The RAPS Report (2025)

'Arts-rich primary schools are highly diverse. There is no one way to be arts-rich. However, there are patterns across the schools that can inform other schools and the school system more generally.....

Commitment to the expressive arts does not come at the expense of other subject learning. The majority of the arts-rich schools we studied did at least as well as, if not better, than equivalent schools and schools in their local authority. Children’s success across the full range of subjects was recognised in their inspection ratings.'

Ofsted's Research Review Series: Art & Design (2023) describes '3 domains of knowledge':

• ‘practical knowledge’, which is about developing technical proficiency

• ‘theoretical knowledge’, which is the cultural and contextual content that pupils learn about artists and artwork

• ‘disciplinary knowledge’, which is what pupils learn about how art is studied, discussed and judged

Also, drawing on research from Lindström, published in the International Journal of Art & Design Education 2012, it explains the pedagogical importance of both 'convergent and divergent goals'. 

'While the knowledge that pupils need to learn must be clear, what they do with that knowledge may be unexpected, unpredictable or unanticipated'.