Royal Shakespeare Company Lead Associate School
RSC Leader: Cassie Cox
We are proud to have been partnered with the Royal Shakepeare Company as an Associate Schools since September 2017, continuing to support other teaching colleagues in utilising the RSC rehearsal room pedagogies to teach Shakespeare as part of the curriculum. As part of a local and national network of schools, we are committed to working with theatre professionals to make Shakespeare's work vivd, accessible and enjoyable for children and young people.
Children experience high quality performances of Shakespeare's work in the theatre and at school. Staff benefit from regular opportunities to participate in professional development, working with theatre education practitioners from the RSC. In their role of 'Shakespeare Ambassadors', our pupils engage in the RSC's national leadership programme for young people and are inspired by talent development opportunities which stimulate their interest in possible careers in theatre.
Every year, we offer young people from our Associate Schools an opportunity to perform Shaekespeare's work and take part in a Playmaking Festival. Our pupils perform in school, community venues and at the RSC to audiences of fiends, families and local communities.
Please click on the link below to see our programme for our Associate Schools:
RSC Associate Schools Programme 2024-2025
Artsmark Award
Art Leader: Katy Hill
At Lighthorne Heath Primary School, we work in partnership with Arts Council England and Artsmark to develop and celebrate our commitment to arts and cultural education for all our children. For many years, we have used the Artsmark framework to help us to embed arts, culture and creativity into our curriculum; to support the development of our broad and ambitious curriculum; to strengthen pupil voice; and to support our pupils' personal progression in the arts.
As part of our school improvement cycle, the Artsmark Framework supports us to:
- Audit current provision and strategic approach to arts, culture and creativity
- Set aims and objectives for our Artsmark journey in our Statement of Commitment
- Monitor progress towards achieving our objectives throughout our journey
- Identify appropriate evidence of impact to collect along the way
- Evaluate our journey and the impact it has had on our whole setting when writing our Statement of Impact
The following Quality Principles are embedded in the planning, delivery and evaluation of our arts and culture curriculum, and support us in delivering high-quality experiences for our children:
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Striving for excellence and innovation
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Being authentic
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Being exciting, inspiring and engaging
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Ensuring a positive and inclusive experience
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Actively involving children and young people
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Enabling personal progression
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Developing belonging and ownership
We hold the Artsmark Gold Award in recognition of our ongoing commitment to providing children with a rich arts and culture curriculum.
The National Gallery Take One Picture
We're absolutely thrilled that our children's artwork, music and creative writing was selected to be exhibited at The National Gallery Take One Picture 2024 exhbition in London! The stimulus for the 2023-2024 Take One Picture project was Henri Rousseau's 'Surprised!'.
The painting shows a tiger in a jungle storm, crouching low in long grass as rain lashes the foliage and lightning flashes overhead – but who or what is surprised?
Children made a wide range of works in response to the painting. Some were fascinated by the tiger, leading to projects about camouflage and animal eyes. Others focused on the plants, inspiring them to research and recreate rainforest foliage. Many children were concerned about habitat loss affecting tigers, which inspired them to use recycled materials and raise money for conservation charities.
Rousseau’s plants inspired the children to create their own jungle. They researched jungle flowers and chose which ones to include. Paying close attention to the colours and shapes, the children painted their own versions and brought them together in a class artwork.
‘I enjoyed being creative and having a chance to do something collectively with my class.’
'Take One Picture' is the National Gallery's countrywide scheme for primary schools. Each year the Gallery focuses on one painting from the collection to inspire cross-curricular work in primary classrooms. During a one-day Continuing Professional Development course at the Gallery teachers are given a print of a painting. The challenge is then for schools to use the image imaginatively in the classroom, both as a stimulus for artwork, and for work in more unexpected curriculum areas. National Gallery Education then displays a selection of the work in the annual 'Take One Picture' exhibition at the National Gallery, and on their website.
Involvement in 'Take One Picture' is a process. In many ways this process is as valuable as the finished work that the students produce. 'Take One Picture' follows a series of stages, including continuing professional development, planning, creating, sharing and evaluating. The first step in the 'Take One Picture' journey is a one-day teachers' course at the National Gallery. During the training, the staff explore the variety of ways in which we can use paintings across the curriculum, and are given an interactive tour of the Gallery. At the end of the course we bring a print of the featured painting, ideas, and inspiration, back to our school.
Thinking about what we would like to do with the 'Take One Picture' painting is the first step in the creative process. Thinking is how we develop ideas. We think creatively and talk to other people in our federation’s schools about how we can use the painting to support children's learning across the curriculum. Brainstorming around existing Schemes of work or curriculum plans helps us to develop ideas.
Once we have thought through our ideas about what to do with the picture, the next step is to plan carefully how best to achieve them. When planning our ideas, we consider ways in which our school will achieve the following Take One Picture objectives:
- Promote the visual arts within education
- Raise pupils’ self-esteem and standards
- Promote learning outside the classroom as a means of enhancing learning within the classroom
- Provide a stimulus for building the wider school community
- Enable pupils to build meaningful connections and inspire a lifelong love of learning
After the thinking and planning comes the doing - when children create their own work. The process of creating takes place during discrete art lessons as well as across other subjects. Sometimes, we have a dedicated week or fortnight when the whole school works of the project, in partnership with our arts professionals. ‘Take One Picture' activities at our school have ranged widely, and have included learning across a wide range of subjects (not just the arts!). The process of making work collaboratively or individually can be very engaging for children. Staff, pupils, parents and staff always comment on how motivating and stimulating they find the project.
After the process of creating, the next stage is to share the work with a wider audience. Sharing gives children and staff a chance to reflect on and to evaluate their work. We love to share our work on our weekly newsletters and right here, on our school website! We also submit our work every year to the National Gallery and have been fortunate enough to share our work with a wider audience through the 'Take One Picture' exhibition in the National Gallery. Our Executive Head Teacher, Juliette Westwood, has also previously been invited to share our school’s ‘Take One Picture’ project learning at one of the Continuing Professional Development Days at the National Gallery for teaching staff nationwide.
Involvement in 'Take One Picture' has had a wide impact. For teachers, it provides training and professional development opportunities, encouraging new ways of working. 'Take One Picture' encourages children of all abilities because of the flexible and open framework. Being involved in class, whole school and national projects improves confidence in their own work and enhances a sense of ownership for their national collection of paintings.