our school.
Future Plans
Moving forward DEP is aiming to build on performance opportunities provided for our Woodlands pathway and would like our next event to be at Symphony Hall with The Music Service. We appreciate how important it is to maintain ties with musicians and services within our community and would like to offer our children more opportunities to see live music in school. Work in the future will focus on more opportunities for all of our children to access live musical performances.
Further Information
Music service: https://www.servicesforeducation.co.uk/music-services-in-schools
Jo Jingles: https://www.jojingles.com/
Rock Steady: https://www.rocksteadymusicschool.com/