Music Technology - 30 Credit Certificate - A Guide To BTEC Grading

This article has been adapted from Donna Hollick's Coulsdon College guide to BTEC Grading for BTEC RQF Certificate in Travel & Tourism, Sept 2020

You are studying the BTEC Level 3 RQF Certificate in Music Technology. Your qualification size is 180 Guided Learning Hours and is equivalent in size to 0.5 of an A Level.  You will be studying 2 units, one internally-marked coursework and the other is an externally-marked exam. 

The following grades can be awarded for the certificate:

• Pass 
• Merit 
• Distinction
• Distinction*

Unit 6 – DAW Production 

You will be assessed for this unit by an external exam.

The marks below show how many points you will get for each grade. 

 

Unit 2 – Studio Recording Techniques 

This unit is assessed by coursework. The table below shows the number of points available for this unit.  For unit 2, points are allocated depending on the grade awarded. To get each grade – all criteria within the grade must be achieved.

For example 

Unit 2 consists of 

• Pass grades - P1, P2, P3, P4, P5
• Merit grades – M1, M2, M3 and M4, M5
• Distinction grades – D1, D2, D3

IMPORTANT - HOW YOUR GRADE IS CALCULATED

You must achieve all the criteria above to get a Distinction,

all the Pass and Merits to get a Merit,

and all the Passes to get a Pass.

If you get all the Pass grades and all of the Distinctions, but only 2 of the Merits – your overall unit grade will be a Pass. 

 The grades awarded for Unit 2 can be seen below:

 

To calculate your overall grade, the points from Unit 6 are added to the points from Unit 2 to give you your overall grade

The points awarded from Unit 6 and Unit 2 will be added together to calculate the final grade which you can see in the table above.

For Example

Mohammed achieved a Pass for Unit 6 and got 12 points. He prefers coursework though and got a Distinction for Unit 2 which is 16 points. Mohammed has 28 points altogether so Mohammed was awarded a Merit for his BTEC Certificate in Music Technology. 

Practice time!

1. Agatha studied a BTEC Certificate in Music Technology. She gets a Near Pass in her exam for Unit 6 and a Merit for Unit 2 coursework – what is her grade overall?

2. Rupert also studied on the same course – he got a Distinction in Unit 6 and a Merit in Unit 2 – what was his overall grade?

3. Mabel studied on the same course. She did very well and got Distinctions on both units – what was her grade overall?

4. Cliff struggled on the course and was awarded a Near Pass on the Unit 6 exam and got a Pass in the Unit 2 coursework – what grade did he achieved overall?

5. Priya studied with the group and got a Merit for the Unit 6 exam and a Pass for the Unit 2 coursework – what grade did Priya gain overall?

Stretch and Challenge

Please give your target grade that you would like to achieve at the end of the year and give 3 strategies you will use to achieve this!

Target Grade – 

Strategies:

1)

2)

3)

Creating Your Artist Profile Page!

 

image from https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.blogger&hl=en_US

Use a free Google Gmail account to make your own Blogger website. 

Always save and publish each blog post so you can share it with others. 

How to build your Artist Profile Blogger webpage!

image from https://medium.com/@MusicPromoToday/tips-for-musicians-how-to-get-your-bio-read-ca518d1cdb4a

Your artist profile = 

1. your best artist or performance photos

2. your best performance video or audio file

3. your artist bio

AN ARTIST BIO SHOULD INCLUDE: 

WHERE: Where you were born and now live

WHAT: 1. Your main instrument 2. List your 3 best musical skills (e.g. vocal range, 

HOW: How you learnt - e.g. self-taught or received lessons & number of years you've been learning

WHERE & WHEN: A list of performances with photos or recordings if possible

WHO: Other artists you have performed with

WHY: 1. Why you perform 2. Who inspires you (influences & favourite music styles)  3. Future ambitions (career - musical or not & what musical )

 Read this article for more help: 'Tips for Musicians: How to Get Your Bio Read' (from MusicPromoToday)

How to upload website links, photos, video & audio files (& emojis! 🤗 )

These four icon buttons allow you to add weblinks, pictures, videos and emojis! 

When you add:  

• weblinks - tick the box to open the link in a new page so the reader can still view your blog at the same time
• pictures - add a caption with the web address to show where it's from (use smallest size font)
• videos - you can link directly from Youtube or upload from a phone or computer
• audio files - see below

Audio files cannot be directly uploaded, as Blogger does not have an MP3 player. Instead, you can include audio recordings link to a website (1) or to a storage cloud (2)

Method 1. Play from a music website (e.g. Soundcloud, etc)

Simply paste the html link into Create/Edit URL or into Insert Video

Method 2. Link directly to file from an online Cloud 

First, upload your MP3 files on an audio hosting service like Google Drive, Dropbox etc... because you can't upload and save audio files on Blogger directly.

Then put it into post's HTML editor not the text editor. 

** Make sure you copy the link to the file itself (from 'right click' menu) and not the web address for the audio player page that opens when you click on the file**