This is a summary of how our school delivers music education to all our pupils across three areas – curriculum music, co-curricular provision 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.

Part A: Curriculum music

This is about what we teach in lesson time, how much time is spent teaching music and any music qualifications or awards that pupils can achieve.
At Woodchurch, we pride ourselves on delivering an inclusive and aspirational music curriculum across Key Stages 3 and 4.

Our Key Stage 3 curriculum has currently been condensed to one seventy five minute lesson every four weeks. We have carefully considered, as a department, the critical knowledge pupils need to secure to study Music at Key Stage 4 and have prioritised practical activities to ensure mastery of instrumentation.

Our curriculum includes key elements of the National Plan for Music Education and has been informed by the Model Music Curriculum (March 2021) which offers guidance on the teaching of Music through Key Stages 1 to 3.

Our Key Stage 3 curriculum is primarily designed to enable pupils’ creativity and to ensure engagement, whilst building foundational knowledge to enable pupils to progress and feel confident with the subject. We commence Year 7 with the exploration of key concepts such as rhythm, pitch and pulse to ensure that our pupils are able to construct mental models and develop a broad understanding of what’s needed to create and compose their own music. Year 8 acts as a continuation of Year 7, allowing pupils to build on the skills and knowledge they have developed during the previous year as well as introducing key musical genres including the Blues and Rap and Hip Hop. This year offers pupils an opportunity to explore lyric writing and music production using software such as Soundtrap to support this.

Year 9 further builds on our offer, consolidating the musical theory studied in Year 7 and Year 8 and introducing two further genres of Electronic Dance Music and Reggae as pupils look to consider the impact of different genres on society, exploring ideas around race and class and finding their own place with music composition. Our entire Key Stage 3 curriculum is planned to focus solely on skills, in a way that allows our staff to be responsive about the concepts they communicate these skills through, whilst exploring key genres helps to prepare pupils for their study of Music at Key Stage 4.

At Key Stage 4 we offer the Music BTEC, for a total of 150 minutes a week, which allows pupils to explore a range of different approaches to the study of Music, offering them the opportunity to develop sector-specific knowledge and skills in a practical way. The qualification encourages pupils to develop their own, individual skills, proving their aptitude in music through their own, personal response to a musical brief. From there, they develop their own understanding of what it takes to work in such a competitive industry, reflecting on effective strategies for rehearsal and performance.

Our offer is entirely inclusive and pupils from across our school community, including those pupils with SEND, are supported to access both our curricular and extracurricular opportunities. This year we are also fortunate to offer over fifty 1:1, fully funded fortnightly peripatetic sessions to pupils to support them with developing their skills in either singing or learning an instrument of their choice.

Part B: Co-curricular music

This is about opportunities for pupils to sing and play music, outside of lesson time, including choirs, ensembles and bands, and how pupils can make progress in music beyond the core curriculum.

Our school currently offers a number of 1:1 peripatetic lessons to pupils across all year groups. This provision allows pupils to opt to develop their vocal or instrumentation skills with a member of our Music staff and is delivered on a fortnightly basis. Pupils currently opt to take sessions in keyboard, drums, singing and music production. This is a fully funded provision that affords pupils additional opportunities to develop their skills in a personalised session that is responsive to their needs as musicians.

We offer a range of Music clubs every day, during lunchtime and after school and these are incredibly well attended. Pupils participate with excitement and enthusiasm and are ambitious in their aspirations to develop as musicians. Our current school production of Legally Blonde is rehearsed after school, during drop down days and outside of the school day, including on weekends and school holidays. Other opportunities for performance in our ensembles include:

• Choir
• School Production
• Annual Night at the Movies/Musicals concert
• Arts festival with musical performance opportunities
• Student led bands – with opportunities to perform at whole school events
• Primary festivals/collaborations
• Performances in assemblies/at parental evenings/events
• Concerts and instrumentation evenings

Pupils are also able to practise their music skills in our practice rooms at lunchtime or afterschool should they wish to. We are continuing to develop our extra-curricular offer in readiness for our application for Artsmark status.

Part C: Musical experiences

This is about all the other musical events and opportunities that we organise, such as singing in assembly, concerts and shows, and trips to professional concerts.

Set out what musical experiences are planned for the academic year, including regular events such as singing in assembly, musical performances, concerts and shows at the school, and trips to concerts outside of the school.

For musical performances, concerts and shows in and out of schools, include how pupils get involved and from which year groups, whether pupils are participating or are members of the audience.

Also consider including:

• charging information, and if events are subsidised or free, including for parents or carers in particular circumstances (e.g. pupil premium eligibility).

Draw on information of any partnerships the school has to support musical experiences, such as with your local music hub, music education organisations, music organisations or musicians.

Alternative titles for Part C could be ‘Musical events’ or ‘Musical performances’.

We offer regular opportunities for performance in our school community during lessons and during whole school and public events. We hold formal performances as outlined below:

Autumn term: assemblies, school production of Legally Blonde, Christmas concert,

Spring term: Shakespeare school festival, A Night with Bond, Easter assemblies

Summer term: Arts showcase, primary festival performance

We are continuing to build on opportunities to perform in connection with our local music hub.

In the future

This is about what the school is planning for subsequent years.

Use this space to include any information on any improvements you plan to make for subsequent years in curriculum music, co-curricular music or musical experiences, including when you plan to introduce changes.

Also consider including:

• any information that relates to the 7 features of high-quality music provision (see the text box at the beginning of the template), such as increasing lesson time to one hour a week each term, introducing the teaching of new instruments or having a termly school performance.

We always aim to continually build on and develop our music plan each academic year and strive to maintain a high-quality provision for our pupils. We are hoping to increase the amount of time pupils are able to access timetabled music lessons next academic year and, with increased lesson time, would look to include the teaching of new instruments.

We would like to further build on the success of this year’s peripatetic uptake and continue with this provision next academic year and potentially look to offer a performance of work completed by these pupils in this provision.

We are looking to strengthen our links in the local community, including developing our work with our local music hub, as we aim to offer more opportunities for performance.

Extra-curricular opportunities will continue to include a school production each year and we hope to include further opportunities for pupils to make the most of their gifts and talents, such as talent shows or arts showcase events.

We are also looking to establish further opportunities for trips and other chances to collaborate with performing and creative arts subjects in our school community.

All of these events will build into our application for Artsmark status at the end of next academic year.