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Music

Why Do We Teach Music At St. Clare's?

“To Sing is to Pray Twice”
St. Augustine

“The beautiful thing about learning is that nobody can take it away from you”
B.B.King

At St. Clare’s we believe that every child deserves a rich musical education that will take them far beyond their primary school years. Our music curriculum engages and inspires pupils to be creative, to develop a love of music and music making and in doing so, increase their self-confidence, creativity and self-worth. Music can empower us to realise that we can and we will reach for our goals, and this is what we want for all pupils at St. Clare’s.

Music is taught through the support of Charanga by all class based staff and all children have high quality music lessons every week. From Reception, children learn to listen, appraise, sing and play musical instruments. They continue to build on these skills as they go on their musical journey through the school. 

We are proud to be a Music Mark School.

 

 

Mission Statement

With Jesus, we learn to love and love to learn

Our Vision

To give every child a sense of belonging, so that they have a safe and stable base from which to develop and learn.

To enable every child to grow academically, socially, morally, spiritually and culturally in the knowledge that they are loved by God and can feel safe and valued within our school community.

To nurture and support children through their primary school journey so that they are confident and well equipped to progress into the wider world as strong, independent learners and thoughtful, caring individuals.

Our Values

Resilience

Inclusion

Honesty

Compassion

Respect

Love

Our Intent

  • To make musical learning and music making fully accessible to all.
  • To give all pupils the opportunity to become musically engaged.
  • To combine creativity, knowledge, vocabulary, skill and technique to enable pupils to think and operate as musicians.
  • To enable pupils to not just experience music but to learn how it works and how to use it in many and varied ways.
  • To enable pupils to listen, explore, respond, create and perform music creatively and purposefully.
  • To equip pupils with a love of music and music making to go with them throughout their lives.

Implementation

  • Use of the Charanga Programme from EYFS onwards.
  • Pupils will have the opportunity to learn to play a variety of different instruments. 
  • Where possible links can be made with topics being taught in each phase, but these are not forced. 
  • Extracurricular opportunities available for children i.e. music tuition from Essex Music Hub and engagement with music through Rock Band.

Impact

  • Pupils act and think like musicians. Music becomes part of their every day life in school.
  • Pupils will take knowledge from each phase and use and develop it in different ways in the next phase, adding to their learning and using it creatively. They will revisit musical concepts and ideas in many and varied ways in order to develop their musicianship.
  • Assessment is completed for all children.
  • Pupils will take knowledge and skills from music lessons and use them in the wider context of the school and beyond. For example: school productions, whole school masses, school productions and events such as the Christmas Fayre and Summer Fete. Pupils also have the opportunity to join music clubs and to perform in the wider community. 

 

We perform every year with other schools in the Rosary Trust at St. Benedict’s School in Colchester:

 

 

 

Essex Music Hub Instrumental Tuition

We are delighted that we are now partnered with two tutors from Essex Music Hub to deliver individual instrumental lessons. These happen on Thursdays and are open to children from Year 2 upwards. We currently have tutors who can teach the following instruments:

  • Flute
  • Clarinet
  • Guitar