This is a simple but effective clay project that I teach with Year 9, but could be any KS3 / KS4 project. The outcomes are excellent and I have found it even keeps Y9 boys engaged… This is a full scheme of learning which introduces various techniques for clay work, including incising and applying, contructing, building etc. The project looks at different artists and their work, then asks students to design their own vessel based on underwater textures. The are opportunities for cross-curricular learning etc. The clay vessels are simple to build, and there are clear steps and instructions showing students how to. Before students build their final piece, there are lessons teaching them to use various clay tools on a simple slab in order to master incising into the clay and applying clay onto clay. Therefore students end up with two pieces of work, one ‘practise’ piece and one ‘final’ piece. This allows time for one to be fired / painted while the other is drying. The end of the project introduces some basic colour theory, looking at harmonious colours, accent colours, tints and shades. We painted our vessels using acrylic but you could easily change how you paint / decorate yours. The scheme of learning includes all of the slides I used over a series of 6 - 7 weeks. Entry tasks, starters, mini acitivities, peer assessment, self assessments, plenaries etc. are all included. The materials I used are just clay and blue carving tools. Students mixed their own slip after I showed them how to.

This is a full GCSE scheme of work for a project based on The Blue Planet. It covers all four assessment objectives and explains to students how they can achieve different grades. It guides them through their presentation and gives examples of different levels of work. The project includes slides for entry tasks / starters / plenaries etc and has a full range of artists’ work to show. The lessons are planned out as I used them, however you can easily remove or change etc. any slides you want to. There are 87 slides in total. This project could easily be adapted for Natural Forms, Pollution or similar themes. It explores: AO1 - research. It shows examples of excellent research design sheets and sketchbooks AO2 - experimentation. It includes a wide range of experiments and ideas for students. AO3 - annotations and design ideas. There are a range of examples of how to annotate work and various ideas for final pieces. AO4 - final designs. It clearly explains to students what they need to do to reach different grades and marks for their final pieces. You can read more about this GCSE Art full scheme of work here.

A KS3 painting project based on Abstract Still Life. This full project covers a series of lessons, teaching students about observational drawing, colour theory, pattern and mark-making and painting techniques. It includes artist research, experimentation, developing ideas and final outcomes. I have taught it with Y8 KS3 students, however it can be easily adapted for any year group. The project includes entry tasks / starters and plenaries / clear lesson outcomes and examples of students work at each stage.

I have found this 3D art project great for engaging boys in art as they get to use new tools and materials and it is really tactile! I marked on teamwork skills rather than ability and the project can be extended or shortened. This is a full scheme of work asking students to build structures (from cardboard) based on architecture designed by Michael Wilford. Students work in groups to design then construct creative ‘buildings’ - from cardboard using minimal materials. They will need carboard, tape, glue guns (if you have them), craft knives. I designed the brief around ‘vessels’ rather than buildings so students didn’t just build houses or blocks. I taught this over a six week term but it can be shortened or extended easily. The project includes all of the entry tasks / starters, main activities and plenaries that I used.

This GCSE Art Project aims to develop and enhance the range of skills that students have been taught at KS3, enabling them to master and improve in a way that was engaging yet simple to achieve. There are some ‘essential’ art skills taught in this project, including: grid drawing, pencil drawing, pen drawing, acrylic painting, watercolor painting, poly printing and different types of research / art analysis / presentation skills. The theme is Pop Culture, allowing students a wide range of references to work from. The presentation includes lesson entry tasks / plenaries and exit tasks, examples of student work, homework tasks throughout. There are printable resources on slides 1-12 with the Pop Culture images I used in lessons. There is an artist research information slide that can also be printed (slide 43) There are 124 slides in total.

This is an observational drawing scheme of work to develop Year 7 students’ drawing skills at the start of the year. This scheme of learning looks first at the hyperrealist artist Marcello Barenghi, then students create artist research pages in their sketchbooks and watch YouTube videos of him working. There are teacher notes in the PowerPoint and links to the clips. Students are shown how to draw from direct observation, bringing in wrappers to draw and understanding how to be inspired by an artist. Students learn how to control their pencils properly, and start to use key vocabulary such as shape, proportion, detail and tone. There are starter activities, plenaries and homework tasks all in the presentation. There are also printable resources (in the slides)- I have made it as easy as possible to use! As I teach this to new Y7 students, it is not a long project and students aim for one complete drawing rather than a series. The aim is to have a high quality finished piece. Students love this project as they can watch the YouTube videos and draw their favourite sweet / crisp wrappers! This resource includes starters / plenaries etc for the whole project, with examples of students’ work at each stage.

This is a full scheme of work teaching oil pastel techniques in a Cubist style. Students look at various Cubism techniques, and apply them to their own artwork - the subject matter is plants and flowers. I have created a full presentation with 30 slides that include starters, plenaries, mini tasks, challenges etc. The presentation shows the steps of the oil pastel art project clearly from start to finish, with various differentiated outcomes and activities. It is simple to teach and the outcomes from my students (mixed ability Y9) have been really wonderful! The subject matter is plants and flowers and I have found it engaging for my Y9 students - mainly because oil pastels provide instant gratification!

This is a colour theory scheme of work based on the artist Kandinsky. Students create a series of paintings whilst listening to different styles of music, experimenting with line, shape, composition and colour. I designed this to engage KS3 boys in painting, so the focus is on the use of colour to convey mood, rather than trying to create very precise, small paintings. This is a full scheme of work with starters, entry tasks, peer and self assessments throughout. All of the outcomes are differentiated and there are examples of students work at each stage. There are links to artists, artist research pages and links to the music I chose for students to paint to. I designed it to last a full term, but you can alter it and use it however you wish.

Continuous Line Drawing lesson for a 1 hour Art Class (mine had 25 - 30 students). I have updated this lesson to include more drawing activities and student evaluations Times can be changed for class sizes. I repeated the timed drawings with different materials (ie. pen, pencil, felt tip, ink) and objects used to extend times. I also extended the discussion times if it was a smaller class. The presentation introduces a continuous line drawing artist, has a discussion about their work, introduces keywords and has three drawing activities (continuous line, blind and in pairs - moving paper instead of the pen to draw!) Includes artist examples, teacher examples, different materials / techniques and a plenary. Encourages art-specific language to describe work. You will need some natural forms for students to draw. I chose dried fruit, shells, leaves etc. There is more information about this lesson here.

Use the resource to test your pupils knowledge on keywords and techniques. One half of the pair has the keyword, the other has the example. Mix up the pairs and let pupils choose one, then they have a limited amount of time to find their partner. Pupils must work co-operatively to discuss which technique matches the correct keyword. Good for getting pupils into small groups or pairs and also tests their knowledge of techniques. I have used as a quick plenary or starter. Keywords included are: Tone, Linear, Continuous Line, Mark-Making, Pattern, Positive & Negative

A long list of different, fun and engaging assessement activities specifically design for art lessons. There are a range of formative and summative assessment ideas, as well as self-assessment tasks, peer-assessment activities and whole-class assessment ideas. All of the resources needed are included in the presentation. A fun way to jazz up the bog standard WWW / EBI.

This Grid Drawing presentation has over 35 different pictures for students to choose to draw from. Each picture has an ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ version so there are over 70 slides in total for you / students to choose from. Each slide can be printed to give out as a Grid Drawing worksheet, ideal for cover / sub lessons or extension tasks. The images are all high res so each slide can easily be printed to A4, then blown up on the copier (if needed). There is a huge range of themes: Sweets, Cake, Fruit & Vegetables, Flowers, Architecture, Tools, Cutlery, Facial Features like eyes, mouth and ears, Fists, Animal textures, reptiles, fish etc. Lego and toys. I have tried to make the task as accessible to all students as possible, so some images are more complex and some are more simple. On the ‘easy’ version of each picture, there is a very light copy of the image for students to draw directly over if they are struggling with the blank grid. The task instructions are written at the bottom of the sheet and there is room for students to write their name on the sheet.

I have created a huge PowerPoint presentation with over 45 starter or plenary activities for your art classes. The activities are all art-related and can be used in KS3 or KS4 art lessons, either as entry tasks, starters, plenaries or exit questions. Sometimes I put the question on the board at the start of the lesson then come back to it at the end. The slides are made up of questions, challenges, thought prompts, image analysis, riddles, true or false competitions, thunks and more. Some are very general so can be used across any class or topic, and some are more specific and related to different art movements - for example, Pop Art or Graffiti. You can use the slides to generate discussion or have students discuss things in groups/pairs etc. I have made them to be as adaptable to your lessons/teaching as possible.

This is a GCSE Photography project which achieved a Grade 9 on the AQA exam board. The project is from the Externally Set Exam (ESA) for the ‘Fragments’ question. It was completed on PowerPoint / Google Slides (not printed into sketchbooks) and edits were done on Photoshop - if you don’t have photoshop they can be done online at photopea.com There are some ‘physical edits’ which were printed in school. The photographs were taken on the student’s phone. The project shows how to meet all of the Assessment Objectives successfully and fully - from research, to experiments, refining ideas and presenting final pieces. You could use it as a template to show other students if you wish.

A step-by-step video for KS4 pupils exploring mark-making. I used this to allow pupils to self-pace their lesson. The video was made specifically for a Landscape project, but you can use it with other topics exploring mark-making. I used this for one lesson at KS4, most pupils did not finish their piece in one lesson. Excellent for differentiation as pupils can stop, rewind and rewatch parts of the video if they need to.

10 wonderful, inspirational quotes from world famous artists. All with a unique art-textured background, ideal for decorating your classroom. Good for encouraging hard work and effort rather than talent: “I am seeking. I am striving. I am in it with all my heart.” Vincent van Gogh “Creativity takes courage.” Henri Matisse “They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.” Andy Warhol “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” Pablo Picasso “Great art picks up where nature ends.” Marc Chagall “The job of the artist is always to deepen the mystery.” Francis Bacon “To create one’s own world takes courage.” Georgia O’Keeffe “Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” Edgar Degas “Have no fear of perfection, you’ll never reach it.” Salvador Dali “If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn’t seem so wonderful at all.” Michelangelo Simply print out and stick up, these are designed at A4 size but you could size them up to A3.

I designed this 3D Pop Art project as a fun way to end the summer term with my students. It is inspired by different Pop Art ideas and I combined a few elements of art (including colour theory) to create this full scheme of work. I taught it with Year 7 (11-12yrs) for around 6 weeks, having one hour lessons per week - though I think it could easily be adapted for different ages too! The 3D Pop Art project was designed to be a fun way to introduce students to some of the basic elements of Pop Art; bright, flat colours, use of line and outline to create comic styles, pattern and the importance of language and text, specifically onomatopoeias. I wanted students to develop their understanding of colour theory too, so added some challenges for colour mixing and use of colour schemes. The project includes starter activities, plenaries, reflection tasks etc. and anything that can be printed is included on the slides. There are 34 slides in total.

This full pattern painting scheme of work is inspired by artist William Morris. There are over 70 slides on the presentation, and it goes through many aspects of creating a repeated reflection design using tracing paper. The project introduces students to the work of William Morris, different types of pattern repeats and colour theory. It builds on basic colour theory and introduces secondary, tertiary, monochromatic, analogous and complementary colour schemes. The presentation includes a slide explaining the project aims and each lesson has clear tasks set. The projects is designed to build students’ skills in painting each lesson, with all lessons having starter / entry tasks and plenaries included. There are lots of examples of high quality student work at each stage of the project. There are also challenges included and printable resources (slides with white backgrounds so they are easy to print and copy) to use in the lessons.

A full scheme of work covering all of the basics in drawing realistic portraits. Aimed at KS3 art students, I usually teach this with Year 7. The powerpoint includes nearly 50 slides, including a quick history of portraiture. It breaks down drawing all of the facial features into easy to follow steps. Each lesson has an entry task/starter activity, challenge and homeworks are included. There are examples of students’ work, as well as links to easy to follow videos. The scheme of work can be easily adapted and I have tried to make it really simple to follow.

This is a full drypoint etching GCSE art project. It covers the four AQA assessment objectives and is based on the theme ‘Inside Out’. I have taught this project as a mini project but it could easily be extended or developed. You need some basic equipment: printing ink, perspex (old CD cases work well) I got off cuts from the school DT department. A tool to scratch the perspex (anything with a sharp point works) and a printing press. If you don’t have a printing press, you can easily transfer the image using a wooden spoon or similar. The project uses Leonardo da Vinci’s anatomy drawings as a starting point and asks students to look at his work then respond. I had students do observational drawings from skulls / bones from the science department. I had students work on design sheets for this project but you could easily do the same in sketchbooks. Students create a series of observational drawings then use them, along with pictures of celebrities or inspirational people, to create ‘Inside Out’ portraits which show half a face and half a skull. I have included steps for each stage of the processes, including drawing skulls, and videos (slides 18 and 20 - link is also in the notes) that show students what drypoint etching is and how to do it. The slides show clear instructions for students and I have also incuded examples of student’s work at each stage. Students create colourful, creative prints that they can work independently on once they know the process. Students were asked to create test prints then a series of final colourful prints - I was really impressed with their outcomes!