Curriculum Music

At Walhampton we believe that children learn the most important musical skills by 'doing'. All pupils throughout the school have the opportunity to perform and play practical music. This might be as simple as a class performance or to 300 parents and friends! The journey of performance starts in the Nursery when confidence and aural skills are grown and developed and continues throughout the whole school journey.

We use the following structure for developing important skills:

Nursery, Kindergarten and Reception

Pupils are taught to:

  • use their voices expressively and creatively by singing basic songs and speaking chants and rhymes

  • play untuned instruments musically and rhythmically

  • listen with concentration and understanding to a range of high-quality live and recorded music

  • Move freely to different styles of music

Year 1-2

Pupils are taught to:

  • use their voices expressively and creatively by singing songs and speaking chants and rhymes

  • play tuned and untuned instruments musically

  • listen with concentration and understanding to a range of high-quality live and recorded music

  • experiment with, create, select and combine sounds using the interrelated dimensions of music

Year 3-6

Pupils should be taught to sing and play musically with increasing confidence and control. They should develop an understanding of musical composition, organising and manipulating ideas within musical structures and reproducing sounds from aural memory.

Pupils are taught to:

  • play and perform in solo and ensemble contexts, using their voices and playing musical instruments with increasing accuracy, fluency, control and expression

  • improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the interrelated dimensions of music

  • listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory

  • use and understand staff and other musical notations

  • appreciate and understand a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians

  • develop an understanding of the history of music

Year 7-8

Pupils should build on their previous knowledge and skills through performing, composing and listening. They should develop their vocal and/or instrumental fluency, accuracy and expressiveness, and understand musical structures, styles, genres and traditions, identifying the expressive use of musical dimensions. They should listen with increasing discrimination and awareness to inform their practice as musicians. They should use technologies appropriately and appreciate and understand a wide range of musical contexts and styles.

Pupils are taught to:

  • play and perform confidently in a range of solo and ensemble contexts using their voice, playing instruments musically, fluently and with accuracy and expression

  • improvise and compose; and extend and develop musical ideas by drawing on a range of musical structures, styles, genres and traditions

  • use staff and other relevant notations appropriately and accurately in a range of musical styles, genres and traditions

  • identify and use the interrelated dimensions of music expressively and with increasing sophistication, including use of tonalities, different types of scales and other musical devices

  • listen with increasing discrimination to a wide range of music from great composers and musicians

  • develop a deepening understanding of the music that they perform and to which they listen, and its history