The national curriculum for music aims to ensure that all pupils:

• perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians 
• learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others, have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence
• understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated, including through the inter-related dimensions: pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, structure and appropriate musical notations.

Key Stage 1

Pupils should be taught to:

• use their voices expressively and creatively by singing songs and speaking chants and rhymes
• play tuned and untuned instruments musically
• listen with concentration and understanding to a range of high-quality live and recorded music
• experiment with, create, select and combine sounds using the inter-related dimensions of music.

Key Stage 2

Pupils should be taught to sing and play musically with increasing confidence and control. They should develop an understanding of musical composition, organising and manipulating ideas within musical structures and reproducing sounds from aural memory. Pupils should be taught to:

• play and perform in solo and ensemble contexts, using their voices and playing musical instruments with increasing accuracy, fluency, control and expression
• improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the inter-related dimensions of music 
• listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory
• use and understand staff and other musical notations 
• appreciate and understand a wide range of high-quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians
• develop an understanding of the history of music.

Year 1

Help to create a simple melody using one or two notes.

Learn how the notes of the composition can be written down.

Year 2

Help create three simple melodies with the Units using one or three different notes.

Learn how the notes of the composition can be written down and changed if necessary.

Year 3

Help create at least one simple melody using one, three or five different notes.

Plan and create a section of music that can be performed within the context of the unit song.

Talk about how it was created.

Listen to and begin to reflect upon the developing composition and make musical decisions about pulse, rhythm, pitch, dynamics and tempo.

Begin to record the composition in any way appropriate that recognises the connection between sound and symbol (e.g. graphic/pictorial notation).

Year 4

Help create at least one simple melody using one, three or all five different notes and talk about choices.

Plan and create a section of music that can be performed within the context of the unit song and talk about choices.

Talk about how it was created and why.

Listen to and reflect upon the developing composition and make musical decisions about pulse, rhythm, pitch, dynamics and tempo.  

Record the composition in any way appropriate that recognises the connection between sound and symbol (e.g. graphic/pictorial notation).

Year 5

Create simple melodies using up to five different notes and simple rhythms that work musically with the style of the Unit song.

Begin to explain the keynote or home note and the structure of the melody.

Listen to and reflect upon the developing composition and make musical decisions about how the melody connects with the song.

Record the composition in any way appropriate that recognises the connection between sound and symbol (e.g. graphic/pictorial notation).

Year 6

Create simple melodies using up to five different notes and simple rhythms that work musically with the style of the Unit song confidently.

Explain the keynote or home note and the structure of the melody confidently.

Listen to and reflect upon the developing composition and make musical decisions about how the melody connects with the song. Justify these choices.

Record the composition in any way appropriate that recognises the connection between sound and symbol (e.g. graphic/pictorial notation) and clearly justify choices.