Brunswick Street, St. Helens, Merseyside WA9 2JE

01744 678670

Holy Spirit Catholic Primary School

Live, Love, Learn. Together we will soar to new heights.

ART

Our Art subject leader is Mrs Sharon Phillips. 

"Every child is an artist." Pablo Picasso. 

Our Amazing Art Ambassadors. 

Our Art Vision at Holy Spirit

INTENT

At Holy Spirit Primary School, we value art  as a subject, to inspire and develop our children’s creative thinking and to develop their cultural, spiritual and moral understanding. Our Art curriculum delivers a really exciting, rich and forward thinking Visual Arts education.We encourage all our children at Holy Spirit to express their thoughts and emotions in a safe and appropriate way. Creativity and the freedom to be imaginative is embedded in everything we do - the skills which are taught through our Art lessons, support and empower our children to do this.  We know that art stimulates creativity and imagination. It provides visual, tactile and sensory experiences, and a special way of understanding and responding to the world. It enables children to communicate what they see, feel and think, by using; colour, texture, form, pattern and different materials and processes. Our lessons offer the chance for children to develop their emotional expression through art to further enhance their personal, social and emotional development. We teach our children to be reflective of their work and respectful of others. We enhance our Art curriculum further by inviting local artists and working with a range of practitioners to lead year group workshops which offer our children different opportunities to explore the Arts in a variety of contexts. 

IMPLEMENTATION

In Early Years, the children explore and use a variety of media and materials through a combination of child initiated and adult directed activities. They have opportunities to learn to: explore the textures, movement, feel and look of different media and materials; respond to a range of media and materials, develop their understanding of them in order to manipulate and create different effects; use different media and materials to express their own ideas; explore colour and use for a particular purpose; develop skills to use simple tools and techniques competently and appropriately and select appropriate media and techniques and adapt their work where necessary. During Key Stage 1, Art is about expanding children’s creativity and imagination through providing art and craft and activities relating to the children’s own identity and experiences, to natural and manufactured objects and materials with which they are familiar, and the locality in which they live. Children will explore the visual, tactile and sensory qualities of materials and processes and begin to understand and use colour, shape and space, pattern and texture, to represent their own ideas and feelings. Through our curriculum, children will focus on the work of artists, craftspeople, other cultures, and sculptors and designers by asking and answering questions, such as: ‘What is it like?’ In Key Stage 2, the children are taught to develop their techniques, including their control and their use of materials, with creativity, experimentation and an increasing awareness of different kinds of art, craft and design. They develop their sketch books to record their observations and use them to review and revisit ideas. They improve their mastery of art and design techniques, including drawing, painting and sculpture with a range of materials (for example, pencil, charcoal, paint, clay). They learn about great artists, architects and designer both in history and in modern day.

IMPACT

By following the National Curriculum expectations, progression through subjects will be evident in the children’s sketch books and through teacher assessment using the skills progression documents for each year group. Our children’s sketch books show a clear journey in skills assimilation from inspiration through to design, skill development and evaluation. The scheme of work we follow,  is designed around the idea that Art is far more than a series of technical skills, our holistic curriculum nurtures creative thinking skills and helps ensure our children learn through Art as well as about Art. We aim to ensure that the children know and remember more, by revisiting skills/ideas and concepts throughout the year and ensure learning is built upon year on year.

Curriculum-Roadmap Art - Access Art Curriculum.pptx

Progression in Art Year 1.docx

Progression in Art Year 2.docx

Progression in Art Year 3.docx

Progression in Art Year 4.docx

Progression in Art Year 5.docx

Progression in Art Year 6.docx

Y1-Y6 Art Long Term Plan .docx

Look at our wonderful Sketch Books!

Our Art Ambassadors were proud to talk about and show the work that they have completed in Autumn 1 following the Access Art Pathways.

Watch our movie to see some of the wonderful work the children have been doing.

Art and design in collaboration with Billy Colours and Heart of Glass

Recently, our school have been working in collaboration with Heart of Glass and artists Cathy Cross and Billy Colours on a mural project which will be painted on the wall on the roundabout by the Horseshoe Pub. Cathy Cross spent a week working with every class in the school creating some amazing pieces of art using floristry wire and coloured paper, light and our children's amazing imaginations.

Take a look at the pieces the children created which will form the basis of the mural that Billy Colours is going to paint.

Celebrating our learning...

Look at the amazing work we have completed in Autumn 1, from Nursery through to Year 6. We have sculptures, mark-making, cave art, typography, leaf art, spirals, self-portraits, continuous line drawing. 

Look at our wonderful Art Gallery!

We have completed our second Pathway of the year, using Access Art - this is well embedded in our school and you can clearly see the progression of skills through each year group

Sketch Books

The national curriculum states, "Pupils in Key Stage 2 should be taught: “to create sketch books to record their observations and use them to review and revisit ideas.” Here at Holy Spirit, we have included pupils from Key Stage 1 who are also using sketch books as part of their learning journey. We are developing the use of the sketch book, not only in art lessons but throughout the curriculum and our children are enjoying the freedom to  express, create, develop and learn, often with limited guidance from the teacher. Each piece starts a journey in our sketch books from a point of inspiration, whether it be a famous artist's picture or painting or a piece of writing. We gather ideas, experimenting with different forms, texture, colour and media, building up to a final piece. 

Year 6 Spring Pathway - Print and Activism.

In this pathway, the children were introduced to the idea that they can use art as a way of sharing their passions and interests with their peers and community. We started by introducing the children to different artists who are activists, in particular Kate DeCiccio, and then the children completed an activity to identify and voice the things they care about as individuals. The children then used collage to cover a canvas before making their own letter blocks to print in relief on their canvases. They turned out beautifully!