Intent  

At Hartsfield School we want our children to have access to a music curriculum that fosters a lifelong love of music. We believe that every child should have the opportunity to develop their music potential and we aim to nurture and encourage musical development throughout the school. Music is highly valued at Hartsfield because it is an emotive and powerful form of communication that can impact and change the way children feel and act. It provides opportunities for children to learn about different cultures and explore how music has changed throughout history. Through music, children develop key life skills such as collaboration, communication and confidence. Music can also help regulate emotions and empower children, it can build resilience and promote self-discipline. At Hartsfield children will be taught through a practical, exploratory and child led approach to music learning. Staff will share their knowledge, appreciation and enthusiasm for music with all children. Music at Hartsfield will help promote the key skills of…

• Listening and Response
• Exploration and Creativity
• Singing
• Sharing and Performing

Implementation 

Our music curriculum is planned so our children can reach the progression milestones by the end of each key stage (please see additional table for progression document). At Hartsfield we follow the ‘Charanga Original Scheme of work’, which provides access to a wide range of musical genres and resources for the children to learn about and explore. ‘Charanga’ is a music scheme that is recommended and supplied by Herts County Council. The key skills of listening and response, exploration and creativity, singing, and sharing and performing are all embedded in classroom activities, extra-curricular music clubs such as choir, as well as the learning of instruments and various performances and assemblies. The elements of music are taught in classroom lessons where children are encouraged to use the language of music to discuss their responses to and to understand how it music is made, played, appreciated and analysed. In classroom lessons children learn to play various tuned and un-tuned instruments and as a year group in year 3 children learn to play the violin with a specialist violin tutor. Units, where possible and appropriate, will be linked to class topics and cross curricular themes. The ‘Charanga’ music scheme supports staff knowledge and continuous professional development opportunities to ensure that all children are being exposed to high quality music teaching. ‘Charanga’ provides well-structured units of work to support non-specialist teachers.