At St Thomas we value music as a powerful and unique art form. Music is a key element of school, bringing together our children as a family, who can reflect and be spiritual as one. It boosts creativity and supports development in social skills, self-discipline and confidence. Our musical intent is supported and informed by current national guidance on best practice, in-service training, staff discussion and professional judgement.

Aims for Music:

Music is a unique way of communicating that can inspire and motivate children. It is a vehicle for personal expression, and it can play an important part in the personal development of people. Music reflects the culture and society we live in, and so the teaching and learning of music enables children to better understand the world they live in. Besides being a creative and enjoyable activity, music can also be a highly academic and demanding subject. It also plays an important part in helping children feel part of a community. We provide opportunities for all children to create, play, perform and enjoy music, to develop the skills, to appreciate a wide variety of musical forms, and to begin to make judgements about the quality of music.

1. To provide a music curriculum where children develop a secure understanding of the musical elements through the skills of focused listening, composing, performing and appraising.
2. To ensure children gain an appreciation, and understanding, of a range of musical genres – classical, rock, folk, jazz and pop music; taken from different times and cultures.

What does music look like at St Thomas?
Weekly music lessons are taught by class teachers. To ensure progression in skills, units are taught using the ‘Charanga’ scheme of work. Where possible, music objectives are linked to other curriculum areas and each year group will carry out at least one musical development project during the year.

Whilst a child is at St Thomas, they will experience a year of teaching by a professional music teacher and all children in Key Stage 2 have the opportunity to perform at the end of year music concert. All Key Stage 2 children have the chance to be involved in the free extra-curricular choir group, which perform at various events throughout the year.

Children from Year 3 to Year 6 are offered the opportunity to have peripatetic lessons in school time. Financial support is available for Pupil Premium children.

In music there are 2 levels to this:

1. Children have the opportunity to express themselves and develop their self-confidence through a highly creative subject. They have the opportunity to explore, create and collaborate to produce their own music and experience performing it to an audience.
2. Children are assessed every lesson, which helps the teacher plan the next steps in their learning. At the end of each term, assessment data is gathered and progress is checked by the subject leader. Children are expected to make good or better progress in all subjects and this individual progress is tracked and reported to parents and carers at parents evening and on the end of year report.