The purpose of study for Art, Craft and Design is to inspire and challenge students in the creative process. It is designed to cover the National Curriculum over the three years of study. Our aim is to allow our students to experience a broad range of skills, processes and techniques to discover what kind of artist they want to be. The curriculum allows our students to experiment with, invent and create their own works of Art and Design and understand how Art and Design influences our world, contributes to our culture and reflects our self expression. Students are exposed to a range of different Art and Design periods and styles, analysing the work of artists, architects and designers, not only to inform their own work, but to understand the importance of creative skills in the wider world. The units through Key Stage 3 are devised to build confidence in both technical skills and creative risk taking, in order to become independent learners. The key knowledge, skills and techniques are regularly revisited across the curriculum to establish retention in long term memory.
The Art and Design curriculum at Key Stage 4 builds on the foundations established throughout Key Stage 3. Through the opportunity to experience a broad range of skills, processes and techniques, the GCSE allows students to develop and refine their skills, working as an artist in their chosen medium of interest. The students explore and experiment as individual practising artists, working from a theme. Using a range of contextual sources, students resolve their ideas to present a personal outcome of their project. The GCSE builds on the practical skills and contextual understanding of Art History, what Art is for and how it can help them to develop as individuals today. The independence fostered by the course provides the transferable skills needed for the modern world in a range of creative industries.
Over the course of the Art and Design experience at Sprowston Community Academy, our students are able to enjoy using a wide variety of creative materials and techniques. This helps them to identify where their strengths lie and develop a strong sense of who they are as an artist. During Key Stage 5, students are prepared to develop their own interests and lead their practice, building on their strengths. Students can specialise in or explore their ideas across multiple different art forms.
The course provides the students with the opportunities and transferable skills of communication, independence, resilience, problem solving, and project management, and produces students passionate about their work, with a strong sense of individual identity. Our curriculum enables them to develop a confident understanding of the skills and approaches needed for a wide range of careers in the creative industries and nurture students that can 'think outside the box', develop critical thinking and the ability to interpret the world around them.
Students produce a range of creative work, exploring their ideas through a variety of different mediums including drawing, painting, sculpture, ceramics, mixed media, photography, digital art, illustration and printing.
GCSE Art and Design is an Eduqas course. Students initially explore a wide range of techniques, processes and ideas before choosing where to specialise for their main Component One Project. Most students choose to specialise in Fine Art where ideas are as important as progress evidence and final pieces, other students choose to be entered for Three-Dimensional Design or Art Textiles. The course values the evidence of progress and discovery, refinement and experimenting as highly as the final outcomes. Evidence of progress is usually kept in a sketch-book, which is your work journal. Fill it with ideas, plans, experiments, thoughts and observations. You may also use video, websites, presentation boards or video to present preparation work
In Art and Design Key Stage 3 students receive continued formative assessment through individual verbal feedback, whole class feedback and peer/self assessment. Students have an opportunity to receive immediate feedback as their work progresses from their teacher. For each unit a success criteria is used to identify areas of development and structure target setting. The success criteria identifies the key skills from the assessment objects used in key stage 4 and increases in complexity over the course of key stage 3 building in skills and knowledge. At the end of each unit, students are assessed against the success criteria covered in the unit including the key knowledge, skills and concepts that should be achieved by all students.
In Key Stages 4 and 5, students receive continued verbal feedback delivered though individual tutorials to identify and discuss areas to improve in their independent work. Group crits are used to identify strengths or improvements and challenge ideas as the students develop their final outcome. Portfolios and sketchbooks are regularly reviewed for quality, and annotated with focused targets to act on during discussion in tutorials from the assessment objectives. Students complete two components from the exam requirement. Component one, the personal portfolio and component two, the externally set exam, are summatively assessed at each submission of a final outcome. Students will receive the assessment criteria to identify the marking bands they are achieving and to identify areas to strengthen their skills in the unit.