The Art & Design Curriculum at West Jesmond
Curiosity, Confidence, Creativity and Community
“Creativity takes courage.” – Henri Matisse
Art & Design Curriculum Aims
At West Jesmond Primary School, we believe that our Art & Design curriculum should engage and inspire all of our children – thus becoming the start of a life-long relationship with Art & Design! Through building a positive relationship with Art & Design we believe that all children will succeed in the subject regardless of potential barriers to learning and previous experiences of the subject. Throughout their time at WJPS, our children will develop their cultural capital, as they learn about a range of contemporary and classical artists that reflect the culturally diverse demographic of our children and families. We take inspiration from our community and the places, people and times we are studying to find out about the art they produced and to study some of the skills and techniques they used.
Our programme of study focuses on the carefully sequenced acquisition of explicit and tacit knowledge. By being able to think and speak critically about their artwork, and of that of others, children at WJPS will become creative, confident, risk-taking and authentic artists.
Implementation
Our unit design consists of Research and Appreciate, Experiment and Create & Evaluate. Every year, our children will progressively learn explicit skills in the National Curriculum’s statutory art forms of drawing, colour and sculpture. Children at WJPS will also specialise in collage and printing (of the other non-statutory art forms suggested in the National Curriculum). We revisit each of these additional art skills in alternate year groups to allow for adequate time to be spent developing specialist skills.
There are also artistic opportunities throughout the school year through extra-curricular art clubs, gallery visits, whole school study weeks, art competitions and school displays, to develop skills and encourage a love of art and creativity. In Art & Design we build up our children’s sense of community through seizing every opportunity to find out about and to see examples of art and the work of artists in our region and beyond.
What you will see in a West Jesmond Art & Design Lesson
- Engaging and inspiring lessons that promote creativity and curiosity.
- Children are given the opportunity to practise skills in a variety of ways with each lesson building upon prior learning.
- High quality instruction and questioning: Supported by our Art & Design Leader, teachers provide carefully planned sequenced lessons and modelling of art skills and techniques that build on children’s knowledge and skills.
- Achievement and Inclusion for all: All activities are planned, scaffolded and adapted where needed to ensure every child at West Jesmond can achieve highly in Art & Design. This may include adapted resources, adult support and awareness of physical/sensory needs.
- Frequent opportunities for children to discuss and review their learning.
- Retrieval of previous learning and explicit links that connect new learning with what the children know.
- An emphasis on correct and ambitious vocabulary
- High quality verbal feedback during lessons in line with the Art & Design Skill Progression document.
- At WJPS, we are passionate that children should take ownership of their sketchbooks – using them as an artist would. Only children write in these books and teachers support through verbal feedback
Impact: Progress in our curriculum is measured by children knowing more and remembering more.
The impact of our teaching in Art & Design is measured using formative assessments throughout the year, based on progress towards the objectives of the National curriculum and the Year Group skills and knowledge set out in the West Jesmond Art & Design Skills Progression Document. Our Art & Design Leader monitors progress for all children through our West Jesmond Deep Dives. If we are meeting our aims, all of our children will be able to talk passionately and knowledgably about art and demonstrate their progression through their sketchbooks and will see themselves as artists.