ACE Art Focus Day 2023

As a new member of staff to Astley Primary in September 2023, please could you tell us how long you have been a teacher and what experience you bring to your Curriculum Lead subjects of Art and Design Technology? 

I’ve been teaching now for 21 years – I'm lucky to do a job I love and I wouldn’t want to do anything else. I’ve always enjoyed art and was really pleased to start leading art and design technology about 9 years ago at my previous school. I loved seeing my class exploring different types of media and would often try things different things out with my class – even when it didn’t go to plan it was still fun and we always learnt something. After a while I started trying to expand my horizons and got artists in to help with various projects. I've been involved in a fairy door trail, glass art, church angels, large murals, owl sculptures and many art competitions.

What subjects did you enjoy when you were at school?

My favourite subjects were English and art. Picture books are brilliant because they combine both of my favourite subjects – I have a huge collection at home! I was always told I wasn’t that good at art but I’ve always loved colour and creating so I wanted to do art at GCSE – I'm not sure my art teacher was that pleased! I didn’t let it put me off though because it was a lovely creative release among all the other academic subjects.

If you could spend a whole day doing one art activity of your choice, what would it be?

Either creating something with lots of colour using paint or making something with clay. I don’t always have a finished thing in mind – I like seeing where the art takes me – it's always a surprise to see where it ends up and I find it’s a great way of relaxing.

In our last ACE Art Focus Day we learned from Miss Le Rose how pupils at Astley were learning about different techniques like pattern, shape, texture, line, form and space. 

Can you tell us how the ACE Art Curriculum is developing in school across the different year groups and the kinds of topics that pupils can expect to explore in their Art lessons?

All of those things still feature in the curriculum as they form the basis of the skills children need to create and appreciate art. Our new curriculum means that the different classes start by working on the same skill but with progression built in throughout the year groups. For instance each class recently looked at colour mixing which involved primary and secondary colours for our younger students, contrasting and complementary colours for years 3 and 4, all the way up to tones and shades for our older students. The new curriculum also has a great variety in the styles of art – well known artists from the past are explored alongside things like environmental art and art from different cultures and movements.

The theme of ACE Art Focus Day this year is ‘We Are All Artists.’ Please tell us what you have in store?

The whole day will be devoted to art, with the theme ‘We Are All Artists.’ 

We have organised a wonderful selection of local artists to work in our school and each class will be working alongside one of these artists for the entire day!

The children will be learning more about how their artist works, then trying out some of their artist’s tools and techniques. Later they will be developing their own ideas and creating a piece of work which they can confidently show to others.

Towards the end of the day we will have ‘open studios’ where each child will be able to visit two other classrooms to find out more about the art the other classes have made. This will give the children a fantastic opportunity to appreciate how every piece of art is totally unique and see some other styles and techniques that have been used during the day.

Astley has a wealth of Art resources for the children to use. What will pupils be using in their activities with our visiting artists?

The artists have devised their own activities for the children involving different media and techniques. There are so many different media the children are going to be using – poster paint, watercolours, collage, oil pastels, line drawing with pencils, wax crayons, fineliners – I loved making up a box of things for each class to use and it helped me get more familiar with the stock cupboard.

Will families be given the opportunity to see what pupils have been doing and what they have produced during their activities?

Yes!! At the end of school 3.15 p.m all parents are welcome to visit their children’s classrooms where they can talk to their child about what they have done and their ACE Art Focus Day experience.

How might families encourage an interest in art and creativity at home and how do the skills in Art help pupils’ learning across all their ACE Curriculum subjects?

Picasso said ‘Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up’ - I think the key is to stay curious and playful. Art is everywhere and it’s free! You donlt need to go to a gallery to experience art. It’s in nature, clothes, books, our soft furnishings, advertising, birthday cards – it's endless. Look out for patterns, colours and styles you like and then just have a little experiment with whatever you have at home – don’t worry about the result, just explore and have fun together!

What would you most like pupils to discover about Art as a subject in their ACE Art Focus Day?

I want them to take away the message that we are all artists! There is no such thing as being ‘good at art’ or ‘bad at art’ it’s just discovering what kind of art you feel comfortable with and, most importantly of all, to have fun and enjoy the journey.