Intent

The national curriculum for art and design aims to ensure that all pupils:

• produce creative work, exploring their ideas and recording their experiences
• become proficient in drawing, painting, sculpture and other art, craft and design techniques
• evaluate and analyse creative works using the language of art, craft and design
• know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms.

Through a supportive and nurturing environment, Grayswood CofE Primary School deliver an art and design curriculum which aims to inspire our children and develop their confidence to trust themselves to experiment and invent their own pieces of art. We believe it is important to develop each child’s ability, nurture their talents and interests, express their ideas and observations, as well as learning about the rich heritage and culture of the world around them. The children have the opportunity to explore ideas and meanings through studying the work of artists and designers. Furthermore, by learning about the roles and functions of art, they can explore the impact it has had on contemporary life and on different periods and cultures.

The children of Grayswood will have the tools to meet the end of key stage attainment targets in the National curriculum and the aims also align with those in the National curriculum.

Implementation

The Grayswood curriculum is shaped by our school vision which aims to enable all children to flourish and develop a lifelong passion for learning. By following Kapow Primary’s scheme of work for Art and Design we are able to meet our vision and aims.

The scheme of work is supported by clear skills and knowledge progression. Art is taught as a discrete subject, alternating half-termly with Design and Technology ensuring all skills are covered in both disciplines. All pupils explore and use a variety of media and material through their Art lessons and skills are taught to build technique progressively. The Kapow Art scheme of work is designed with four strands that run throughout and revisited in every unit. These are:

• Making skills
• Formal elements (line, shape, tone, texture, pattern, colour)
• Knowledge of artists
• Evaluating

Through the Formal elements of art units, our children have the opportunity to learn and practise skills discreetly. The knowledge and skills from these units are then applied throughout the other units in the scheme. Key skills are continually repeated and then applied with increasing complexity. This allows the children to revise and build on prior learning.

The units of work are fully scaffolded and support essential and age-appropriate sequential learning. Creativity and independent outcomes are embedded into the units, supporting children in learning how to make their own creative choices and decisions, so that the outcomes are individual and unique and personal to each child. To support their creative choices, the children have access to a range of class-based materials and mediums as well as a fully stocked art cupboard for the whole school.

All lessons are practical and encourage exploration, with KS1 and KS2 children using sketchbooks to record their ideas. This also allows for the progression in skills to be clearly documented and accessed. To ensure art is accessible to all children, differentiated guidance is available with opportunities to stretch children’s learning when required.

Strong subject knowledge is vital for our staff to be able to deliver highly effective and robust curriculum and as members of Kapow, our teachers have access to training videos to develop their subject knowledge and ongoing CPD to enable them to deliver lessons of a high calibre and ensure pupil progression.

Impact

Children should leave Grayswood equipped with a range of techniques and the confidence and creativity to form a strong foundation for their Art and design learning at Key Stage 3 and beyond.

The impact of following Kapow Art and Design scheme of work means that children will:

• Produce creative work, exploring and recording their ideas and experiences.
• Be proficient in drawing, painting, sculpture and other art, craft and design techniques
• Evaluate and analyse creative work using subject-specific language.
• Know about great artists and the historical and cultural development of art.
• Meet the end of key stage expectations outlined in the National curriculum for Art and Design.

The creativity of all our pupils is celebrated through communal displays, publishing on the school newsletter and on our website. 

We measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

• Interaction with pupils during discussions and related questioning.
• Day to day observations.
• A celebration of learning in the form of displays.
• Pupil discussions about their learning (pupil voice); which includes discussion of their thoughts, ideas, processing and evaluations of work.
• Moderation staff meetings where sketchbooks are explored and there is the opportunity for a dialogue between teachers to understand their class’s work.

At the end of each year we make a summative judgement about the achievement of each pupil. This judgement is supported through the documentation and evidence from sketchbooks. Children in Foundation Stage are assessed within the Early Learning Goals and progress is tracked through ongoing assessment.

Enrichment in Art

In addition to the curriculum, we offer the following enrichment opportunities in Art for children at Grayswood CE Primary School:

• An art exhibition every other year for children to showcase their work
• Inter-school confederation art competitions
• Priors Field Sculpture Trail and Art Workshop
• After school art and craft club
• Art work displayed at Haslemere Train Station
• Community Arts Project: Haslemere Hens (2022), Hasemere Hound (2019), Haslemere Hogs (2017)
• Local community competitions e.g. Haslemere Christmas window display