Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.

Pablo Picasso

Areas of Exploration 2023 2024

Disciplines Skills Behaviour Traits for Academic Year 2023 2024

Intent
Through experiencing art and design at Baydon pupils will be encouraged to develop an appreciation of the place of art in the world today, and in the past, and be able express thoughts, feelings and their identity through exploring a range of activities during their primary years. Areas of exploration will provide opportunities to learn, hone and refine skills, to develop resilience when products don’t at first match their visions, to inspire. End products the pupils can value and have pride in their creations. Pupils will gain understanding that art can be developed from a range of starting points, from being inspired by others, poetry, music, and the world around them.

Art and Design is taught throughout all year groups. At our school we have chosen to use the scheme of work developed by Access Art for our pupils. The aims and objectives from the National Curriculum through Access Art are covered through our four year rolling long term plan. We have chosen AccessArt to teach art to our pupils as it designed to inspire and enable high quality visual arts teaching and learning. We agree with AccessArt that art is far more than a series of technical skills, and their holistic curriculum nurtures creative thinking skills and helps ensure pupils learn through art, as well as about art.

The AccessArt Primary Art Curriculum is knowledge-rich, and pupils will learn a wide range of skills, developing understanding and showing clear progression. But crucially, the knowledge and understanding pupils will build will go far beyond the technical, factual knowledge many current curriculums focus upon. Our curriculum balances declarative knowledge with experiential knowledge, building self-knowledge and nurturing traits in learners which will hold them in good stead whichever direction their learning takes them.

Pathways

Each term pupils explore art and artists through a pathway focus. These pathways are met each year to embed and further learning, skills and knowledge. The pathways follow a repeated rhythm, providing lots of time to balance repeated practice with new experiences, quiet approaches with active and dynamic activities, time to work alone with collaborative and community based activities… all geared to create energy and momentum throughout the year.

Pathways revisited each year include: Drawing and Sketchbooks; Print, Colour, College; Working in Three Dimensions (visited twice  in a year); Paint, Surface, Texture; and Collaboration & Community. Each time a pathway is visited/revisited it will consist of warm-up (Artists: Activity: Crit/Reflection), artists (Materials: Activity: Crit/Reflection), challenge or Brief (Artist: Activity: Crit/Reflection).

Disciplines

Over the course of studying art during primary school children will have the opportunity to cover a range of disciplines through the pathways, including architecture, collage and assembling, craft, digital media, drawing, fashion, graphic books, graphic design, illustration, installation art. painting, performance art, photography, printmaking, set design, sketchbooks, sculpture and textiles. For information on disciplines covered in the current academic year please view here.

Skills

Skills covered in the scheme are organised under three headings: Making, Ideas & Intention and Articulation & Understanding. During the course of study pupils will cover the following:

Making: Mark making, colour, composition, pattern, light/dark, positive/negative space, texture & relief, shape/form, relationship of 2D/£D, transformation/manipulation, scale, modelling, structure & construction and balance.

Ideas & Intention: working from observation, working from imagination, exploring self expression, exploring though play and working for purpose.

Articulation & Understanding: exploration, conceptual understanding, reflection, note taking & annotation.

For information on what skills are being taught and when please view here.

Behaviours and Traits.

During the course of study behaviours and traits are developed including creative risk taking, being comfortable with not knowing, collaboration, curiosity with’ other’, engagement through imagination & experience, and emotional & visual literacy. For information on behaviours and traits encouraged through the curriculum this year please view here.

Links with Artists

One area in particular that was attractive to our school to adopt the AccessArt materials for use within our school was the inclusion of a diverse wide range of artists, designers and craftspeople from across the world ensuring that pupils at Baydon have the ability to experience the world beyond our village doorstep.

Below is an example of progression in school, with the final products in a recent sculpture topic.

Expanding Horizons (Cultural Capital)

Through art lessons we aim to:

• Embrace the British creative industry and rich heritage
• Creative thinking skills
• Creating children’s cultural referencing through art (society, changing of times)
• Multi-cultural, artists from around the world, global art
• Styles, (abstract)

Art in EYFS

Expressive arts and design educational programme (taken from the EYFS Framework 2024):

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.

Early learning goals that link to art:

EYFS – Expressive arts and design

ELG Creating with materials

• 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.
• Make use of props and materials when role playing characters in narratives and stories.

EYFS – Physical development

ELG Fine motor

• Use a range of small tools, including scissors, paintbrushes and cutlery.

In Robins (reception year)  pupils will:

• Have daily access to a range of media and materials eg different types of paper, varying thickness/hardness of pencils, thick and thin brushes, paint, paint sticks, pastels etc. in continuous provision.
• Are taught different techniques such as drawing, painting, printing, collage, which they can then practise independently through Access Art pathways.
• Explore colour-mixing through our provision