Online Teaching Materials
Downloadable resources for music teachers
Teaching materials are an integral part of a music teacher's practice. Every month Music Teacher publishes downloadable materials for KS3, 4 and 5, offering complete units of work, GCSE and A Level set-work guidance, and practical ideas across all levels for both classroom and peripatetic teachers. All materials are written by experienced teachers and examiners and provide indispensable content for your teaching.
If you would like to see an example of a Teaching Material, please click here.
SubscribeEdexcel GCSE AoS2: Unpacking Purcell’s ‘Music for a While’
Secondary education KS 4 Archive
This article provides teaching ideas and suggestions for Area of Study 2 of the Appraising component of the new Edexcel GCSE music course, which we have now started teaching to Year 10 students (see...
Formative assessment and differentiation
Secondary education KS 3 Archive
It’s essential that we make every effort to cater for the needs of every student in our classes, and plan for maximum progress to be made. Here I present some ideas about how best to organise...
Edexcel AoS1: Bach’s Cantata ‘Ein feste Burg’ BWV80
Secondary education KS 5 A2 AS Archive
A previous Music Teacher resource (January 2017) gives a comprehensive overview of what’s required. As well as including essential information, this resource will suggest strategies for approaching...
Edexcel GCSE AoS4: Fusions
Secondary education KS 4 Archive
With Year 10 students, teachers are now nearly halfway through teaching the new GCSE music courses, and here I provide some support for Area of Study 4 of the Edexcel specification, which is simply...
AQA GCSE AoS4: Copland’s Rodeo
Secondary education KS 4 Archive
It’s quite a soft touch to use Copland’s Rodeo as an example of AoS4’s Western classical tradition since 1910 in the new AQA GCSE specification. This resource is about providing context for Rodeo’s...
Planning a KS3 programme with the new GCSEs in mind
Secondary education KS 3 Archive
The new 9-1 GCSEs are supposedly more rigorous than their predecessors. In practice, however, this looks like a slight increase in the amount of music theory knowledge expected for the exam, and an...
Edexcel GCSE AoS3: Music for stage and screen – context, analysis and creative approaches
Secondary education KS 4 Archive
Edexcel’s GCSE specification for examination in 2018 includes a new Area of Study, AoS3: Music for stage and screen, which features two big hits from Hollywood and Broadway. This resource gives a...
Creative responses to the new Edexcel GCSE set works
Secondary education KS 4 Archive
This resource draws on the techniques of an ‘animateur’ (workshop leader) and puts them in the context of the curriculum, considering practical ways to approach features in all eight of the set works...
AQA & OCR: John Adams
Secondary education KS 5 Archive
Many music departments include modules on minimalism in their KS3 and KS4 schemes of work. A contemporary musical style that uses simple repetitive diatonic phrases with catchy rhythms and engaging...
AQA, Edexcel & OCR: Olivier Messiaen
Secondary education KS 5 Archive
As a teacher, Olivier Messiaen taught many of the figures who became giants in the post-war avant-garde – among them Boulez, Stockhausen and Xenakis. And as a composer, he sits on a line from Debussy...