Music

Music at Stillness

Intent

At Stillness Junior School, our intent is to provide a rich, vibrant, and fully inclusive music education that fosters creativity, self-expression, and a lifelong love for music. We believe that every child is a musician. Our curriculum is designed to give all pupils—regardless of background, starting point, or additional needs—the opportunity to actively participate in high-quality, practical music-making.

In partnership with Junior Jam, we deliver a progressive scheme of work that is fully aligned with our current school curriculum, the National Curriculum, and the Model Music Curriculum. By carefully structuring our learning paths, we ensure that musical knowledge, vocabulary, and skills build sequentially year-on-year. Central to our intent is a deep commitment to diversity and inclusion. We expose our pupils to an extensive range of musical styles, traditions, and historical periods, ensuring our music curriculum reflects and celebrates the rich cultural diversity of our school and the wider Lewisham community.

Implementation

Our music curriculum is brought to life through hands-on, practical lessons delivered by specialist instructors from Junior Jam, who provide all the specialist instrumentation and equipment directly to our classrooms. The curriculum is structured around progressive blocks of learning that combine listening, composing, performing, and evaluating:

• Singing / Vocals: Pupils develop an understanding of pitch, range, expression, and dynamics, using their voices collaboratively to build ensembles and vocal confidence.
• Songwriting with Glockenspiels: Children learn the fundamentals of notation, rhythm, and melodic composition, exploring how to create and transcribe their own musical ideas.
• Music Theory with Keyboards: This unit embeds foundational music theory and keyboard skills, allowing pupils to read music, understand scales, and develop digital and acoustic finger dexterity.
• African Drumming: Pupils explore the deep historical and cultural significance of untuned percussion, mastering polyrhythms, call-and-response techniques, and the power of playing together as a cohesive rhythmic community.
• Class Jam: Synthesising their learning, pupils come together to form a whole-class contemporary band. By combining multiple instruments and percussion, children learn to play different musical parts simultaneously, understanding how separate layers lock together to create a unified live performance.

Inclusion and accessibility are built into every lesson. Junior Jam’s adaptive teaching methods, visual aids (such as innovative coloured notation), and structured adaptations ensure that learners with SEND can access the curriculum at their own level and experience equal success alongside their peers.

Impact

The impact of our music curriculum is seen in our pupils’ growing confidence, resilience, and enjoyment during performances. Through their engagement with singing, keyboards, glockenspiels, and African drumming, children at Stillness Junior School develop not only specific musical talents but also essential transferable skills, including teamwork, critical listening, and focus.

We measure curriculum impact dynamically – using assessment tools, progression maps and lesson-by-lesson feedback. This ensures that every child is making measurable, continuous progress against national milestones. Ultimately, our curriculum empowers pupils to value music from diverse global cultures, express their own unique identities, and leave Stillness Junior School with a secure, well-rounded foundation in musicianship.

Music Overview.

Singing-Knowledge Organisers

Songwriting with Glockenspiels-Knowledge Organisers

Class Jam-Knowledge Organisers

Theory with Keyboards-Knowledge Organisers

Keyboards-Knowledge Organisers

African Drumming-Knowledge Organisers

School Music Development Plan Summary 2025-26

Beyond the Curriculum

At Stillness Juniors our learning goes beyond the curriculum and is supplemented in a number of different ways. We enrich our knowledge through workshops – some led by our wonderful parents, themed days, school trips, team sports, and afterschool clubs to name some. Head over to our gallery and our Instagram page where you will see a showcase of these activities.

Please only use this form to apply for a new instrumental lesson, existing lessons remain active until cancelled.

Instrument Lesson Application Form
To apply for an instrumental lesson please fill in the form below:

Lesson Status Checker
Complete the form near the bottom of the page and take note of your lesson ID. You can use this to track the progress of your application or lesson: