Creative Curriculum

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.

The objectives of teaching music in our school are to enable children to:

• perform, listen to, review and evaluate music

• be taught to sing, create and compose music

• understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated.

• know and understand how sounds are made and then organised into musical structures;

• know how music is made through a variety of instruments;

• know how music is composed and written down;

• know how music is influenced by the time, place and purpose for which it was written;

• develop the interrelated skills of performing, composing and appreciating music.

For more details see the Creative Curriculum Policies at the bottom of the page.

Art & Design

The purpose of Art and Design education is to give pupils the skills, concepts and knowledge necessary for them to express their responses to ideas and experiences in a visual or tactile form. It fires their imagination and is a fundamental means of personal expression.

While it is essentially a practical subject, art should provide opportunities for reflection and, with increasing sensitivity, pupils should acquire the ability to make informed, critical responses to their own work and that of others. There is great pleasure to be derived from Art and Design and, through deeper understanding; pupils can gain access to cultural richness and diversity.

The aims of Art and Design are:

• To enable all children to have access to a varied range of high quality art experiences

• To provide an imaginative, innovative and co-ordinated art programme which will foster enthusiasm for art and design amongst all the children

• To foster an enjoyment and appreciation of the visual arts and a knowledge of artists, craftspeople and designers, through links with the local and wider multicultural community.

• To stimulate children’s creativity and imagination by providing visual, tactile and sensory experience

• To help children explore the world at first hand, using all their senses and experimentation, and so gain knowledge and understanding of the world in which they live

• To develop children’s understanding of colour, form, texture, pattern and their ability to use materials and processes to communicate ideas, feelings and meanings

• To inspire confidence, value and pleasure in art

• To cultivate children’s aesthetic awareness and enable them to make informed judgements about art and become actively involved in shaping environments

• To teach children to express their own ideas, feelings, thoughts and experiences

• To develop children’s design capability

• To enhance children’s ability to value the contribution made by artists, craft workers and designers and respond critically and imaginatively to ideas, images and objects.