Music Education in Gloucestershire 2013/14: a Snapshot
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Music education in Gloucestershire 2013/14: a snapshot Contents Section A: Introduction & background 2 Section B: Schools music Schools music executive summary/key points 3-5 Section C: A snapshot of the work of other Hub partners 1 Learning instruments and the fundamentals of music 6 2 Singing 6 3 Groups and ensembles 6 4 Targeted inclusion work 7 5 Independent music making - technology & bands 7 6 Wider work with young people 7 Section D: Leading and developing the Hub – the work of 8 the commissioning team and partners Appendix: Schools music – results 1 Background 9 2 Curriculum music 9 3 Exams 10 4 Arts Award and Arts Mark 11 5 Types of learning on offer 11 6 Standards 11 7 Instrumental tuition 12 8 Music technology 18 9 Songwriting 20 10 Singing, rapping, beatboxing 22 11 Music groups, ensembles, choirs 24 12 Activities subsidised by the Hub 26 13 Additional questions 26 Make Music Gloucestershire, the county’s music education hub, Colwell Arts Centre, Derby Road, Gloucester GL1 4AD T 01452 330 300 E [email protected] W www.makemusicgloucestershire.org.uk 1 Section A: Introduction and background What is this report for? This report is a snapshot of the work in 2013/14 of schools, and organisations funded by Make Music Gloucestershire, the county’s music education hub, in reaching young people through music education. It focuses on the numbers and types of music learning and making rather than the impact and stories. The aim of this report is to help us all (schools, music education organisations, musicians, and others working with young people in music) to build a picture of music education in the county, understand what's happening and what's needed, and plan accordingly. Also and importantly it will contribute to the analysis of how effective we are in delivering on the requirements of the National Plan for Music Education, and the Core and Extension Roles of hubs set out by Arts Council England and the Department for Education as a requirement of hub funding. Where has information come from? Information has been drawn from two sources: • The ‘data app’, which was launched last year, as a means of collecting data for and from schools and Hub partners on an annual basis - http://glos.musicdatashare.org.uk/. There were two parts to the app: a survey for schools, and one for other music educators/music education organisations. Due to the low response to the latter we have not analysed the information from that particular survey, but see Section C for more information. We plan to replace the latter with direct reporting from Hub-funded partners to the commissioning team, and a simpler survey for those not funded by the Hub. • Information provided direct to the Hub commissioning team from Hub funded partners, in readiness for reporting to Arts Council England through their annual (autumn) Hubs Data Return What happens next? This report will inform Hub planning and allocation of resources, including for our next phase business plan for 2016 onwards. We hope schools and music educators will also use it to inform their own plans. We have seen this initial phase of data collection as a pilot: we’re aware there are many gaps and further work is needed, and we will be building on the data and improving our methods over time. We hope that in reading this report, schools and other music educators will understand the importance and value of this information, and that more will supply information for next year’s report. Please sign up to our music educators or schools enewsletters for further information about the next phase data collection and to keep up to date with Hub news and opportunities. Visit the Make Music Gloucestershire website to find out more about how you can get involved in the Hub. And if you offer music opportunities and services for children and young people then do add your information to TouchBass, the county’s online search tool making and learning music. Our thanks to all those who provided information, and please let us know if you have any observations or queries: contact [email protected] 2 Section B: Schools music Executive summary / key points Please note: these figures are based on small sample sizes: 23 primaries, 10 secondaries, 1 special and 1 ASP schools. We anticipate that these samples will increase each year. a) Curriculum music, Arts Award and Arts Mark At Key Stages 1-3 (primary and years 7-9 in secondary), most pupils were receiving an hour of music but it is concerning that in primaries, just under one quarter were receiving no music at all. Schools reported that at these key stages, 48% of pupils were at grade 1-3 standard; 12% grade 4-5 and 8% at grade 6 and above. Key Stage 4 (secondary, GCSE), figures suggest an average of 3 hours of music per week, although 20% of schools offered no music at all. The average number of pupils taking GCSE Music1 was 15, and the range was 1-30. Exam boards used were Edexcel, AQA and OCR. At Key Stage 5 (secondary, AS & A level), figures suggest 4-5 hours of music per week, although 50% of schools offered no music at all. AS and A-level classes tended to be groups of 1-3, although two schools had larger classes in the case of AS level (13 and 20). No schools had pupils taking BTEC music. Exam boards used were Edexcel and OCR. GCSE/AS-level students were reported to be mostly at grade 4-5 standard (46%) with 31% at grade 6 and above, and the rest grade 3 or below. four schools (secondaries) had pupils working towards Arts Mark; five primaries and five secondaries were Arts Mark accredited or working towards this. b) Types of music learning on offer Instrumental music was not surprisingly the most popular method, followed by Singing, then songwriting. Only 30% of primaries were using music technology, and 70% of secondaries. It is concerning that 26% of primary schools and 30% of secondaries do not teach music through singing2. The ASP and special schools offered all four categories of musical learning. c) Instrumental tuition Whole class 1 In future surveys we will be clear to specify that we mean all forms of music exam, from musical theatre to music technology. 2 In future surveys, we will include a separate category of composing/creative music making and will include songwriting in with singing 3 70% of primaries, one of the secondaries, and the ASP had been offering whole class instrumental tuition. 39% of the primaries in this survey received whole class tuition from Gloucestershire Music (this slightly lower than actual figures from Gloucestershire Music which suggests they reached 41% of primaries in 2013/14) and 22% used their own teachers. The remainder used other providers. One-to-one or small group in school One-to-one or small group tuition was available to pupils in all secondaries, 70% of primaries, and both the ASP and the special school. Type of instruments learned and instrument stock Instruments offered covered a wide range, with rock, pop, folk and world in the minority compared with western classical orchestral instruments. It is difficult to quantify this accurately because of the way the data was collected but we will improve on this in future years. However, when asked what they’d like to be able to offer but don’t, 38% of those who responded said they’d like to be able to offer some form of percussion. Around half of schools had their own instrument stock (39% of primaries, 56% of secondaries). Numbers learning instruments through different methods Up to and including KS3, there were: • 1,895 pupils in the sample schools learning instruments through whole class tuition, an average of 82 per (primary) school in the sample – which, based on average pupil numbers per primary school in Gloucestershire (174) 3 represents 47% of total pupils. • 610 learning instruments 1-1 or in small groups in school, an average of 27 per primary or 16% of total pupils. • 1,466 learning instruments out of school, an average of 64% of total pupils. Total numbers of pupils learning music The total number of pupils learning music as a whole is difficult to assess from this data, as a) there will be double counting of pupils within the information given for learning instruments, music technology, singing, songwriting; and b) also double counting across different methods (ie some pupils will be learning both in school and out of school, etc). 3 Data Source: All figures for pupil numbers taken from January 2013 School census (42, 718 primary pupils). Provided by Gloucestershire County Council’s Strategy and Challenge team http://www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/inform/ Tel: (01452) 328544 Email: [email protected] 4 One estimate would be that if 1,466 in this sample are learning instruments out of school and 610 in school through 1-1/small group tuition, it’s likely that few will be doing both, so we might say that around 2,000 in the sample are learning instruments outside the curriculum/classroom. Based on the 23 schools with an average of 174 pupils this gives a total pupil population of 4,000, so this represents 50% of all pupils. We intend to improve the App in future to address these points. We are also investigating the possibility of gaining accurate annual information about this through other routes (eg adding a music question to the annual pupil wellbeing survey), so that we can then compare changes year-on-year across the whole of the pupil population.