At Sir John Heron Primary School, we follow the National Curriculum for music with lessons being delivered through the Charanga scheme. 

Click here to view the programme of study from the National Curriculum for music for KS1 and KS2:

2022-23

Week beginning 13/03/2023

This term year 1 has been enjoying exploring traditional tales through drama, music and art. Each week we watch a snippet of Little Red Riding Hood, discuss the story and then learn a new song relating to the story. Last week we learnt “I love red!” and this week, we learnt “Wolfie blues”. This is a great way to softly introduce a variety of music genres as well as tying in with multiple subjects. Here you can see some examples of their accompanying artwork of the big, bad wolf!

Week beginning 06/03/2023

Wow, what an exciting day to have music and PE on! For world book day we all put on our best character costumes and enjoyed an active morning full of sharing our favourite books, dancing and singing.

Week beginning 20/02/2023

Reception love to sing songs together! This week we are looking at how we communicate with others using our bodies and our voices. In these pictures you can see how they are expressing being cold in the snow and how they represent travelling in a plane!

Week beginning 13/02/2023

Year 4 are becoming masters of the Ukulele! Children receive an hour of full class ukulele each week with Miss Slocombe. They’ve now learnt multiple ways of playing the same note and a variety of chords which enables them to play and sing along to some of their favourite songs as well as discovering new songs and the good old classics!

Week beginning 06.02.2023

This term in Year 6 Music Technology, we are exploring even more free and easily accessible ways to create music online. Today we used the Roland50 Studio TR 808 interface to create our own drum beats based on the House and Garage styles.

Week beginning 30.01.2023

In Music Technology this week, the children used Chrome Music Lab to compose pieces of music based on the C major pentatonic scale. We discussed the origins of the word “penta” and how it linked to other subjects such as history and maths before creating our own pieces of music.

Week beginning 23.01.2023

This week year two enjoyed using their imaginations in music! The children listened to four different pieces of instrumental music that were composed in order to make the listener imagine a type of transport. They used their listening skills to identify what each piece was about and then drew what they imagined.

Week beginning 16.01.2023

This week upper key stage 2 has enjoyed being introduced to the wonders of Chance Music. We talked about how anything you see visually can be turned into music if written out a certain way, or how any sound made can be classed as music. We then looked at how Chance Music can be a risk-free and fun method of composing, with a link to maths!

Week beginning 9.01.2023

Last term year 5 and 6 explored how to use music technology to create music of their own, whilst thinking about different features of music and how to incorporate them into their pieces. Their composition brief was to compose snippets of music for a video game designed by one of their peers. 

Here are some examples of their work, we hope you enjoy them!

Example one

Example two

Week beginning 14.11.2022

This week year 3 have combined their fantastic ukulele skills with their compositional skills to create their own short pieces. They enjoyed working in small band groups to compose and then perform to their peers.

Week beginning 31/10/2022:

Our Reception children are very excited to be learning their Christmas songs to prepare for their upcoming Christmas Carol concert in December! They enjoyed working as a team to create actions to help them remember the words for each song. They cannot wait to show you how well they sing Jingle Bells!

Week beginning 10.10.2022:

This term our Year 5 classes have been working on their composition skills using music technology as their way to capture their ideas. The final outcome will be to create music to ‘evoke a specific atmosphere, mood or environment’ (Model Music Curriculum 2021). To do this, each child has studied a range of age-appropriate video games and explored the careers of video game composers such as Ninichi. They have then spent some time creating a storyboard for their own original videogame which they will then be creating a soundtrack for. We have really enjoyed discussing our ideas and even the PE teacher came in to see what all the excitement was about!

Week beginning 03.10.2022:

This week, Year 2 has been focusing on a short song called 'Kye Kye Kule' which has supported them when thinking about small pitch steps, matching a pulse and responding to a leader. We also started to look ahead at our Christmas Nativity, but we’re not quite ready to give you a sneaky peak just yet!

Week beginning 26.09.2022

We are so excited to have the KS2 choir back and running in full force! We are currently putting together a programme of a range of songs chosen by the children. This week we have been focusing on the pop song ‘Firework’ by Katy Perry and learning how to safely “belt” our voices with support from our diaphragms to sing louder and higher. We can’t wait to show you what else we have planned!

Week beginning 19/09/2022

Year 2 had so much fun learning a new rap with a range of actions and funny sounds! We then practised our listening skills whilst choosing our songs for the Autumn season, including some spooky season songs. As you can see, there were some very mixed reactions to one particular song about eating worms and other creepy crawlies! Eww!

Week beginning 12/09/2022:

What a fantastic couple of weeks to our new school year we have had! Year 3 children have been practising singing and dancing the song ‘Power in Me’ with huge amounts of energy and enthusiasm. This was a whole school favourite from last year that we love to share at any opportunity we get! We’re looking forward to seeing what the rest of the future holds for music at Sir John Heron.

2021-22

Week beginning 18th July 2022:

This term both year 3 and 4 have focussed on a song writing topic, based on the theme of plastic pollution. Both classes researched facts about plastic pollution and practised their rap skills before writing their own verses. The children were really pleased with the end results!

Plastic Pollution by Year 3

First, there were millions,

Now it’s turning into billions.

Many years of plastic pollution,

We need to find a solution.

We desperately need a health potion,

For the dying ocean.

Let’s have a battle with this plastic,

This will be so fantastic!

Lots of plastic in the ocean,

It’s starting to look like a venomous potion.

Please can you all reuse it,

if you don’t want to lose it.

Everyone should watch the news,

So you don’t just go ahead and snooze.

Year 3 are not being sarcastic,

When we talk about the issue of plastic.

Plastic Pollution by Dali Class

Plastics are on the beach and shoreline,

It’s taking over the world, it’s only a matter of time.

Dali class have beautiful intentions,

We can make some new inventions.

All of the plastic in the sea is floating,

You have to watch out if you go out boating.

Out there you see lots of strangers,

Starting to cause many, many dangers!

Millions of bottles in our oceans,

Making it into a toxic potion.

You think it’s just an illusion,

We’re here to help find a solution.

Plastic Pollution by Monet Class

Why is pollution everywhere on the ground?

Put it in the bin so it can be safe and sound.

It enters the environment,

Never wants to go on retirement!

We need to be part of the solution,

To stop this horrific plastic pollution.

We must act now and fast,

To make our environment last.

Give me all of your attention,

Help us make a new invention.

We need to be in this together,

To make our world last forever.

Week beginning 13/06/2022

This week year 4 has been focused on songwriting. They are currently working towards writing rap fillers for a song about plastic pollution. They have really enjoyed the cross over between literacy and music.

Week beginning 06/06/2022

This week our Year 1 classes worked on creating their own percussive responses and playing simple rhythm patterns on tuned instruments. They have been learning a song called ‘Come dance with me’ and adding in their own dance moves to match the words.

Week beginning 28.03.2022

Every week, both our key stage one and two children have singing assemblies. During this time they draw upon their classroom learning experiences to learn an exciting range of songs. This video clip shows our key stage two children singing a snippet of the song ‘One and a million’ by Emily Barden. We love this song because it celebrates the power of working together, and it shows off how well the children have been working together to sing in harmony.

Week beginning 21.03.2022

Year 3 enjoyed making lots of loud sounds today! We watched some professional samba drumming and created our own samba bands. First, we learnt some rhythms based on foods (for example: mango ice-cream, mango ice-cream) before creating our own using the favourite foods of the class! We found this to be an easy way to memorise all sorts of complicated rhythms. We then added a drum and vocal ‘break’ in the middle where we all played the same rhythm and called out “samba music!” in unison.

Week beginning 14th March 2022

Year 1 has been exploring the different ways they can create sounds from their glockenspiels. They played a game where they had to create a “fish sound”. We talked about what we thought fish would sound like if they were represented by instruments, and the children chose to make small-step jumps whilst playing lightly using their percussion sticks. If their partner made a big jump on the instrument, their fish would be caught!

Week beginning 07.03.2022

Year 6 has been exploring the exciting world of film and video game music composition. They were keen to learn all about the career of composer Ninichi, who specialises in film and game soundtracks. 

They designed their own video games using a storyboard and will be moving on to creating a short soundtrack using instruments, garageband and all sorts of sound effects!

This week year 4 explored the exciting ways that traditional nursery rhymes can be used in more modern styles. They started by listening to and analysing a jazz cover of ‘Frère Jacques’ before learning to sing the song. They progressed to singing in two groups in a round with different children stepping up to lead their peers. After this, they then transferred those skills to playing the melody on the xylophones.

Week beginning 28.02.22 

This week, Year 4 re-visited the song ‘Arcade’ by Duncan Laurence. The children enjoyed singing it so much that we decided to use it as our choice of music for theory practise. The children were provided with a two-part written notation of the song and xylophones. In partners, they first learnt the main melody and then the harmony part. They then challenged themselves by either having each partner play a different part, both at the same time, or they had a go at playing the melody in the right hand and the harmony in the left hand.

Week beginning 21.02.2022

This week, Year 4 were inspired by the BBC Ten Pieces body percussion piece Connect It by Anna Meredith. They explored lots of different ways that they could make sounds and movements with their bodies to create their own musical story about a vehicle on a journey, ending with it breaking down. 

10.01.2022

Our Year 5 Nightingale class really enjoyed learning a song all about space travel, and were keen to share their confident singing with the rest of the school in not just one, but two performances! Here they are holding up their space props in their performance to the key stage one children. We love to see all our children immersing themselves in music and most of all, having fun with it!

06.12.2021

Year 3 - We are song writers!

This week the year 3 children collaborated to write their own version of the song “Jingle bells”. They considered how many beats and syllables to add into each sentence, how to make the song interesting and in keeping with the theme. The lyrics are:

Sprinting through the snow in a winter wonderland,
Bells are ringing with joy and Santa comes to you,
Laughing in the snow, snowballs flying high,
Gazing at the ornaments and children laugh with glee!

Jingle bells, jingle bells, Santa on the sleigh.
Oh what fun we can have on this icy winter day, hey!
Jingle bells, jingle bells, Santa on the sleigh.
Oh what fun we can have on this icy winter day, hey!

Skating through the ice, mountains sharp and tall,
Building a snowman, Olaf’s twin is here!
Santa’s flying high in the winter sky,
Reindeers bringing santa to the noisy town below.

Jingle bells, jingle bells, Santa on the sleigh.
Oh what fun we can have on this icy winter day, hey!
Jingle bells, jingle bells, Santa on the sleigh.
Oh what fun we can have on this icy winter day, hey!

Oh what fun we can have on this icy winter day.
 

01.12.2021

Christmas is coming! Year 2 has been hard at work learning the songs and dances for their Christmas Nativity… Since October! They are very excited to share their performance with family and friends very soon. Here’s a sneak peak of them learning some groovy moves!

01.12.2021

This week, Year 1 re-visited a familiar nursery rhyme, but in a different style. They enjoyed using their listening skills to identify the instruments that they could hear before creating some actions to help teach the song to others.

29.11.2021:

This week year 3 have been discussing the importance of warming up their bodies before singing, especially during these colder months! They worked together to create some warm ups for their faces and here you can see them engaging all their facial muscles, including the tongue!

22.11.2021:

This week, the Year 4 children have been music journalists. They were asked to write a review about the song “Sunflower” from the popular film 'Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse'. They drew on their key vocabulary and music analysis skills that they have been practising in order to write an independent piece of work telling others about the song.

This week in Year 1, we have been thinking about how to move our bodies around to music. We listened to a new song about dinosaurs wearing trousers - how silly! We talked about our favourite dinosaurs and pretended to be one as we moved around the room. We thought about what our faces looked like as well as how we would move our arms and legs. We had lots of fun!

15/11/2021:

The children of Sir John Heron are so excited to be making music together again! Our year 3 and 4 ukulele club practises every week to learn new, challenging chords. With these chords, they can now play a range of classic favourites from “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” all the way to modern chart hits.

2019-2020

Year 4 Music Posters

This week the Year Four classes pulled together their prior knowledge, new knowledge and personal interests to create music posters for the classroom. We discussed everything we thought of when hearing the word “music” from styles of music, instruments and singers through to the Composers of the Week that we have learnt about. Here are a few examples of their work.

Music Education Expo 2020

This week’s website update comes to you from the annual Music and Drama Education Expo! Every year this event brings together hundreds of musicians to share their knowledge and experience of the latest resources and teaching methods. Miss Slocombe attended a variety of talks and workshops from how to manage performance anxiety to building a primary orchestra from scratch. She was also very excited to meet and discuss all things music with Gareth Malone OBE (well known choral animateur, singer, composer and workshop leader) after purchasing his new song book “Bright Star.” She looks forward to sharing her new music resources and knowledge with the school!

Anti-Bullying Raps

Our Year 4 children created their own raps on the theme of anti-bullying. Working in small friendship groups, the children started by sharing their knowledge of what bullying is ("Lots of times and on purpose"), how it can make someone feel and how to prevent it. They then studied a variety of anti-bullying raps and over the course of 6 weeks, added their own unique verses to an existing song. These clips show one group’s performance to their peers. We really liked how they have added their own dance moves and considered how the rhythms of their words should fit in with a backing track.

Performance skills in Year 2

In music lessons, we are working on our performance skills by sharing what we have learnt that day with the rest of the class. Year Two always take pride in their music making, and it was delightful to be asked by them if they could record a performance of their study song for the website. Here is a video of them performing “I Wanna Play In A Band” by Joanna Mangona.

Listening Time!

In our music lessons, we learn a range of skills through different activities. One activity we always include is listening time. In the video clip below, you can see Year One swaying in time to a modern rap song they have been learning. For this particular week, the background music was completely new to the children as many had not heard the Baroque style before. After listening to the music, we then spent some time discussing what we heard using our key music vocabulary.

Folk Music in Year 6

This term, Year 6 are exploring traditional/folk music from England and analysing how current music has formed from many different roots. We discovered that a very old folk song (“When I’m gone”) is sung in the film “Pitch Perfect” which was modernised and altered to include new percussive actions using just a cup. This is one of many examples we discovered along our journey. Here's another example: did you know that the song “Counting Stars” by One Republic was inspired by a little known folk song? Neither did we! We decided to challenge ourselves to learn the song “When I’m Gone” (the cup song) and have a go at the actions! Here are some pictures to show our progress.

Instrumental Lessons

This term we are offering instrumental lessons to our Year Four classes, thanks to the wonderful support of our local music hub. We already have flute and clarinet lessons well underway and this week we started violin! It was fantastic to see all our keen and enthusiastic instrumentalists in their first lesson and we cannot wait to showcase their learning in our next concert.

Jazz meets PSHCE!

Last term the children in Year Five and Six focused on jazz music with a PSHCE twist. They were inspired by Maya Angelou’s poem “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me” and wrote their own versions of the poem focusing on their own fears and how they could overcome them. They then turned these into performances in the style of Beatnik jazz by reading or rapping over jazz background music.

Christmas Concert

We have just had our final whole school assembly of 2019, and went out with a bang with our Christmas concert! All the children joined in enthusiastically to sing some well-known Christmas carols. 

Reception Christmas Concert

Over the past month, the children in Reeception have worked extremely hard to learn and memorise six songs for their Christmas concert, complete with actions! They all performed with lots of energy and we could hear every word. Well done to all the children who were involved, your adults and teachers are very proud of your hard work!

Christmas is coming!

In the Reception classes, we have been very busy learning lots of Christmas songs for our Christmas concert! We often take movement breaks, thinking about how to listen to the music and move our bodies to the beat. We really enjoy working as a team and having fun singing together.

Drop-in Sessions

On Fridays, the children have an opportunity to come along to music drop-in sessions. During these times, it is free choice! So far, we have had mini piano lessons and explorations, bass guitar playing, solo singing and even bands! Having these taster sessions available is a fantastic opportunity, encouraging children to have a go at something new or benefit from one to one time with the music teacher.

SEND Music 

At Sir John Heron, we are committed to providing engaging and enjoyable learning experiences for all our children, including those with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and with profound and multiple learning difficulties (PMLD). All children participate in a weekly music lesson with Miss Slocombe.This week, our children have been using songs to identify parts of the body alongside focusing on turn taking and choosing.

Year 3 Ukulele - November 2019 

This term our Year 3 classes have started learning the ukulele during music. They started by focusing on beginner skills such as how to hold and tune their instruments, but have quickly moved on to learning a number of chords, some of which use up to three fingers! We enjoy a variety of music in our classes and are working towards creating ukulele covers of our favourite songs. 

Year 4 Leadership Skills - November 2019

During their warm up games this week, Year 4 have been focusing on developing leadership skills. As musicians, we often spend time practising alone, but we come together as a group to work as a team or to be guided by one person. Miss Slocombe handed over the role of teacher to different pupils who then lead a circle game with thirty children! Each of these young leaders showed a remarkable boost in confidence and successfully guided us all into the main lesson activity. Well done!

Choir Club

We are very excited to share with you our wonderful members of the Key Stage One Choir! Each week we gather together for an hour of singing, often with added dance moves and lots of laughter! So far, the choir has learnt six songs in only three sessions - wow! We look forward to sharing a performance with you all soon. 

Week 3

This week our Year 6 pupils have become song writers! Together, they chose a current song that they like, analysed it, and then began to write their own covers.

First, we explored how different song writers have mixed rap with country music, and the different themes they have sung about in their lyrics. The children's own covers are based on modern day London and what it means to them. We have had many interesting whole class discussions surrounding what is "popular", our local areas, interesting landmarks and our thoughts on current politics and environmental issues. We look forward to taking these first initial ideas and structuring them into a song.

13/09/2019

Wow! What a fantastic first week back in our music department. This week, Year 2 have been exploring rhythms, using different parts of their bodies to create lots of interesting sounds. They also started the term by learning a completely new song in just ten minutes! Super stars!