What would you like your child to get from primary school music education?

[lingle]

I'm gathering views because I've started working doing music in a primary school and have reasonably free rein......

what would delight you if your child had achieved it at year 6? Being able to read music? Being able to use their instrument or voice to join in with others? Being able to play chords on a ukelele? a recorder? a tune on a violin? a tuba? Passing Grade x on an instrument? Singing or Playing a solo without looking mortified? Being in a rock band? Writing their own songs? Knowing and caring about their favourite musician? Having a positive can-do approach to lots of genres, including classical? Playing a rarer instrument like oboe? Knowing the secrets of rock improvision or blues improvision? Being able to say "I'm on grade 3"? Being able to say "I can play thistune on thatinstrument"?

go on, distract me from my other job (which is rather solitary and analytical) please.......

:)

What I'd also like is plenty of improvisation (I guess there is a lot of that already) - encouraging pupils to just 'jam' and be free to make up melody and rhythm, but still responding to each other to achieve something as a group rather than just bashing out any old noise if that makes sense. I am a good pianist and used to teach, but I cannot improvise at all, I feel stuck to the 'rules' and it is very frustrating. I would love to see children have the confidence to make something up.

Know lots of songs and have the confidence to sing them.

The kind of campfire songs that people used to learn together, or pop songs that we all know. Or the whole of Joseph and his Technicolour Dreamcoat.

I think it's really important for music to resonate and bind people together. I don't care whether my DCs will be able to read music or be on grade 3 or whatever. But I want them to leave school knowing Eleanor Rigby, On Ilkley Moor baht at, Jerusalem, Bridge over Troubled Water - the kind of stuff you can sing in the car and enjoy.

What's wrong with playing the violin? My mother says that there really wasn't much in the way of awful noise - and I've found the same with ds.

Fuzzpig, my 9 year old (who attends a programme called LearnRock) explained to me that improvisations about playign a pentatonic scale, starting anywhere with no jumps and finishing on the home note. It really demystified it for me.

I'll have a google, thanks lingle :)

What's wrong with playing the violin?

Because until you get reasonable at it, it's just awful- lots of scraping and no discernible tune. Unless people are really really good, it just doesn't sound nice played by itself IMO.

:)

Well I had no trouble with it - perhaps the first few weeks - but then I was mainly pizzicato then so it didn't really matter.

I have also taught beginners - and as long as you get them to actually listen to themselves and understand the relationship between what they're doing and the sound that's coming out, you can get them to make a decent noise quite quickly.

A violin is actually a fantastic instrument to play. In an orchestra there are 26 violins compared to normally 2 flutes. So, if you persist, you can be a fairly ordinary violin player and still play in a reasonable orchestra when you're an adult (this is non professional ones of course) whereas you would have to be really good if you were a woodwind player.

But where is the money to employ musicians in primary schools?

There has been no noticeable music teaching at my DS's junior school this year. There was the option to participate in the city-wide choir, but the head cancelled the school's entry as she claimed it cost too much.

Since half term there has been the option to attend guitar lessons one lunchtime a week, however this is only for children who already play, and own their own guitar.

DS has not shown any musical talent (or even interest) as yet, but I do find it sad that the school do not appear to value music in any way.

that's a pity whatmakesyousay.

To change situations like that, I think one has to figure out what the head really is interested in and then figure out how more music could achieve that for him/her. So for some heads it's inclusion, for others it's signs of excellence.... they're all different I suppose.

That is really sad WMYS :(

It is. I went to a junior school which had amazing music provision - we had a good choir, and a decent size orchestra, plus a guitar group, a chamber choir, a wind orchestra and a jazz group. It was a fairly ordinary state school in a village, but looking back now, it was fabulous.

No-one really knows what the head is interested in, she's not the approachable type and is not a popular head, although she has improved the academic standards at the school. It just looks like most of this has come at the expense of any kind of enriching activities. It's still far from being a high performing school, but it does have a challenging intake, and it is clear that most of the focus goes on attendance and behaviour.

In the meantime, I subject both DCs my choice of music in the car at least one day a week, which can run from classical to cool jazz to Americana, and I am slowly teaching DD to read music and play keyboard and recorder, because she wants to. DS would rather just listen to LMFAO and Rizzle Kicks!

Not that there's anything wrong with that music

Let me get my Soap Box out......... I feel very strongly about music provision in primary schools.

When I had more time on my hands, I used to volunteer at local primary and do singing sessions with reception class. We sang 'Wimaway', 'We Are The Champions', 'Food Glorious Food' etc, listened to Beethoven, Grieg, and Latino music, played musical statues, learnt about crotchets, minims and quavers.... We also did two performances in front of the whole school! It was great! My idea was to continue with this year group throughout the school, trying to get rid of the embarrassment/stigma about singing and classical music. I thought that it may gradually change the ethos and other year groups may follow on.

HOWEVER - on moving to the y1 teacher, it was "oh we won't have time for that, so no thank you". And that was that.

I now do other musical stuff throughout the school - some of it paid, some not. It is a real struggle to fight against some teachers. I have to say I get lots of nice feed back from the parents, so I am determined to continue. I feel really strongly about it!

Rant over.
Sorry.

I bet you'd be more than welcome in my DD's school!

Hi. Would be very interested in the Kodaly method. Any info for people living on South Coast eg Dorset?

I am not musical so know nothing!

How can children who will turn into adults access making music with instruments if they can't read music. I think it's really important. It is easier to pick up when you are a child. If as an adult you think "well, maybe I'd like a go at piano, or guitar or something" not being able to read music is a huge barrier. And you can do some really good stuff with recorders as long as you get some tenors and altos in there as well.

Others have said really good things that I'll repeat! group singing can be a fantastic buzz - especially doing more complicated things in different parts.

Exposure to "high-brow" stuff. The popular stuff is popular for a reason. Saint-Saens The Swan, Messiah, a ballet like Nutcracker, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (sorry, know no German), Moonlight Sonata, Dvorak Cello Concerto, Gymnopodie. Just to show how beautiful and powerful classical music can be. But also great jazz, blues, other stuff.

All DC's at our primary do violin in Y5, are taught to read music, sing solo's and group songs all through the school, encouraged to join the choir (They do a children's concert in the Royal Albert Hall every year), they have optional (paid for, if you can afford it) tuition after school for other instruments, like drums, piano, flute etc. They learn to play the recorder in KS1.

The school also has assemblies where they get DC from the local Secondary to gone in and do teaching sessions with other instruments - the last one was African bongo drums for Y3 as their topic this term was 'The Heart of Africa'.

Oh, and they get other musicians in too - Autumn term they had a whole school assembly with the drummer from Status Quo (name?).

Hi lingle -

Glad to hear you are getting something organised at school. You may recall (or not) that we discussed music in schools, back in January.

I don't have much to add to what others have already said, except that for young children I consider the most important feature of music is that they ENJOY it. It should be a fun activity, especially at the start. Reading notation would not be a high priority for me, as that can be learned later, once a child is comfortable with making music on their chosen instruments.

Formal study, Grades etc can come later for the children who are keen enough and can apply concentration and self discipline. Quite often, I think, parents are making up for their own lack of musical training when they were young, by trying to 're-live' it through their offspring. That also happens in Dance and Drama of course, probably more so than in music.

In Secondary school they also cover Music Technology : recording, synthesizers, sequencers, computers, etc. With a Year 6 keyboard club I once hooked-up children's keyboards to the school's Clavinova, which the kids enjoyed. If a Primary school is well resourced and has a capable adult in charge, then recording, multi-tracking etc should be achievable.

Let me know if I can be of any further assistance. And for all the parents who claim to hate recorders I guess you may have heard the following :

www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=sRsdeyWBfqc&NR=1

I will add that I have now moved both my children out of our local school (that I still work in).

yay to performing..but don;t make them do solos if they don;t want to. I still have vivid memories of being made to do a violin solo in a recital at school. Just awful.. so scary...and I was about 14 at the time. No way would I have been able to handle it when littler. I enjoyed playing in a group, but I gave up violin partly because of that day. I started locking myself in the loo when it was time for my lesson. I hated taking Grade exams too. just so nerve wracking. Playing for it's own sake ought to be enough.

This is a biiig soap box for me, so I'll be brief and the op can pm me if they are interested...

I think the first thing a school should do is sing- everyone - teachers as well. Not from music or even words sheets, but by ear and memory. Sing anything, pop (the pitch range is often pants for kids though), classics and yes even hymns and proper church music. Sing in many languages live and dead.

Kids from pretty much birth up benefit from singing (Ok maybe they don't sing themselves for a while LOL but my friends just 2yr old sings nursery rhymes and makes up her own songs too that have a tune and words). they benefits are huge- the fun of a group activity, better concentration and memory, counting skills - ever tried singing times tables and historical facts? Tremendous way of learning them (my dad is 88 and he taught the "slow learners" in junior school in the 1970s . He took his guitar, wrote songs and they learned - he even had a song called "Sam Pepys little black book" about the events of the 1600s ).

Listen to amazing music performed really well- my kids primary had something classical and rousing to walk into assembly to every time and were expected to sit and listen till everyone else was settled.

Go to concerts or have live music in school. From the local secondary school band to people you (gasp) pay eg African drummers or a troup of mediaeval Waits with very interesting instruments and stories.

Perform often as groups/small group and solos. Perform to school and parents.

Move on to reading music yes- it's a great skill- but if the year2 kids can sing and are mostly starting to read words, if you show them " the dots" they'll start to decode them by themselves and formal stuff can come later.

And of course individual instruments. Locally there is a "whole class" initiative that is funded for a short time but that needs to continue really.

I wouldn't bother with grades/medals etc unless that suits you and the kids- it's a real pain LOL

And yeah THE RECORDER IS A REAL INSTRUMENT!!