St Augustine's Catholic Primary School

Arts, craft and design embody some of the highest forms of human creativity.  A high quality Art and Design education should engage, inspire and challenge pupils. The purpose of Art and Design education is to give pupils the skills, concepts and knowledge necessary for them to express their responses to ideas and experiences in a visual or tactile form.  It fires their imagination and is a fundamental means of personal expression.  Purposeful Art and Design creates an awareness of how both reflect and shape our history and contribute to the culture, creativity and wealth of our nations. 

Design and Technology prepares children to take part in the development of our rapidly changing world. Creative thinking encourages children to make positive changes to their quality of life. The subject encourages children to become autonomous and creative problem-solvers, both as individuals and as part of a team. It enables them to identify needs and opportunities and to respond by developing ideas and eventually making products and systems.  

Teachers, from Foundation Stage to Year 6, will follow the KAPOW combined Art and Design & Technology long term plan throughout the year. Teachers will ensure full coverage of the National Curriculum, as well as progression of skills and knowledge. Curriculum coverage, prior learning links, future learning links and cross-curriculum links can be seen on the whole school Art and Design & Technology planning overviews.

A variety of teaching and learning styles will be used in Art and Design & Technology lessons. The principal aim is to ensure a broad and balanced curriculum is delivered by developing children’s knowledge, skills and understanding. The curriculum will be differentiated by resources, tasks, responses and outcomes.

As in all other areas of the curriculum, assessment is an integral part of the teaching process. Class teachers should keep records of work carried out by pupils using their sketch books or DT folders. Photographs are a useful tool to keep as a reminder of pupils achievements. Formative assessment is used to guide the progress of individual pupils in Art and Design & Technology. It involves identifying each child’s progress in each aspect of the curriculum, determining what each child has learned and what should therefore be the next step in their learning. Formative assessment is mostly carried out informally by the teachers in the course of their teaching and should be based on the identified assessment opportunities. Children’s progress in Art and Design is reported to parents through the pupil annual report.

The purpose of monitoring and evaluating is to raise the overall quality of teaching and levels of pupil attainment. Art and Design & Technology are monitored by the subject leader throughout the year. The monitoring will include learning walks, lesson observations, scrutiny of knowledge organisers, staff discussions and pupil voice feedback. This information is then used to identify any gaps in knowledge that can be addressed by in school training or external training providers. The subject leader will work with the Headteacher to monitor whether the children are getting access to a wider range of learning opportunities within their lessons.

In addition to our weekly Art/DT lessons, we are always on the look out for opportunities outside of school for our pupils to develop taught skills and apply them in a different context. Here are some of the competitions we have been involved in: