One of the most enjoyable things about art is how subjective it is. No two opinions on a piece of artwork will be the same. Teachers often talk of Reading for Pleasure. I am a strong advocate of Viewing Art for Pleasure. Responding to art is one of life’s great joys. The key here is discussion. Discussions around artworks need to be planned well within a broader curriculum that emphasizes vocabulary, language, and the value of talk. In its simplest form, this could just be as simple as a pupil saying what they can see in front of them but with careful modelling and the right school culture, it can lead to powerful discourse in the classroom. 

I recently delivered a session titled, ‘Primary Maths: Differentiation through scaffolding and adaptation’ at the #PrimaryEssentials conference on Saturday 8th May. Recordings of the event are still available for purchase here.

The talk focussed on the importance of high-quality differentiation that allows the vast majority of children within the classroom setting access to the same content with tangible real-life examples of how to do so. Instead of creating 30 different tasks/lesson plans for the 30 children in the class teachers should instead use strategies to ensure children are accessing age-related curriculum expectations. 

Skills progression has an important part to play in designing a well-rounded art curriculum but what does the term ‘skills progression’ actually mean?

In its most basic form, it is essentially advancing pupils through a series of simple steps that becomes progressively more advanced in order to develop proficiency in more complex skills.

Continuous provision is essentially all of the resources in the environment that have been provided by practitioners to extend the learning of the children in their care. Children are able to access these resources independently and safely, and use them to explore. They are chosen carefully and mindfully by the practitioner so that even in the absence of an adult the children are able to build upon learning.

Planning backwards and sequencing should be paramount. Teachers should have a firm knowledge in knowing how things fit together. These need to be the fundamental building blocks. Planning a one off, individual lesson in detail with no idea how it fits into wider learning won't help the children. It might be a great lesson but with no understanding of how children learn and how learning will be embedded it's all for nothing.