Art

Our subject lead for Art is Mrs Boud

Intent

At Marden Vale Primary Academy, we value Art and Design as an important part of the children’s entitlement to a broad and balanced curriculum.

We strongly believe that Art and Design embodies some of the highest forms of human creativity and helps to develop a pupil's imagination, confidence and their ability to express their thoughts and feelings. Children learn to reflect, to develop their own ideas and opinions; to articulate and critically discuss work in a supportive and respectful way. They learn to work independently, to collaborate; to experiment and take risks; to innovate and problem solve.

Art and Design involves learning a wide range of conceptual, social and practical transferrable skills. We believe at Marden Vale that Art and Design education should engage, inspire, support and challenge pupils; equipping them with the knowledge and skills. As pupils progress, they should be able to think critically and develop a more rigorous understanding of Art and Design. They should also know how Art and Design both reflect and shape our history, and contribute to the culture, creativity and wealth of our nation.

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.
• to know about great artists, craft makers and designers, and understand the historical and cultural development of their art forms.

At Marden Vale, the Art Curriculum will enable children to think critically and express themselves creatively.

Our Art Curriculum centres around 5 principles:

• making,
• generating ideas,
• formal elements,
•  knowledge of artists,
• evaluating work. 

These 5 principles will develop children’s art and design skills by exploring different media and developing their skills though painting, drawing, printing and 2D and 3D work including learning about the formal elements of art such as colour, pattern, form, texture and tone, etc. They will take inspiration from exploring the work of a diverse range of artists and crafts people and children will develop an understanding of different cultural heritages. This in turn will broaden their knowledge of artists and their techniques and foster their appreciation of art throughout the world and history. Children will be encouraged to take risks and experiment with the creative process and, through reflecting on ideas and evaluating their own and the work of others, they will further develop their understanding and critical abilities.

Implementation

Early Years

During the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), children will be given the opportunity to explore colour, texture, shape and form in two and three dimensions. The children will have access to a wide range of constructions, collage, painting and drawing activities, using appropriate tools and art materials.

The Early Years outcomes for Art and Design are taken from the following area of learning: Expressive Arts and Design.

During the Early Years Foudation Stage, at Marden Vale, children will learn to:

• safely use and explore a variety of materials, tools and techniques, experimenting with colour, design, texture, form and function;
• use what they have learnt about media and materials in original ways, thinking about uses and purposes; and
• represent their own ideas, thoughts and feelings through design and technology, art, music, dance, role play and stories.

KS1, KS2

At Marden Vale, we ensure that art and design is given the same importance as the core subjects, as we feel this is important in enabling all children to gain ‘real-life’ experiences.

The children are taught Art in discrete lessons that build on previous learning. There are cross curricular links to topics where appropriate to maximise learning potential and allow children to make links between different areas of their learning. Areas covered include sculpture, mixed media, collage, printing, clay work, recreating artists’ styles, exploring art with a message, painting, graffiti and the works of different artists.

The Art and Design Curriculum at Marden Vale is based upon the 2014 Primary National Curriculum in England, which provides a broad framework and outlines the knowledge and skills taught in each Key Stage. Teachers plan lessons for their class using our Art Curriculum, progression of knowledge and skills document (written by Art Subject Leads from DSAT Primary Schools). Teachers, under the guidance of the Art leader, use this document to plan their art and design lessons suitable to their classes’ interests. Children showing extensive aptitude in art and design will be celebrated in celebration assemblies, class assemblies which parents attend. For our annual Art week, the Art subject leader plans fun, engaging art and design activities for the children (whole school project) to complete; pupils may also have their work displayed in school and may win competitions that we take part in (eg. Calne in Bloom).  

Educational visits are another opportunity for the teachers to plan for additional art and design learning outside the classroom. Children can visit local art museums and have visitors into school to share learning and have hands on experiences. 

Alongside our curriculum provision for art and design, we also provide all pupils with the opportunity to participate in art based after school clubs and art and design class treat activities. 

Impact

Our Art curriculum is high quality, well thought out and is planned to demonstrate progression. In addition, we measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

• making observations of the children working during lessons
• at the end of each unit, teachers will carry out assessment linked to our progression of knowledge and skills document

• reflection on standards achieved against the planned outcomes;
• a celebration of learning for each term which demonstrates progression across the school;
• pupil discussions about their learning; which includes discussion of their thoughts, ideas, processing and evaluations of work.

We ensure that children are equipped with art and design skills and knowledge that will enable them to be ready for the curriculum at Key Stage 3 and for life as an adult in the wider world. We want the children to have thoroughly enjoyed learning about art and design, therefore, encouraging them to undertake new life experiences now and in the future.