Principles for structuring lessons
An effective lesson will be organised into a sequence of distinct learning episodes, each of which will have a beginning (engaging the pupils in musical learning through teacher input), a middle (activities for pupils to explore and learn) and then a quick check for understanding before moving to the next episode. At the end of the lesson there might be a longer review time.
This plan for the lesson might be summarised as ‘engage – learn – review’ and it provides a useful framework for all lessons. The amount of time each episode requires will vary considerably, but the format can remain constant. When you decide how many episodes to cover in a lesson, and how long each should be, try not to exceed the concentration span of your pupils. For example, keep most episodes under 15 minutes for Year 7 pupils.
Equally, the activities and roles of the teacher and pupils within each section can vary considerably. Some lessons will involve large amounts of direct teacher input while others will see pupils spending most of the lesson resolving practical composition challenges.
You could now:
- Undertake Task 7 (The good lesson guide) to see pupils talking about the benefits of clearly structured lessons
- Read each of the tabs below to explore what the details of ‘engage – learn – review’ might look like within a music lesson
Engage
The engagement episode of the lesson needs to do two things: to involve pupils in music and to articulate the learning for the lesson. It may therefore include any or all of the three following strategies.
Musical engagement
Pupils can be engaged with music from the moment they come into the room. Singing, rhythmic work, chanting, movement activities and improvisation can all be used to ensure that pupils immediately engage their ‘musical thinking’. Music is unique. It is about sound, and is at once abstract, ephemeral and simultaneously complex. This thinking needs to be engaged from the very start of the lesson.
Starter activity
Starters are lively, engaging starts to lessons. They are the place to establish early teaching points or to position the ‘little and often’ objectives by revisiting and practising skills or consolidating knowledge. They also allow teachers to establish quickly any gaps in knowledge. They are often short (e.g. 5 minutes) and may involve activities that are not directly musical.
Introduction
All lessons need introductions where learning objectives and outcomes are shared. Here the scene is set and the lesson located in the context of previous and future learning. Pupils should be helped to see the ‘big picture’ – refer back to the section Locating the lesson in context.
Introductions are short, but be sure to allow enough time.
Sometimes, the musical engagement and starter activity can be delivered through one activity, so that pupils see how the opening activity helps them to establish what they will be learning in that lesson. This link between one-off, ‘warm-up’ activities and the learning that follows is important: without it, pupils will not see the relevance of the activity and may actually become disengaged.
At other times, engagement will be separate. This is most likely where a performance activity is being built up over the whole of a unit via short, quick-fire ‘rehearsals’. For instance, in a unit on gospel music, pupils might work on a simple vocal call and response in week 1, add a bass line in week 2, a set of backing vocals in week 3, movement in week 4, and so on until the whole class is able to perform a complete song at the start of the unit’s final week.
In lessons where this is happening, it is likely that following the musical engagement episode there will be an introduction and then a starter, simply to break up the activities for pupils so that they are clear how a given activity is contributing to learning.
Learn
New learning or introduction of task
New learning is introduced by teacher input. This will draw on a range of strategies or techniques to engage pupils. It may involve listening to some music followed by a discussion or use modelling to teach a new skill. The length of input should relate to the age and maturity of the pupils. In a lesson concerned with developing a concept, the initial input may be very brief and confined to a description of the task. When introducing tasks, make clear the expected learning outcomes and suggest timings. There may be a series of carefully sequenced inputs during the lesson, each followed by a period of development.
Development
Pupils need opportunities to explore and use new knowledge, understanding or skills. They will learn by applying new ideas or trying to generate their own understanding from practical experience of music making. Once again, the tasks undertaken by pupils will be determined by the range of techniques known to the teacher and related to the nature of the learning objective. For example, removing and adding new loops to an existing audio file will enable pupils to learn about textures within a given style. Again, the length of the activity should be related to pupils’ age and maturity. More challenging pupils often benefit from shorter and more varied episodes.
Review
Plenaries
In plenaries pupils and teachers review and take stock of learning and there is an opportunity to reflect on the learning process itself. These periods may be short (e.g. 5 to 10 minutes) and it is important that learning points for the whole class are drawn out, rather than issues for individuals, pairs or groups. There may be a series of shorter plenaries throughout the lesson. It is important to recognise that plenaries in music can sometimes be purely musical – they do not have to include talking. This will not be the norm, but when pupils have demonstrably heard and ‘caught’ the music, trying to articulate the learning at that precise moment can actually destroy the very aesthetic learning that music is trying to develop.
In this scenario, the teacher will need to recognise what has happened, and identify strategies that enable pupils to understand later what that ‘special moment’ revealed about learning.
