We are Artists

Our art vision

Art lessons at St Mary’s provide children with the opportunity to work in ways that differ from other subjects. We provide a high quality art and design curriculum that engages, inspires and challenges children, equipping them with the skills to experiment, invent, develop their own works of art.

Our Art Curriculum

At St Mary's, we follow the National Curriculum art and design programme of study and we use the Kapow scheme of work. Children enjoy having art lessons in our purpose built art room.

The art and design curriculum at St Mary's is ambitious in the range of skills and techniques delivered. Children learn about famous artists and develop the vocabulary to talk about and critique their own as well as other's artwork, techniques and styles. Lessons develop critical thinking and a deeper understanding of the subject.

Due to the spiral nature of the curriculum, children revisit artists, skills and techniques enabling them to hold on to their knowledge and let their light shine.

Art in the Early Years

The Art curriculum at St Mary's begins with the crucial Foundation Stage. Here, children are encouraged to be creative in many ways. Children have free access to a wide range of resources to create and make as they wish. Children also have art sessions where they learn the basics of becoming an artist.

Drawing: Marvellous marks

Exploring mark making through different drawing materials. Beginning to draw from observation using faces and self-portraits as a stimulus.

Painting and mixed media: Paint my world

Exploring paint and painting techniques through nature, music and collaborative work. Developing creativity through child-led exploration of mixed-media, making collages and transient art.

Sculpture and 3D: Creation station

Exploring the sculptural qualities of malleable materials and natural objects; developing the use of tools and joining techniques; designing and making clay animal sculptures.

Craft and design: Let's get crafty

Developing cutting, threading, joining and folding skills through fun, creative craft projects.

Seasonal crafts

A craft for each season, including Easter and Christmas.

Art in KS1 & 2

Art lessons at St Mary's are fun, engaging and inspiring. We follow a progressive scheme of learning that ensures children are introduced to a range of artists, processes and media.

Within sessions, children are invited to explore and be more practical, spending more time on their artistic skills.

Our lessons follow a four part structure:

1) Recap and recall: here children are asked questions and given time for discussion around previous learning that will inform the lesson. We also revisit our knowledge organisers and look at any key vocabulary.

2) Attention grabber: here the children are introduced to a particular artist, method, era or media. At this point children are invited to ask questions and become an 'Art Critic' and share our opinions using our key vocabulary.

3) Main event: This part is the practical element where we use inspiration from our attention grabber to learn a new skill, practise and create our artworks.

4) Wrapping up: This part gives us the opportunity to reflect on our own and each other's practise and evaluate as well as discuss some of the bigger questions surrounding art.

Year 1 Art

Drawing: Make your mark

Exploring mark making and line; working and experimenting with different materials through observational and collaborative pieces.

Painting and mixed media: Colour splash

Exploring colour mixing through paint play, using a range of tools to paint on different surfaces and creating paintings inspired by Clarice Cliff and Jasper Johns.

Sculpture and 3D: Paper play

Creating simple three dimensional shapes and structures using familiar materials, children develop skills in manipulating paper and card. They fold, roll and scrunch materials to make their own sculptures.

Craft and design: Woven wonders

Learning fibre art skills such as plaiting, threading, knotting and weaving to create three-dimensional woven artworks inspired by artist Cecilia Vicuña

year 2 art

Drawing: Tell a story

Using storybook illustration as a stimulus, children develop their mark-making to explore a wider range of tools and experiment with creating texture to add detail to drawings.

Painting and mixed media: Life in colour

Developing colour mixing skills, learning about the work of artist Romare Bearden and creating textured papers using paint, children compose collages inspired by their exploration of colour and texture in the world around them.

Sculpture and 3D: Clay houses

Exploring the way clay can be shaped and joined, children learn a range of essential skills for working with this medium. They learn about the sculpture of Rachel Whiteread and create their own clay house tile in response.

Craft and design: Map it out

Responding to a design brief, children learn three techniques for working creatively with materials and at the end of the project, evaluate their design ideas.

year 3 art

Drawing: Growing artists

Developing an understanding of shading and drawing techniques to create botanical inspired drawings.

Painting and mixed media: Prehistoric painting

Discovering how and why our ancient ancestors made art, experimenting with natural materials to make homemade paints and playing with scale to paint on a range of surfaces.

Sculpture and 3D: Abstract shape and space

Exploring how shapes and negative spaces can be represented by three dimensional forms. Manipulating a range of materials, children learn ways to join and create free-standing structures inspired by the work of Anthony Caro.

Craft and design: Ancient Egyptian scrolls

Developing design and craft skills taking inspiration from Ancient Egyptian art and pattern and paper making.

year 4 art

Drawing: Power prints

Using mechanical engravings as a starting point, pupils develop an awareness of proportion, composition and pattern in drawing and combine media for effect when developing a drawing into a print.

Painting and mixed media: Light and dark

Developing skills in colour mixing, focussing on using tints and shades to create a 3D effect. Experimenting with composition and applying painting techniques to a personal still life piece.

Sculpture and 3D: Mega materials

Exploring how different materials can be shaped and joined and learning about techniques used by artists as diverse as Barbara Hepworth and Sokari Douglas-Camp, children create their own sculptures.

Craft and design: Fabric of nature

Using the flora and fauna of tropical rainforests as a starting point, children develop drawings through experimentation and textile-based techniques to design a repeating pattern suitable for fabric.

year 5 art

Drawing: I need space

Exploring the purpose and impact of images from the ‘Space race’ era of the 1950s and 60s; developing independence and decision-making using open-ended and experimental processes; combining drawing and collagraph printmaking to create a futuristic image.

Painting and mixed media: Portraits

Investigating self-portraits by a range of artists, children use photographs of themselves as a starting point for developing their own unique self-portraits in mixed-media.

Sculpture and 3D: Interactive installation

Learning about the features of installation art and how it can communicate a message; exploring the work of Cai Guo-Qiang and discovering how our life experiences can inspire our art; investigating how scale, location and interactive elements affect the way visitors experience installation art.

Craft and design: Architecture

Investigating the built environment through drawing and printmaking, learning about the work of architect Zaha Hadid, creatively presenting research on artist Hundertwasser and exploring the symbolism of monument design.

year 6 art

Drawing: Make my voice heard

From the Ancient Maya to modern-day street art, children look at how artists convey a message. Exploring imagery, symbols, expressive mark making, and ‘chiaroscuro’ children consider audience and impact to create powerful drawings to make their voices heard.

Painting and mixed media: Artist study

Exploring a selection of paintings through art appreciation activities. Collecting ideas in sketchbooks and planning for a final piece after researching the life, techniques and artistic intentions of an artist that interests them.

Sculpture and 3D: Making memories

Creating a personal memory box using a collection of found objects and hand-sculptured forms, reflecting primary school life with symbolic and personal meaning.

Craft and design: Photo opportunity

Developing photography skills and techniques to design a range of creative photographic outcomes.