MUSIC - What You Will Learn

Key Stage 3

The following page gives details about what pupils will learn at Key Stage 3 from Year 7 to Year 9.

The Department for Education and Skills Standards website contains full information on the scheme of work for Key Stage 3 music and outlines the competencies needed to achieve each national curriculum level.

The units are not statutory and the music department will decide it's own structure of work based on this material:

• Unit 1. Bridging unit (exploring musical processes)

This unit develops pupils' understanding of the process of composing by creating and performing music in response to musical and non-musical stimuli. It provides an opportunity for pupils new to the school to develop and demonstrate musical skills, knowledge and understanding achieved in years 5 and 6.

During the unit pupils will explore how sounds can be used descriptively, rhythmically and melodically to create a composition.

• Unit 2. Form and structure (exploring structures)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise, explore and use different musical structures and understand how they can create different effects.

During the unit they learn about the importance of contrast and variety in musical structures. They learn how to sing a 'call and response' song and explore ostinato accompaniments (rhythmic and/or melodic). They create and develop pieces in both ternary and simple rondo form, making connections between the structure and its impact on the listener.

• Unit 3. Soundscapes (exploring acoustic and electronic sounds using music technology)

This unit develops pupils' ability to explore sounds and compose, using both acoustic and electronic sound sources. The emphasis is on how music technology can support and affect the way music is created, performed and heard.

Pupils learn how individual sounds have their own 'fingerprints', and that synthesisers and samplers can be used to reproduce and imitate acoustic sounds. They learn how to use a mixture of acoustic and electronic sounds in composition work and how to assess the effectiveness of their work. They also begin to appreciate how electronic effects can be used to change sounds in performance, how recordings are made, and how MIDI technology can be used to process musical sounds.

• Unit 4. Musical cycles (exploring cyclic patterns)

This unit develops pupils' ability to identify and create music based on cyclic patterns.

During this unit pupils are introduced to the concept that some music is conceived structurally in cyclical rather than linear terms. Pupils listen to music originating from Java, Africa and India. They perform and compose group pieces using cyclical models.

• Unit 5. Musical cliches (exploring the way music is used)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise, analyse and use a range of musical cliches used in different musical genres.

Pupils learn how composers use musical cliches and conventions. They listen to and analyse a variety of music and identify cliches used in film and television, conventions used by composers and instrumental techniques that have become cliches through frequent use. They improvise, compose and perform their own music using and challenging musical cliches and conventions.

• Unit 6. Shanty time (exploring musical arrangements)

This unit develops pupils' ability to analyse and create their own arrangements.

During this unit pupils learn to make arrangements of existing material. They listen and analyse other composers' arrangements and consider the various compositional devices used. They also develop and rehearse their own 'class orchestra' and perform their own arrangements.

• Unit 7. Variations (exploring ways to develop musical ideas)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise, explore and make creative use of musical devices found in variation form.

During this unit pupils explore how musical ideas can be changed to create different moods and effects. They will explore a range of music in variation form from different times, identifying the main features of the music and the musical devices used by composers. These activities provide an intellectual challenge in assessing how far something can be changed before it is no longer recognisable.

• Unit 8. Jazz improvisation (exploring improvisation)

This unit develops pupils' ability to identify, explore and make creative use of musical devices found in jazz.

During this unit, pupils learn some basic approaches to improvisation. They develop blues scale motifs within a 12-bar blues, improvise using chord/scale relationships and apply that understanding by developing patterns in a diatonic sequence. They analyse and develop riffs aurally, use ICT as an aid to practice, and begin to understand the importance of improvisation to jazz genres.

• Unit 9. Music for dance (exploring musical conventions)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise, perform and create African dance music with an understanding of musical conventions and processes, eg the use of mnemonics. In this unit pupils learn about Gota dance music, and explore musical conventions. They apply and develop rhythmic skills and the ability to play in an ensemble.

• Unit 10. Hooks and riffs (exploring riffs, hooks and grounds and the use of music technology)

This unit develops pupils' ability to identify, explore and make creative use of given musical devices to create an intended effect.

During this unit, pupils recognise and understand how composers use repeated melodic and rhythmic devices called riffs, hooks and grounds. They explore riffs, hooks and grounds through performing and composing, and consider the effect of using these in popular music. Pupils also learn how hooks and riffs can be created and manipulated using music technology, particularly through the use of sequencers.

• Unit 11. The overture (exploring introductions and the development of themes)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise and compose within the musical genre of overture. Pupils learn how themes can be used, eg to provide musical contrast, to describe different characters, to suggest a time or place.

Pupils identify structural and expressive features and refine, complete and notate compositions. They also appraise music critically, expressing and justifying their opinions, and appreciate how the overture has been used in different times.

• Unit 12. Bhajan/qawwali (exploring Indian musical genres)

The unit develops pupils' ability to identify, explore and perform bhajan/qawwali with understanding of its conventions and context.

During this unit, pupils sing bhajan and qawwali and recognise some of the features of these songs. They extend and develop musical ideas within the conventions of a rag and tal. They learn about the cultures and contexts in which these genres are performed and begin to appreciate how they are performed. They invent melodic material within a rag, add their own accompaniments within a tal, and perform them.

• Unit 13. Music and media (exploring how music is used)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise that music enhances a visual image or sells a product, and to compose their own examples.

During this unit pupils explore how music can convey ideas and communicate messages in a range of media. They investigate how music can create an effect and how various musical devices, together with other media, can convey a message. They identify how personal responses to music can be influenced by environments and by the use of musical elements and resources. They also compose, refine and record pieces in which a sense of time, place, mood or intention is essential.

• Unit 14. The concerto (exploring characteristics of a selected genre)

This unit develops pupils' ability to recognise and use characteristics of the concerto, with understanding of how different parts interact.

During this unit pupils recognise, appreciate and understand the genre of the concerto. They justify opinions and preferences, using musical knowledge and vocabulary. They sing and play a variety of music, including music with solo sections; take part in group performances and identify how musical traditions change over time and place. They also improvise in different styles and develop musical ideas within musical structures.

• Unit 15. Song (exploring songs and the use of music technology)

In this unit, pupils learn to recognise and understand how composers structure songs and how instrumental arrangements can play an important part in the success of popular songs. They learn to create their own songs, working within fixed parameters. They also learn how music technology can be used to structure, shape, arrange and provide a backing to popular songs.

This unit develops pupils' ability to evaluate, explore, compose and perform different songs with understanding of musical devices, structures, processes and cultural influences.

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