GLF Schools

GLF Schools

GLF Schools was founded in 2012 in order to enable the federation of Glyn School (an academy in 2011) and Danetree Junior School. Together, we began our journey to become a MAT of more than 1000 talented staff working with over 10,000 children in 40 schools across 5 regions in southern England.

Our Schools

Banbury Region

Banstead Region

Berkshire & Hampshire Region

Caterham Region

Crawley Region

Didcot Region

Epsom Region

London Boroughs

Redhill Region

Sunbury & Camberley Region

Art and DT

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“Every child is an artist.  The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” - Pablo Picasso

Subject Overview

At Cordwalles Junior School, we recognise that Art and Design Technology has the capability to include every child through creativity and imagination.  It enables children to understand the world through visual, tactile and sensory experiences.

Curriculum Intent

At Cordwalles Junior School, the curriculum is designed to allow the children to be the best that they can be in an inclusive, happy and safe environment in which the school community encourages pupils’ confidence to grow.  A quality art and design education should engage, excite, and challenge students, providing them the knowledge and skills they need to experiment, invent, and create their own works of art and design.  As pupils progress through KS2, they should be able to think critically and build a coherent understanding of art and design.  They should also understand how art and design reflect and shape our history, as well as contribute to our country's culture and creativity.

Curriculum Implementation

The Art and Design curriculum at Cordwalles Junior School is based upon the 2014 Primary National Curriculum in England, which provides a broad framework and outlines the knowledge and skills and taught in Key Stage 2.  Teachers plan lessons for their class using our progression of knowledge and skills documents.  The progression document ensures the curriculum is covered and the skills/knowledge taught is progressive from one year group to the next.

We have introduced a new curriculum for Art and DT, taught in half termly units.  Each year group will explore a half termly unit of: 

  • Form

  • Printing

  • Painting

  • Drawing

  • Food Technology

  • Design

Curriculum Impact

Long Term Curriculum Overview 2021-2022

The sequence of lessons is structured upon the following: researching existing art/artists, building upon skills, planning, creating artwork/making designs and evaluating their progress. 

Assessment:

  • Teachers will allow children to discuss their thoughts and opinions freely and openly.  This will allow teachers to have an insight into the child’s understanding of artwork.

  • Teachers will provide formative feedback verbally within lessons, especially during discussions within inputs. 

  • Teachers will assess children’s work at the end of each unit, looking at the entire unit as a whole.  Teachers will answer questions such as ‘Has the pupil followed their design accurately?  Have they made amendments when necessary? Have they analysed their finished product for pros and cons?’

Curriculum Implementation

Within Art and Design, we strive to create a supportive and collaborative ethos for learning by providing investigative and enquiry based learning opportunities.  Emphasis is placed on investigative learning opportunities to help children gain a coherent knowledge of understanding of each unit of work covered throughout the school.

Our Art and Design curriculum is high quality, well thought out and is planned to demonstrate progression.  We focus on progression of knowledge and skills and discreet vocabulary progression also form part of the units of work.  We measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods: 

  • Assessing children’s understanding of topic linked vocabulary before and after the unit is taught.

  • Summative assessment of pupil discussions about their learning.

  • Images and videos of the children’s practical learning, uploaded onto Seesaw.

  • Interviewing the pupils about their learning (pupil voice).

  • Moderation staff meetings where pupil’s books are scrutinised and there is the opportunity for a dialogue between teachers to understand their class’s work. 

  • Annual reporting of standards across the curriculum.

  • Marking of written work in books.

What a 'typical' lesson looks like:

Research Lessons:

Exploring various artists and artworks from around the world which is linked to the current topic, for example, in Year 4 children will study Barbara Hepworth in their ‘form’ topic.  Children will have the opportunity to discuss artwork freely and give opinions on existing pieces.  Lessons include introducing new tier 2 and 3 vocabulary within each lesson, with the opportunity to discuss and give context to such vocabulary.

Skills Lessons:

Within these lessons children will explore and refine a specific skill or technique which is required for their final piece.  Children may be required to sketch a facial feature as part of their portraits unit, create an engraving as part of their clay pots unit or explore making strong shapes in their bridges unit.  For these lessons, children will receive high quality input and feedback from the class teacher, ensuring that they have the fundamental knowledge to guide them in their sequence of learning.

Planning Lessons:

Whilst planning lessons within DT are more structured to provide the children with a clear plan for their next lesson, art lessons may follow a more flexible approach.  Within DT, the planning lesson preceding the ‘making’ lesson typically involves opportunity for the child to design the look of their piece, instructions on how they will make it and an insight into how it will work.

Making/Creating Lessons:

Children will often have 2 lessons to create a piece of work that combines everything that they have learnt in the unit.  Children will use many of the facilities and resources we have to offer to create their piece.

Evaluation Lessons:

Within these lessons, children will have the opportunity to look upon their work and evaluate what has gone well and what they might change.  This is an important lesson as it helps them develop resilience within Art/DT.  The children will answer questions such as:

  • What has gone well?  Why did it work well?
  • What has not gone to plan?  Why not? 
  • What would you change about your design?  What would you change about the process you took?  What steps might you do differently next time? 
  • What are you proud of yourself for achieving?

Thus, children are able to take a balanced approach to their work and they build upon a resilient mindset.  

Teaching & Learning

SEND

At Cordwalles, teaching staff will adapt lessons to suit the needs of every SEND child.  Teachers will anticipate any barriers that may limit the learning of their pupils and plan accordingly.  In some activities, children with SEND will be able to partake in the same way as their peers.  In other activities, children with SEND may be given a parallel activity working towards the same lesson objective, or they may be given the tools and support so they can fully take part and learn.

Home Learning

Lockdown

In the circumstance where students are expected to learn from home, teachers will provide art lessons once a week.  These art lessons will be accessible from home and will give alternative activities to an otherwise resource heavy subject.  Children will likely learn about different artists around the world, examples of the lessons taught from home are as follows:

  • Drawing upside down, inspired by the work of Michelangelo
  • Creating a hat design, practical or drawing, inspired by Coco Chanel
  • Sketching broken buildings, inspired by the work of Anselm Keifer

Homework

Once a half term, children are set 'Take Home Tasks' inspired by their history and geography curriculum.  Children have the opportunity to create Art and DT projects which explore these topics, which is a fantastic opportunity for cross curricular practise.