Tell me what they want, what they really, really want? Dr Liz Stafford analyses Ofsted’s latest recommendations for music in schools Lukewarm on the heels of the Music Subject Research Review (2021), Ofsted have now published their long promised companion piece the Music Subject Report. This latest report draws on findings from 50 schools visited by Ofsted inspectors between December 2022 and June 2023, 25 of which were primary schools. I found it really encouraging to see that the report actually paints a reasonably
positive picture of music at primary level. So often we get blamed for things that are totally out of our control, like GCSE take-up numbers! It is great to have some positive praise for once, and in particular the acknowledgement that there are things, such as singing, that we might do better than secondary schools! It was equally good to have a reminder that the quality of music provision is intrinsically tied to its quantity - in that the schools which had
