Art

Art gives all children the ability to express themselves, to be creative and to use their imagination.

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Intent

At West Cliff School we aim to provide children with art and design experiences which are creative, enjoyable, challenging and confidence-building, based on the central activities of generating and developing ideas, making and evaluating.

 The aims of the Art curriculum at West Cliff Primary School are to enable pupils to: 

• be taught within the requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage and National Curriculum and beyond. 
• realise their full potential in an individual, creative and imaginative way and to value their own capacity for producing a range of art and design  
• understand and communicate ideas and feelings through the language of art and design
• develop aesthetic awareness and the ability to make informed critical judgements;
• understand cultural diversity and appreciate different values and traditions. 
• gain enjoyment from participation in and appreciation of art and design within school, the local environment and the wider community. 

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Implementation

In EYFS, Expressive arts and design  is one of the seven areas of the early years foundation stage and is used to develop a child's imagination, creativity and their ability to use media and materials. Children do this in range of ways including playing with colours, textures and design. All these approaches to expressive arts help children to represent and understand their own feelings and ideas. In our EYFS provision children have access to high quality materials during free flow activities. and their curiosities and interests are developed through focussed intervention.

In KS1 and KS2 our art and design curriculum covers the National Curriculum and beyond, focussing on the progressively developing skills of generating and developing ideas, making, gaining knowledge and evaluating.

Our art and design curriculum is arranged so that the skills of drawing, painting, printing, textiles, sculpture, collage and digital art are taught progressively to every year group. Pupils learn about a range of artists and art forms - modern, traditional and from a range of cultures. One unit of art is delivered per term.

Each child produces a sketchbook. Lessons focus on exploration and experimentation, skill and knowledge development, evaluation of the work of others as well as themselves, cultural contexts and imagination and creativity. Each teaching unit leads to a completed piece of work; this may be individual or collaborative in a range of scales. 

Creative risks, mistakes and mess are encouraged!

In recent years, our rich art curriculum has been supplemented and enriched by a wide variety of community groups, professional artists and organisations. Several artists and groups have been involved, providing workshops and specialist teaching. Pupils have participated in cultural events featuring the arts such as Musicport, Whitby Christmas Festival and Krampus Run. In 2023, children and parents worked collaboratively to produce a huge piece of art, linking our love of art with our beach school curriculum, as well as fundraising for the school.