Art and Design
Intent
Our intent at Heather Garth Primary Academy is to enable pupils to become creative and reflective learners, who are able to express themselves fluently and confidently in a variety of different ways. When devising our long-term progression plan for art, we identified 3 ‘Key Threads’ for the teaching of art within our curriculum.
Under these ‘Key threads,’ Art and Design is organised into areas which we feel will provide coherence throughout the curriculum and support children in building and embedding knowledge. As a school, we fully recognise the importance of a repetition of knowledge and skills for children to make progress and have narrowed the coverage of techniques to ensure children develop skills and have regular, planned opportunities to practise producing quality work in these key areas.
The 3 ‘Key Threads’ are:
1: The art of drawing and painting
2: The art of printing
3: The art of sculpture
The key concepts: line, shape, form, space, colour, tone, texture and pattern are embedded within our curriculum progression plans.
Children in Early Years provision are exposed to and explore, a variety of medium, materials and equipment in both continuous provision and adult led activities.
Implementation
At Heather Garth Primary Academy, staff plan and structure a sequence of lessons following our lesson sequencing guide. This ensures they have planned to meet the knowledge and skills detailed in our progression document and the National Curriculum. Our art curriculum develops pupil’s interest and curiosity about art and design through a series of lessons offering skills progression, knowledge progression and by offering pupils the opportunity to ask questions and demonstrate their skills in a variety of ways.
The National curriculum states that: ‘Pupils should be taught to develop their techniques, including their control and their use of materials, with creativity, experimentation and an increasing awareness of different kinds of art, craft and design.’ Our Art and Design curriculum (where appropriate) has been structured in a cross-curricular way to effectively facilitate this, while also providing maximum inspiration to our artists. Art projects (where appropriate) are linked to a class topic theme to enhance the pupils’ understanding of the key historical or geographical concepts covered. At Heather Garth Primary Academy, each of our artists has their own sketch book, in which they can record ideas, practise new techniques and further refine their skills. A diverse range of Artists from different eras are studied throughout the school to give our artists a balanced knowledge and understanding of art, craft and design.
In EYFS, through Expressive Arts, children are encouraged to explore different media, explore how media can be combined to create different effects and develop a range of skills and techniques experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function. This is then refined and developed when the children reach FS2 as the children’s actions become more accurate. Children are given daily access to a range of creative provision, both indoors and outdoors. This is planned and resourced by the class teacher to provide the children with a range of experiences and materials to work with. Children are encouraged to create on both small and large scales throughout the environment, whilst using a range of techniques and materials. Children are encouraged to develop their communication and language skills through talking about their creations and sharing these with others to build confidence and self-esteem.
In KS1, Art is taught half termly and alternates with Design Technology. Pupils follow the Heather Garth Primary Academy scheme of Art which enables the pupils to progressively develop their skills within Art in the areas of: drawing, painting, printing and sculpture, with the key concepts of: line, shape, form, space, colour, tone, texture and pattern embedded within our plans. The scheme of work is designed around a 5-part sequence of learning: researching and developing ideas, sketchbook experimenting, mastering techniques and developing ideas, and finally evaluating. These areas are then re-visited in other units with increasing complexity in a spiral curriculum model. This in turn allows for the pupils to revise and build upon their prior learning.
In KS2, the pupils continue to follow the Heather Garth Primary Academy scheme for Art, which enables pupils to progressively develop their skills within Art – building on their skills from KS1 and progressively developing their skills within Art in the areas. Again, these areas are then re-visited in other units with increasing complexity in a spiral curriculum model. This in turn allows for the children to revise and build upon their prior learning.
Impact
The curriculum for Art and Design is planned to support and demonstrate a seamless progression through school. Due to the nature of this curriculum area, Art and Design monitoring takes various forms. A key component of this is pupil voice; school leaders use this as an effective tool to ascertain the pupils’ ability to express themselves through a range of different mediums. Sketch book monitoring, throughout all year groups, also takes place each half term to compliment this, allowing leaders to ensure our artists have the opportunity to develop their skills fully and showcase their talents, while also ensuring our curriculum standards are being achieved in each year group.
Please click on the picture below to see the documents.
