Art and Design

We aim to develop and encourage children’s natural creativity so that they can become confident and enthusiastic artists.

We believe that children should be given the opportunity to enjoy, discuss and respond to a variety of art, craft and design forms.

Aims & Objectives

• To encourage the natural abilities that every child possess in this curriculum area.
• To help children explore the world first hand using their senses and experimentation to gain knowledge and understanding of the world in which they live.
• To enable children to express their ideas, feelings thoughts and experiences in a visual form and promote enjoyment in all art activities.
• To develop ability to use a sketchbook as a ‘notebook’ for ideas and observations.
• To teach children to look carefully at images and artefacts from the past, the present and from other cultures.
• To help children communicate confidently and develop aesthetic judgements applied to their own work, to the work of others and to the world around them.
• To develop skills and knowledge of materials so that ideas can be generated, undertaken and completed with success.
• To use increasingly expressive language and art specific vocabulary to respond to their own work and that of others.
• To give all pupils an opportunity to develop their ICT skills using various graphics software packages.

Teaching & Learning 

We use the ‘AccessArt’ programme to ensure the appropriate coverage and progression of necessary skills in all year groups. This is via a ‘split curriculum’ pathway which offers the alternation of Art and DT each half term.

These lessons will often have cross-curricular connections and can be linked with the year group global theme.

Our principal aim is to develop the children’s knowledge, skills and understanding in art and design. We ensure that the act of investigating and making something includes exploring and developing ideas, whilst evaluating and developing individual pieces of work. We do this best through a mixture of whole-class teaching and individual or group activities.

Throughout the year we give children the opportunity to work on their own, collaborate with others, work in two and three dimensions and on a range of different scales. Children also have the opportunity to use a wide range of materials and resources, including ICT.

In Foundation Stage, the development of children’s artistic and cultural awareness supports their imagination and creativity. It is important that children have regular opportunities to engage with the arts, enabling them to explore and play with a wide range of media and materials. The quality and variety of what children see, hear and participate in is crucial for developing their understanding, self-expression, vocabulary and ability to communicate through the arts. The frequency, repetition and depth of their experiences are fundamental to their progress in interpreting and appreciating what they hear, respond to and observe.

EYFS use the Development Matters (September 2020) to shape their curriculum and inform planning towards meeting the Early Learning Goals (ELGs) set out in the Statutory Framework (July 2020). Children will learn to

• Draw with increasing complexity and detail, such as representing a face with a circle and including details. Use drawing to represent ideas like movement or loud noises. 
• Show different emotions in their drawings and paintings, like happiness, sadness, fear etc.
• Explore colour and colour mixing. 
• Create closed shapes with continuous lines, and begin to use these shapes to represent objects.

ELG: Creating with Materials Children at the expected level of development will: 

• Safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function;
• Share their creations, explaining the process they have used;

S.E.N.D. & Equal Opportunities

Planning should take into account the needs, gender and race within each year group so that all children find the work accessible, stimulating and, whenever possible, appropriate to their interests.

Children with special needs may well find it easier to express their ideas and feelings in a visual way and will benefit from ‘open ended’ art tasks and activities.

It is also a subject not necessarily governed by academic ability and provides all children with an opportunity to succeed. Each child is encouraged to feel their work is respected and of equal value to the work of others. Each child’s work is celebrated – thus helping to promote self-esteem.

We aim to give all children the opportunity to develop an appreciation of art from different cultures through topic work or when studying religions and specific festivals.

Teachers present pupils with work from a variety of artists, craft workers and designers – including both genders and work from artists with a variety of ethnic backgrounds.