Art & Design

Our Vision

At Bewsey Lodge, we view creativity as an important part of the national curriculum, as it encourages children to work independently, be creative and take risks. Our aim is to develop children who are confident, independent learners who are willing to take risks and explore with many different materials and techniques. We endeavor to provide a positive and nurturing environment that promotes creativity and the freedom to explore and learn through art.

We are passionate that our students are given opportunities to explore their ideas by experimenting, inventing and creating their own varied works of art using a range of materials, where the children learn how to recognise shape and form, make marks, draw, paint, sculpt and explore other art, craft and design techniques throughout their learning journey at Bewsey Lodge. 

Intent

We are passionate about providing a high quality Art education that provides children with the skills and confidence to recognise the importance of art in every aspect of daily life. In our school, we want our children to appreciate how Art has changed the lives of human beings from the creation and designing of clothing and everyday objects as well as to appreciate the creation of physical art for decorative purposes too.

All children are taught about historic and contemporary artists as well as cultural crafts and art techniques. These techniques build on the following areas of art: drawing, painting, digital art, 3D sculpture, collage and textiles.

At our school the children are taught the fundamental areas of art and how to use materials safely and artistically in personal ways.  Our curriculum also encourages children to become independent learners, through researching, investigating and evaluating their artistic experiences. 

Children at Bewsey Lodge School will:

• Demonstrate a love for the Creative Arts and an interest in further study in this area.

• Show a passion to explore the world around them in many different forms.

• Be able to discuss the work and processes of other artists and craftspeople.

• Be able to articulate their understanding of how certain art pieces make them feel

• Demonstrate skills in many different areas such as drawing and painting.

• Work independently to create sustained pieces of artwork which show skill and understanding of the techniques used.

Implementation

At Bewsey Lodge School, Art is taught weekly. Children are able to build on prior knowledge and develop their skills as they progress onto the next class.  In EYFS, art is included within all aspects of their curriculum as it allows for so many learning opportunities in creative hands on approach for our young learners. As with other learning in Reception, children mainly learn art skills through activities linked to their weekly topic sessions such as creating collages with leaves that were collected for a seasons lesson or creating painting of flowers as the children explore how plants grow from seed to flower. These activities help your child to develop important skills such as fine motor skills when holding paintbrushes and tools or cutting with scissors.

We have a very developed approach to teaching the National Curriculum, which has been written and constructed to push the boundaries of the National curriculum above and beyond any expected coverage of art.

When Art is taught, it centers around the main topic of study for each year group per term. For instance, in the Year 3 topic, ‘Would you rather live in the Stone Age or Iron Age?’ the children develop their skills in painting linked to Steven Brown who is a contemporary living artist. The children look at different animals from the Stone Age era and develop drawn studies before transferring their drawing into paintings. they look at primary and secondary colours and further develop their colour skills linking to Browns work using these Stone Age creatures. This not only allows them to explore art but it allows the children to link the historic concept of the animals that living during the Stone Age era. Therefore, their understanding of this period is further enhanced in both history and art.

Likewise, in Year 6 when learning about the Ancient Greeks and the influence they have had on our lives today, the children study Ancient Greek myths –which develops their imagination and writing skills. We then take this area of learning and In art, the children create their own 3 colour overlay prints based on the myth ‘Pandora’s Box’. This allows the children to look at another myth and explore the ideas behind it in an artistic way using images and cultural patterns from the Greek Era.

Where possible, we enhance topics with cultural art experiences through workshops, visits, and educational trips. Past excursions have included a trip to London to where we were able to look at London from different angles and were able to create sketches and pen drawings detailing different building we could see; seeing theatre shows like ‘Lion King’ which display a wealth of creative opportunities through costume and set design; visits to see the Van Gogh experience at Media City and visit to museums and galleries to look at Mayan and Egyptian artefacts.

The loan of artefacts from Warrington Museum further enhance learning, allowing hands-on experiences and an opportunity for children to develop their first hand observational skills by

drawing detailed studies of artefacts linked to Local history during year 5’s topic - Warrington and the War’. This was followed up by looking at one of our great historic artist -Henry Moore- and developed skills in painting linked to the WW2 artefacts loaned from the museum.

Impact

We believe that every child is an artist and each one is unique with how they work and what they produce. Assessment is based on each skill that is the focus per term as well as being able to discuss and communicate what they have produced, researched and how they can evaluate their own work the work of others. Sketchbooks are not written in by the teacher as these sketchbooks belong to the children in a personal manner so we don’t feel it is right to write comments about how the child has expressed themselves creatively as to not squash any artistic creativity as ‘wrong’. That said all constructive feedback is given verbally during lesson time where the child can work 1:1 with their teacher in a more hands on approach.  At the end of each unit, teachers then use this discussions, and the evidence from sketchbooks and lessons, to form a judgement about whether a child is working at the required standard, below or above. An example of these standards can be found in the file below in the ‘‘WHAT ARTISTIC SKILLS WILL MY CHILD BE DEVELOPING ON THEIR JOURNEY AT BEWSEY LODGE?’’  section.

During their time with us, the children are expected to master certain skills in each year group and there is a very clear progression of these skills set out for each year group to refer to. Each skill builds on the previous year and gets more challenging as the children progress into the next year.

For example: In Year 1 a child will begin to draw focusing on basic shape and lines to create patterns linked to the story book ‘‘Aliens in underpants’’. After lots of experimenting with different types of line and shape, using multiple media, the children will then design their own pair of underpants for the fictional alien character they have read about in the popular children’s book.

By Year 6, the children are able to build on their knowledge of shape and form and create realistic observational drawing, which show 3D qualities using various levels of tone and shading including the use of colour blending techniques.

Recent News -

Roots and Reflections: A Journey Through Black British History.

Back in July our year 5 and 6 cohorts took part in a workshop to celebrate Black history month with artist Tina Ramos. Each class created a different style of artwork exploring their response to the works of several artists who were to be celebrated during Black History week. The children’s artwork is now proudly up in an exhibition at Warrington Museum.

If you get chance to visit the exhibition will be on show from 12th Oct 2024 - 5th Jan 2025.

Please help to celebrate this achievement by visiting the gallery to see the marvelous work of our students up on the wall.

Have a look at what we’ve been up to in art across the school!

Art in Gold class:

Art in Silver class

Art in EYFS - Pictures coming soon!

Art in Year 1

Art in year 2

Art in year 3

Art in year 4

Art in year 5

Art in year 6

Who teaches Art at Bewsey Lodge?

Mrs Leach is the Creative Art coordinator at Bewsey Lodge and oversees the curriculum for all classes. She is secondary school trained and brings a wealth of ideas and outstanding subject knowledge, which ensures the children's progression of skills is monitored and challenged in many ways. 

Years 5, 5/6 and 6 are taught art weekly, by our Art Specialist Mrs Leach, whilst EYFS year 1, year 2, year 3 and year 4 are taught by their class teachers.

All our teachers are able to inspire and motivate the children to dream big with their ideas and take risks with new materials and ideas, which is always evident in the children’s sketchbook work.

Keep an eye out for our next installation of artwork around the school which displays and celebrates the children's talents and creative flair. 

Art Champions!

Over the year these students will represent our Creative Art subject and will take part in various projects throughout the year to develop their love and passion for the subject, as well as create opportunities for our whole school community to enjoy as well.  

Our champions will also help to monitor the art curriculum at our school and will be involved in finding out about how the other children are finding their art journey at Bewsey Lodge. 

Our new art champions for 2024-2025 are...

                                                                              COMING SOON!

We encourage student voice and each year and our team of students will take on their role of subject champions and get the opportunity to take part in subject meetings, creative events, artist workshops and fundraising events which promote the creative arts in our school.

Previous Art Champion trips

WE HAVE RECIEVED OUR GOLD AWARD!!

Here at Bewsey lodge we believe in the importance of creativity and being able to encourage individual opportunities via artistic routes. 

Our main focus and drive is to create a curriculum which allows the children to express themselves through many ways.  This passion and drive from both teaching staff and students, has helped us to achieve our recent Gold Arts Mark award. 

Well done to everyone for an amazing achievement!

What artistic skills will me child developing on their journey at Bewsey Lodge?

Below are links, which show the progression targets for each year group from EYFS - Year 6. Take a look to see which skills your child will be learning next.

YR1 Art Tracker mtplan Objectives 1

YR2 Art Tracker mtplan Objectives 1

YR3 Art Tracker mtplan Objectives 1

YR4 Art Tracker mtplan Objectives 1

YR5 Writing Assessment Checklist

Y6 Art Tracker mtplan Objectives 1