YEAR

UNIT

DEVELOPMENT

AUTUMN TERM

We can play the piano and know the notes on a piano

Animal Magic – Find Danny Dog, using all fingers, locate notes, prompt cards initially.

SPRING TERM

Rock and Roll – 12 Bar Blues, recap Danny Dog, find C, F and G for Chord 1, 4 and 5

Roll Over Beethoven – Playing the theme of Beethoven 5 and Fur Elise, intro to sharps and flats

SUMMER TERM

The Moldau – encourage playing melodies on keyboards by selecting 3 or notes and playing them in a sequence to create a repetitive tune

Nursery Rhymes – children use glockenspiels to play melodies. They recognise pitch and practise aural skills (which note is higher?). Transferable skills for keyboard

AUTUMN TERM 

It’s an Enigma! – identifying Elgar’s theme used in Nimrod from Enigma Variations, children found the notes on keyboards and created their own music incorporating this theme. They then used Garageband to include loops. Children later dedicated their own music to a friend. Like Elgar, they created their own theme first from 3 or 4 selected notes

SPRING TERM

Chinese Dragons – Introduced to pentatonic scale of CDEGA – locate these notes and know to play in any order and create sequences. Lots of work on rhythm in this unit. The pentatonic can also be used playing only black notes – introduced to sharps and flats. Use Garageband to make the keyboard sound like Chinese instruments. Compose own rhythm pattern selecting from CDEGA

SUMMER TERM

A link with knowledge when studying Indian music. Children introduced to the Raga which has different descending and ascending patterns and is associated with days, seasons, moods or special occasions. Notes are named and musicians learn by imitating their teachers. Children play Sa (C) as a drone. Children play the Raga ascending and descending and find the notes on the keyboard. They then improvise tunes and add the drone

AUTUMN TERM

Children revise the names of notes on the treble stave and find these notes on keyboards quickly. The first time the children have been introduced to treble stave is Year 4 What an Enigma! But recognise the music ladder from Year 3. Holst did not write about Earth in The Planet Suite but Hans Zimmer did. Listen and recognise the theme. See the theme written down and play by locating notes on the keyboard. Optional Left Hand given for children to use either using two hands or when playing with a partner. Improvise with the theme for composition with the title Earth – use of Garageband

SPRING TERM

Mayan Music – a unit heavy on playing but also improvising and writing music using standard notation. See flip in entirety for details. Revise names of notes and where to find them, improvise by playing pentatonic DEGAB and writing on the stave. This shows progression from Year 4 as children did not focus on the stave.

 Children play Xtoles, an ancient Mayan Warrior Song. Lots of games and recap. Revise rhythm cards. This is the first time children are introduced to bar lines.

Children then play and create their own bar of music to use as a middle section. Children introduced to playing and creating music using ABA structure.

Once the children have drafted and played middle sections, they write a final draft using musical symbols. Revise legato and staccato, forte and piano.

SUMMER TERM

Nature documentary – children play using keyboards and other instruments to create underscoring and are taught simple techniques to evoke a sense of foreboding and imminent disaster.

They are taught the C major scale and learn to play this ascending and descending; legato and staccato. Use this knowledge to play and compose music for the underscoring for a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis – link with science.

AUTUMN TERM

Music for Film – recap underscoring but this time in film not documentary. Children play own compositions using given techniques.

Children are given a theme to arrange. An alternative LH using optional simple 5ths is given.

Egyptian Platform Games – further introduction to semitones but this time in context of major and minor chords. Children improvise as a class and play combination of notes in E major and A minor chords.

Chilren identify the Mario theme and have a go at playing it

SPRING TERM

Lark Ascending – like Vaughan Williams, children create and play a piece of music on keyboards inspired by a poem. Practise two techniques – falling bass line and changing single notes in 3 or 4 chord positions.

SUMMER TERM

References made to notes on the piano when learning the Gamelan style and recreating this on xylophones and glockenspiels