The St Gregory's Art Curriculum

Intent 

At St Gregory's, we believe that Art and Design provides children with a unique opportunity to explore creativity, express individuality, and engage with the world in meaningful ways.  

Our intent is to: 

• Develop creativity and confidence: Encourage all children to experiment, take risks, and express ideas through a wide range of media and techniques. 

• Foster cultural and historical understanding: Expose children to artists, designers, and craft makers from different cultures and periods, promoting diversity and appreciation of the world around them. 

• Enhance wellbeing and spiritual development: Art offers reflection, mindfulness, and self-expression, supporting emotional wellbeing and personal growth in line with our Catholic values. 

• Provide progression and ambition: Using the Kapow scheme of work, we ensure a structured and coherent curriculum that builds skills systematically from Early Years through to Year 6. 

 Implementation 

Art and Design is implemented at St Gregory's through a carefully sequenced curriculum using the Kapow scheme, ensuring breadth and depth across all key stages.  

We achieve this by: 

• Structured lessons and skill progression: Across the school, year groups will follow the Kapow units, covering drawing, painting, printing, textiles, sculpture, and digital art, building skills incrementally. 

• Cross-curricular links: Art is integrated with themes, RE, history, and geography, enriching learning and embedding understanding in a wider context. 

• Exposure to artists and techniques: Children study a range of artists, including contemporary and local creatives, linking practice to inspiration and context. 

• High-quality resources and opportunities: We provide varied materials and tools to encourage exploration and innovation. 

• Celebrating creativity: Displays, exhibitions, and showcases encourage children to take pride in their work and share it with the school community. 

• Staff development: Regular CPD and Kapow training ensure teachers deliver high-quality lessons confidently and consistently. 

Impact 

Through this curriculum, pupils at St Gregory's: 

• Develop practical skills and creativity: Children can confidently explore different media, techniques, and processes, producing high-quality outcomes. 

• Appreciate art and culture: Pupils gain knowledge of artists, designers, and cultural contexts, understanding how art reflects society, history, and beliefs. 

• Build confidence and resilience: Pupils are encouraged to experiment, reflect, and persevere, developing independence and problem-solving skills. 

• Show pride and ambition: Children actively engage in showcases, exhibitions, and competitions, demonstrating achievement and enthusiasm for Art and Design. 

• Make connections across the curriculum: Art supports wider learning, enhancing literacy, communication, and critical thinking, while reflecting the school's Catholic values of respect, creativity, and stewardship. 

• Art allows every child to be GREAT at St Gregory's! 

Adaptive teaching and Special Educational Needs (SEN) 

Adaptive teaching strategies are used to ensure that all pupils can access learning and remain in the classroom as much as possible. Lessons are carefully planned and scaffolded to ensure that all pupils will be able to achieve the shared learning objective at their own level. Children with the greatest need, for example those with Special Educational Needs (SEN), will be given more in lesson support. This will include: more quality teaching and learning time with the class teacher; activities being broken down into smaller, more manageable steps; a higher level of personalised scaffolding in activities. It is our goal for all learners to be able to achieve the learning objective successfully in every lesson. Through adaptive teaching we aim to foster independence, resilience and self-confidence for every child.