“Where words fail, music speaks.”

Hans Christian Andersen

Intent

Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity. At Park Lane Primary School, we therefore believe that music gives children the skills to explore new cultures, learn to persevere through practice, and strengthen students’ self-confidence. Our children can take these skills beyond the classroom to improve their musical ability outside of school, or to use these skills to make wider change in society.

We strongly believe that music plays a fundamental role in helping children to feel part of a community, therefore we provide opportunities for all children to create, play, perform and enjoy music both in class and to an audience. Through assemblies, key stage performances and trust-wide events, children showcase their talent and their understanding of performing with awareness of others. Carefully planned lessons enable children to develop their skills, appreciate a wide variety of music and begin to appraise a range of musical genres.

Our vision is that all children are afforded the opportunity to learn to play a variety of instruments, to sing, and to be exposed to a wide variety of high quality music performances. Park Lane Primary actively seeks to remove all barriers to this education, and make sure these opportunities are available to all students regardless of their financial background or attainment.

As a part of the Griffin Schools Trust, our robust vision for music also includes collaborating with other schools within the GST to create a uniform and cohesive curriculum, and also having the opportunity to sharing and collaborate on performances.

Implementation

• The teaching of music lessons is delivered by class teachers with support of a music specialist hub within the Trust.
• Performances are recorded and showcased on Seesaw (our virtual learning platform)
• The Sports and Arts Fund from the Griffin Schools Trust provides children with funds to further develop skills away from the school setting.
• Staff members are provided with regular CPD opportunities for music including working alongside The Voices Foundation and supported through a wider network of schools within The Griffin Schools Trust.
• The music lead works closely alongside the rest of the Arts Team to provide targeted and ongoing support, where needed.
• Assessment on Target Tracker is used as a tool to ensure that children achieve highly and as a basis for future target setting within music lessons.
• Park Lane is committed to investing in high-quality music equipment and resources to ensure the effective delivery of music lessons ensuring children are exposed to a variety of opportunities.
• Teachers make sure that each skill is modelled to enable all pupils to be successful within the lesson.

The Park Lane music curriculum:

• Creates immersive musical experiences
  The chance for children to play a variety of instruments and sing, in an ensemble and individually. This includes receiving guidance from music specialists, and allowing children to develop creatively as unique individuals.

• Widens cultural horizons
  Allowing children to listen, analyse and create music from a wide range of cultural and historical backgrounds, including familiar and unfamiliar styles. This helps to promote a tolerance and respect for other cultures, as well as broadening children’s horizons.

• Develops skills and knowledge simultaneously
  The curriculum teaches children about music and music history, as well as the skills to create their own music using their voices and a variety of instruments.

Impact

Our Senior Leadership Team are strong advocates of music at Park Lane, which supports the delivery of music lessons by all teachers.

This is demonstrated in a variety of ways:

• Children achieve highly in the arts, which is reflected in the standards achieved against the planned outcomes. A music specialist ensures that standards are continuously driven.
• Children are offered many extra-curricular opportunities, which this year included performing at the Royal Albert Hall, taking part in The Big Sing 2022, and receiving workshops from visiting specialists in their field.
• Arts experiences promote a tolerance and respect for other cultures, as well as broadening children’s horizons.
• Work that is produced is of consistently high quality including those children with SEN needs.
• Gifted and talented pupils have a variety of opportunities to develop their skills in preparation for the next stage, including the inclusion of the Sports and Arts Fund.
• Seesaw showcases a progression of skills developed within music and highlights children’s achievements in the subject throughout their time at Park Lane.
• The enjoyment of learning in music as a subject is apparent across all key stages and pupil voice in this subject echoes this.
• Drop ins carried out by the Arts team provide the chance for the subject lead to evaluate the subject in each year group. Following this, targeted support is provided to ensure all lessons are ‘skills based’ and to an appropriate level to both challenge and support all learners.