For your prep this week read THIS article. Write a letter to Nicola Benedetti and tell her what you think about her comments. The best ones will be shared here.
Don’t forget to justify your point of view with evidence from your own experience in music this year!
mrsgowersclasses 
Nicola Benedetti,
I think that your comments and thoughts in the Telegraph are true, that we should be exposed to classical music in music lessons. But I don’t think we should have to do it all the time and be forced to do it. Firstly we do cover classical music in our music lessons, and don’t just do what we want, we unpick it and discuss it and i have played it. But I don’t think we should have to do it all the time which we don’t. We should cover all types of styles and genres of music to widen our knowledge and understanding of music in general, if we only did classical it would be boring and we would know a lot less about actual music. we should explore all types of music to help us understand and I also think that learning about more modern music is better as its what we hear everyday on the radio and on TV so we would know more about our culture in music. We should be free to explore all types of music (which we already do)and would learn more about music not just classical, so it would benefit us more and help us in the subject of music.
Aimee
Hi miss. I have some exciting news for you! After writing my letter, I sent it to Mrs Benedetti’s enquiry email address. After waiting till this morning, I recieved a reply. I wish to show it to you by picture, but my iPad won’t allow me to copy and paste it. But roughly what Benedetti’s email said was that the press altered what she had said to make it a more sensational scoop, and most of what Mrs Beneddeti had really said was that children should listen more to classical music. Personally, I feel quiet proud to have (sort of) made contact with a celebrity!
From Joe in 7GM
No way Joe!!
Sent from my iPhone
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Found the text for you- Thank you for your email. In refer you to Nicola’s twitter account where she explains that she has been misquoted in the Telegraph and other papers, all of whom have reported on a magazine story and distorted what she said in order to print a more sensational headline. At no point did Nicola say anyone should be ‘forced’ to listen to classical music as this is not something she believes ought to happen.
Can you forward me the email Joe? Ag@monkswalk.herts.sch.uk
Sent from my iPhone
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Dear Nicola Benedetti,
I agree with your beliefs that children should be listening to classical music because most children do not have the chance to listen to classical music at home. Children are always listening to the new type of computer generated music. This music is starting to take over classical music, as no children now listen to older music from famous composers. What average kid would know who Richard Wagner is? So children should be taught classical music in schools.
However I do not agree that classical music is the only style of ,music children should be listening to in school. I believe that children should be listening to all varieties of music, different instruments, different genres and different cultures or eras of music. Also I think that children should have the chance to express themselves in their own way.
James
All children should have the chance to be exposed to classical music, even if they’d rather play video games, I disagree with this quote. This is because i believe that you dont have to listen to classical music to be able to be a student of music. I reckon you can listen to all ckinds of music, no matter what it is. However, i did say you ‘dont have to’ which therefor indicates that you can listen to classical music, but you dont have to have a choice. These have been my reasons why. 🙂
ps: i was supposed to put dear Nicola Benedetti, wasnt i?
Dear Nicola Benedetti,
I agree with you about your recent newspaper article. I think that students should be able to be exposed to classical music as it would give them as more wide range of music. However, I think that children should be exposed to more music rather then just classical, as there are alot more types of music out there that could inspire students. I like the way you have compared education to choices such as a maths lesson to video games, as what you have said is completely true. People do not let children approve or disapprove any other educational choices, so why should they let us approve or disapprove music? Are they implying that music is not as an important lesson as history or science?
Thank you.
Dear Nicola Benedetti,
I agree that classical music is great. On Friday the 16th I saw a 60 piece orchestra perform children’s books theme songs and it was GREAT! And really related to the children but I think the children and teens should be able to choose what they play. So if they want to learn the violin the can have lessons. I don’t think we should be forced because we should explore all music not just classical. Music has changed quite a bit so our generation has different opinions on classical music. We may like video games and stuff but some of us like all sorts of music like classical so I only partly agree with your newspaper article because we should explore all music.
Dear Nicola Benedetti,
I partially agree with what you have said, that you think that children should be exposed to classical music. I agree with you because most children expect classical music to be boring and they don’t listen to it or want to learn about it. If they were to have learnt about it at school actually listened to many different famous composers then that view might change.
Though i don’t think they should be only learning about classical music. Children should learn about a variety of genres, instruments, and cultures of music. They shouldn’t be forced to only learn about classical, they should have the freedom to explore and learn about a large range of music. Also learning about modern day music they can widen their knowledge about our culture in music nowadays.
Thank you,
Emilia
To Nicola Benedetti,
I disagree with what you said because I don’t think children should have to listen to classical music to be a student. I think that the teaching at the moment is fine and I don’t think they need to change it at all.
James
Dear Nicola Benedetti
I think that exposing classical music to children whether they like it or not isn’t fair. I think this because there are many children who are not so fond of classical music and would rather focus on what kind of music they’re interested in,However I can see your point because many children in our days think classical music is boring and doesn’t mean anything to them , however by them learning more about it , it would hopefully change their minds and make them appreciate it more. Overall I think that you don’t need classical music to show that you appreciate music, but it does help to broaden your experience of music. From my experience of music I have learned that any kind of music you listen to is interesting it doesn’t matter if it is pop,classical or rock its still music and should be appreciated..
thank you
Anya.
dear Nicola Benedetti,
I think that your idea is wrong because I know that you want to help people by doing this but people need to find it there own way not by you. I understand that you want to give people that chance with classical music but children need to do things in their generation like pop music, because if they were going to do that it would be in a history lesson. music is about learning new things like how to play instruments not what classical music is. if it were me I would set a piece of prep on listening to classical and then let people decide whether they like it and want to do more on it but that should be up to them. even though you think we don’t love it some people might so you cant stereotype people into this situation. you are a classical music player so how would you like it if someone came up to you and said we are suddenly changing things you have to play pop now. it wouldn’t be nice so maybe we should just slowly do little bits on classical.
thank you
Daisy
Dear Nicola Benedetti
I think that your comments and thoughts in the Telegraph are true that we should be exposed to classical music in music lessons. Children would expect that classical music is boring but if they never heard it how would they know its boring? Partially agree that they should have a few lessons/topics about or to do with classical music as they might enjoy it and if not at least they learn something new about it.But they shouldn’t be forced to learn about classical music all the time as there are many different genres or music and types.We already did learn a bit about classical music in classes but we should explore other genres as well. If we listened to loads of different varieties of composers it could change peoples view on classical music or at least appreciate it. To me each variety of music is interesting some i prefer more than others but i am happy to explore different genres.Overall, i think that classical music should be exposed as well as different genres this way the students can have an idea of a variety of genres out there.
Olivia.
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