Thursday, December 08, 2011
New plan for music education in England.
The UK government has announced a new national strategy for music education including the introduction of "music hubs".
The UK Department of Education and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport have jointly published the government’s policy statement on music education in England. This follows the Henley Review of music education published earlier this year and the government response to it.
The national policy document, The Importance of Music, identifies the aim of music education in England:
‘to enable children from all backgrounds and every part of England to have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument; to make music with others; to learn to sing; and to have the opportunity to progress to the next level of excellence’.
To achieve this:·
1. Children from all backgrounds and every part of England should have the opportunity to :
- learn a musical instrument;
- make music with others;
- learn to sing;
- have the opportunity to progress to the next level of excellence if they wish to.
2. Teachers are to be given wide freedom in how they teach music in schools, but all schools should provide high quality music education as part of a broad and balanced curriculum.·
3. National Curriculum music is to be in all maintained schools for all five to fourteen year olds(subject to the outcome of the National Curriculum review).·
4. Access to whole-class ensemble teaching programmes for ideally a year (but for a minimum of a term) including
- opportunities to play in ensembles and to perform;
- clear progression routes available and affordable;
- a singing strategy to ensure every child sings regularly.
5. Music Technology used to enable, deliver, support and extend the good teaching of music.·
6. Each school should have a choir and aspire to having an orchestra or large scale ensemble.
Music Hubs
A key part of the new national music plan will be the introduction of “Music hubs”. These new hubs will take responsibility for developing and delivering key parts of thenational music strategy for a local area. The government document describes how the new hubs will "take forward the work of local authority music services from September 2012, helping improve the quality and consistency of music education across England, both in and out of school."
The focus will be on assessing and meeting local needs of children, and drawing on a range of local, national and regional music and arts provision in each area.·
Local authorities can bid to run a music hub but the process is open to other organisations and groups too. The music education hubs will be in place from September 2012
The application process to become music education hubs will be coordinated by Arts Council England. The assessment of applications will look closely at the following areas:
- leadership and governance
- a track record in high quality music education
- partnership working
- proposed music education hub delivery
- value for money
Part of the new national plan for music education are changes to teacher training.
A new primary Initial Teacher Training add-on module is to be developed by the Teaching Agency to boost new teachers’ skills and confidence in teaching music.·
Hubs and school-to-school support will provide opportunities for continuing professional development.
A new Music educator qualification will be under development by 2013 ensuring the wider music workforce is better skilled, and properly recognised for their role in and out of school. This includes the development of qualifications (probably modular) for creative practitioners as music educators "to ensure the wider music workforce is better skilled and properly recognised for their role in and out of school."
The complete National Plan for Music Education can be viewed/downloaded at: http://www.education.gov.uk > Enter DFE-00086-2011 in the Search field.
The Henley Review of music education and the government’s response to it, published in February 2011, can be viewed/downloaded at: http://www.education.gov.uk > Enter DFE-00011-2011 or DFE-00012-2011 respectively in the Search field.