THE ARTS
We have passion for giving all children opportunities to shine, whatever their strengths. The arts supports this and gives a varied and exciting approach to teaching the curriculum. There are four key arguments for delivering arts in primary schools: cognitive development; overcoming inequalities; building confidence; and social cohesion. Creative subjects support children to express themselves, develop self-confidence, and experience culture on an equal footing. As a school we embrace this and have completed the journey to become an Arts Mark Silver accredited school.
We have also used the arts for our linking project with a multicultural school, Prospect Vale Primary in Heald Green, Stockport. This has supported the children in making strong friendships with children, many of whom come from different cultures.
Children from a wide variety of classes worked with a local artist to produce a stunning, welcoming piece of art in our main entrance based on a local landmark, '20 trees'. The children learnt many new and exciting techniques that they could then share with their peers and become 'experts' in their classrooms. They now have clear 'ownership' to the main entrance of our school. They talk about their contribution with real pride!
We have also worked with Artis Group thanks to PTA financial support (https://www.artisfoundation.org.uk/). They have worked with every class in school to develop 4 key areas; Promoting wellbeing; tackling social and emotional issues; supporting the growth of the arts in school with adults and children; developing resilience. The children absolutely love the sessions and thrive on these new and exciting challenges.
This current 2025-26 academic year has seen us become part of a new and excting project. See below:
Teaching For Creativity
Teaching for creativity is a project aiming to increase creativity and the arts in schools.
The project links the school improvement plan to working with artists. The aims are to improve teacher’s skills in teaching an art form and to demonstrate the value of creativity in education. This encompasses teaching creatively, being creative in school improvement planning and teaching children to be creative. The arts are creative, but creativity is bigger than the arts and working creatively can positively impact all subjects and areas of school.
Each educational setting will work with a practicing artist. Each setting will look at their school improvement plan and decide on an area that they would like to work on. For example, schools have worked on Oracy, writing, assessment, concentration, wellbeing. The school and artist work together to plan how to have the greatest impact.
The schools and artists all meet regularly to learn from each other and continually evaluate the work they are doing.
History
Following an unsuccessful bid to be part of The Arts Council Teaching for Creativity Project in 2021 by Alice Littlehailes Head at St Luke’s. The Mighty Creatives liked the idea and funded a pilot project with two schools. This led to an application to The Paul Hamlyn Foundation by Alice with The local LCEP (local creative education partnership). This was successful and a project was funded for 23/24 24/25. This project was to work with 8 schools. In 2025 Alice applied with Buxworth Primary School to The Arts Council lottery fund for a £100,000 grant to extend the work to 8 more schools and nurseries. This was successful and the work is funded up until November 2026. Hayfield was invited to be part of this latest cohort of schools.
See this link for a fabulous presentation.
