Art is a highly valued subject at Carterhatch Infant School. We believe that all children are creative and that it is important to allow our young artists to express themselves by providing them with a variety of different experiences and mediums. In addition to allocated learning time, children can often be seen sketching in different environments, having independently chosen their own tools and techniques.

The children are given the opportunity to study different artists reflecting varied cultures and re-create their own masterpiece in relation to whom they have been learning about. For example, year two have fun exploring the techniques and style of Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama and Nursery create collages in the style of Henri Matisse. 

The National Curriculum for Key Stage 1 Art ensures that all pupils are taught:

• to use a range of materials creatively to design and make products
• to use drawing, painting and sculpture to develop and share their ideas, experiences and imagination
• to develop a wide range of art and design techniques in using colour, pattern, texture, line, shape, form and space
• about the work of a range of artists, craft makers and designers, describing the differences and similarities between different practices and disciplines, and making links to their own work.

Development Matters Statements for Art and Design

3 and 4 year olds should be learning to:

• Explore different materials freely, to develop their ideas about how to use them and what to make.
• Create closed shapes with continuous lines and begin to use these shapes to represent objects.
• Draw with increasing complexity and detail, such as representing a face with a circle and including details.
• Use drawing to represent ideas like movement or loud noises.
• Show different emotions in their drawings and paintings like happiness, sadness and fear.
• Explore colour and colour mixing.