Holiday work for KS4

You sent off their controlled assessments, you paced anxiously as they sat the listening exam, and you signed their leaving book, but you know that they are destined to return to your school. Getting Year 11 pupils though their GCSE music is a huge achievement – and one that you, quite rightly, should be very proud of. If you have a successful sixth form within your school, however, there’s every chance that these young adults will be back the following September and, for those who choose music, you will be their classroom teacher once again.

Once their exams are finished, they will spend their time celebrating, and many will enjoy the sort of freedoms that we adults can only dream of. Yet, as the summer drags on, these pupils will undoubtedly find themselves experiencing something that busy music teachers can only dream of – boredom. As they walk out of the school gates with their school shirts covered in signatures, it’s hard to imagine that these young men and women would consider spending their holiday doing work for your subject.

Giving them a homework task to do may seem like a futile effort, but such a perspective fails to take into account the amazing ability of adolescents to experience boredom. A bored 16-year-old will quite happily do some work in his/her summer holiday for a subject he or she has chosen, if it alleviates a little tedium.