Art and Design

Art and Design at St Louis Catholic Primary School

Intent (the knowledge and skills that pupils will gain at each stage through the curriculum)

It is our intent that all pupils leave St Louis being able to confidently create pieces of artwork and sculpture that share ideas and experiences. All children will be provided with opportunities to develop their drawing, painting and sculpture skills. We expect all children to have an understanding of the formal elements of art: colour, form, line, pattern, shape, texture and tone. As it states in the National Curriculum, 2014, “A high-quality art and design education should engage, inspire and challenge pupils, equipping them with the knowledge and skills to experiment, invent and create their own works of art, craft and design.”

We use a range of artists within our curriculum to inspire the children’s artwork. We develop skills alongside our knowledge of artists and use sketchbooks to show our progression of skills throughout the school. We encourage our children to evaluate and analyse their artwork in relation to other artists and pupils.

There are four main strands that run throughout our art curriculum. These are: making skills, formal elements (line, shape, tone, texture, pattern and colour), knowledge of artists and evaluating. Throughout Kapow’s Art and design scheme of work, these strands are revisited in every unit. In the Art and design skills and Formal elements of art units, our pupils have the opportunities to learn and practise skills discretely. The knowledge and skills from these units are then applied throughout other units in the school. Key skills are revisited again and again with increasing complexity in a spiral curriculum model. This allows pupils to revise and build on their previous learning.  

We have high ambitions for all pupils. For pupils with SEND, art and design enables children to communicate their ideas, observations and creations. The children will be supported with new concepts and skills whilst giving them the freedom to express their own ideas.

EYFS: Building Good Habits

Pupils in EYFS will be given opportunities to share their ideas through mark making. The children will develop their understanding that marks have a meaning and will be exposed to a range of different mark making materials, such as pencils, crayons, paint and chalk. The children will begin to develop their understanding of different types of lines, for example, thick, thin, wavy and straight. The children will explore, use and refine a variety of artistic effects to express their ideas and feelings whilst exploring colour and colour mixing. The children will begin with being able to name colours and will progress onto being able to experiment with mixing colours, including identifying primary colours and mixing them together to make secondary colours. They will develop their fine motor skills so that they can use a range of tools competently, safely and confidently and develop their drawing skills to be able to draw with increasing complexity and detail.

KS1: Journey of Discovery

Pupils in KS1 will build on their knowledge of mark making. Pupils will begin to use sketchbooks as a way of recording their ideas and the development of a range of different concepts. The children will explore drawing and painting as well as creating craft and design materials. Whilst exploring drawing, painting and craft projects, the children will begin to develop the formal elements of art. The children will develop their knowledge of colours by learning about primary and secondary colours as well as beginning to create shades of colours using black and white paint. The children will begin to develop their knowledge of form by learning about sculptures and they will begin to draw lines for a purpose and develop their confidence throughout. The children will begin to explore patterns, both repeating and non-repeating patterns, using natural and man-made resources. The children will begin to explore the purpose of shape within artwork, identifying and describing a variety of shapes within works of art. The children will begin to explore texture by using different materials to show what parts may feel like as well as recording textures through rubbings. Pupils will use a range of materials to begin to explore tone within art. Throughout the pupils journey of discovery, the children will meet a range of artists, such as; Vincent Van Gogh, Louise Bourgeois, Damien Hirst, Edwina Bridgeman, David Hockney and Jasper Johns.

KS2: Broadening Horizons

Pupils in KS2 will delve deeper into their knowledge of the key concepts of art. The children will use their observation skills to develop their drawing, using what they can see to inform what their drawing is. The children will begin to develop more control with their painting and will make more informed choices about the artwork that they create and the resources that they use, such as the different thicknesses of paintbrush and the brush strokes that they make. The children will further develop their knowledge of colours by mixing more complex colours, matching colours more closely to objects and using colours to show emotions and feelings. The pupils will delve deeper into their understanding of sculptures and art in 3D forms, looking closely at how artists create 3D models. The children will delve deeper into their knowledge of line by looking at how artists create expression and shapes through lines. The children will continue their knowledge of patterns, looking at how and why patterns are formed and how patterns can express feelings and emotions. The children will further develop their understanding of texture by using different materials to create more complex textures. The children will continue to use sketchbooks in KS2, however, the children will now use sketchbooks as a way of recording their ideas, processes and amendments. Sketchbooks will be used as a safe place for the children to explore new techniques and ideas as well as fine tune and further develop concepts that they already have.

Implementation (how the curriculum developed or adopted by the school is taught and assessed in order to support pupils to build their knowledge and to apply that knowledge as skills)

At St Louis we follow the scheme Kapow to support our teaching of the art curriculum.

The units covered by each year group have been carefully selected to enable the pupils to develop a broad range of knowledge and skills. Where appropriate, units and lessons have been adapted to form cross-curricular links with other areas of our curriculum, for example, art units and lessons that link to historical periods studied within our history curriculum. All year groups teach at least one art unit per term, either through weekly lessons or as a complete unit, allowing teachers and pupils to come off of timetable to complete each lesson of the unit within a short period of time.

The progress the children make with their skills is documented within their sketchbooks and their progress with their factual knowledge is documented within the beginning and end of unit quizzes. Each unit begins with a quiz to enable the teachers to gain an understanding of the children’s prior knowledge. The same quiz is then implemented at the end of the unit to see the progress that each of the children has made in their factual knowledge of artists, skills and vocabulary.

Prior to lessons, our teachers have the opportunity to watch teacher videos recorded by specialists to support their delivery of the art national curriculum. Kapow primary supports teachers in our school who may lack confidence in their own artistic abilities. Each unit of lessons includes multiple teacher videos to develop subject knowledge and support ongoing CPD. Kapow primary helps teachers to feel supported in delivering lessons of a high standard that ensure pupil progression. Differentiated guidance is available for every lesson to ensure that lessons can be accessed and enjoyed by all pupils and opportunities to stretch pupils’ learning are available when required. Supporting our teachers in the delivery of the curriculum enables our students to make good progress towards achieving the national curriculum objectives.

All art lessons begin with a quiz using knowledge organisers. We use knowledge organisers as a way of enhancing pupils’ understanding of each topic. Using knowledge organisers for each unit supports pupils in building a foundation of factual knowledge by encouraging the recall of key facts and vocabulary, including information about key artists, movements and styles. Within each lesson, the children will follow the Kapow stages of attention grabber, main event and wrapping up to guide their journey throughout the lesson. Our art lessons are always practical in nature and encourage experimental and exploratory learning with all pupils using sketchbooks to document their ideas. Pupils have the opportunity to develop their skills practically either within the classroom or our art room, giving children access to a range of resources needed to create and develop their artwork.

Throughout their lessons, the children will have the opportunity to use a mixture of teacher input and videos to gain understanding of a range of concepts and skills. The Kapow pupil videos have been created by subject specialists to help pupils to see art techniques modelled by experts, to ensure that the delivery of Art in our school is of the highest quality. Pupils take pride in their artwork and enjoy seeing their hard work displayed throughout the corridors across the school.

Outside of art lessons, the children have the opportunity to develop and apply their skills in other contexts. The children have the opportunity to develop their artistic skills and knowledge of different artists during celebration days, such as the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee 2022 and King Charles III Coronation Day 2023. Lessons in other aspects of our curriculum use art as a means to record the children’s ideas. For example, creating paintings in RE and collages within history lessons. In addition, the children enjoy using our art resources at various times throughout the year for example, when they create cards for their families.

Impact (the outcomes that pupils achieve as a result of the education they have received)

Lesson visits show the learning that is taking place. Pupils’ will be able to answer questions based on their knowledge organisers and they will be able to talk about their prior learning. As the pupils’ progress through the school, the pupils will become increasingly confident in talking about how they have developed their skills and will be able to apply both old (in previous units and year groups) and new skills (developed in their current unit) to their artwork.

By taking part in regular discussions, evaluations and decision-making processes within their art lessons, the children will not only know facts and key information about art, but they will be able to talk confidently about their own learning journey and have a growing understanding of how to improve. The pupils will be able to talk confidently to an adult about what they have learnt in their art lessons. They will begin to use art specific vocabulary where appropriate and will be able to talk about the skills that they have developed and used in their lessons.

The work in the children’s sketchbooks should reflect the children’s journey throughout a unit. The sketchbooks will show the development of the knowledge and skills of the children throughout the unit, and from year group to year group, demonstrating progress, a deepening knowledge and a development of skills over time. Unit quizzes should show an increase in accuracy at the end of the unit compared to the beginning, as the pupils will be able to use their knowledge and skills that they have built up throughout the unit to help them to answer the questions.