Having honest and open conversations with students and parents is where growing awareness of the arts needs to begin. If a student shows aptitude, talent or enthusiasm for an arts subject, plant the seed early in an organic and individual way, and let them know you think they’re promising. Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset, observes:
‘Sometimes students have to be told: you could do this. Because with the arts, students and parents have a perception that you have to be at a certain standard. I spend a lot of time getting them to change their perspective, and show them work from a range of abilities.’
Claire adds that arts subjects seem to encourage far more self-critique than other subjects, and therefore often need more verbal encouragement one-on-one, from teachers:
‘If a student wants to take triple science or Geography, there’s often very little discussion about it – they just take those subjects. But there’s something about the arts where students get very self-critical and wonder if they’re good enough. My message is always that if you enjoy it and want to work hard – give it a go.’
These conversations can happen when you expose students to a wide range of arts subjects during KS3 so they get to try a bit of everything and don’t “switch off” too early. Victoria Harrocks, Dance Teacher and Community Arts Practitioner at Formby High School, says that early exposure and encouragement of arts subjects has had a direct impact on GCSE numbers at her school:
‘We now offer a lot of arts subjects in Key Stage 3: Music, Drama, Art, Dance, Design Technology. I think offering those subjects lower down the school is hugely important because it impacts GCSE uptake; for the first time ever, we have two GCSE Dance classes in Year 10. We've never had two GCSE dance classes and that’s because we introduced dance in PE at KS3.’
By exposing students to a wide range of arts subjects from 11-14, it allows time to produce more impressive work, and when students get excited about the outcomes of their study, and schools are able to showcase the work publicly, that’s when attitudes can change, as Victoria observes:
‘If the parents can see the quality of your showcases – whether they're looking at a digital art gallery or it's a live performance – they are usually more encouraged to allow their children to take an arts subject.’
Ultimately, it comes down to building trust and respect with students, Claire says:
‘The power of human connection can’t be underestimated. It’s about the relationships you build with students and the everyday conversations you have with them; at the end of lessons or clubs, we gently drop into conversation that we think they’re doing well in an arts subject, so that gradual self-belief can build.’
It’s important to advocate to parents and students about the benefits of choosing arts subjects at GCSE because of the wider creative pathways they can lead to: further education, careers and lifelong wellbeing practices. The UK is a culturally rich country brimming with creativity and cultural diversity, with arts and culture contributing £10.6 billion to the UK economy annually.
What many parents may not realise is that the number of creative industry jobs is rising, and careers in the arts are consistently at the top spot on job satisfaction polls. But even if students don’t pursue careers in the arts, having experience in these subjects and evidencing it on applications increases a person’s overall employability. When advocating for the arts, it’s worth highlighting that they not only offer creative development, but life skills such as:
These skills can then be transferable into any subject or career choice.
To offer useful insights into creative careers, it’s also recommended to take students on trips to arts colleges or universities early – not just once options or work experience is discussed – to give them something tangible and aspirational to aim for. Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset explains:
‘We go on an Arts University Bournemouth trip with our Year 8 groups, which is fantastic because we show students the facilities, the courses on offer, the foundation course, the galleries. It’s an inspirational experience for them and gets them thinking about pathways to the arts far earlier than a lot of schools do. We have ex-students who’ve gone into music and animation careers as a result.’
Alternatively, schools can welcome visiting artists who can show what careers in the arts entail. You could even consider hosting an artist in residence at your school to keep the idea of future creative pathways relevant in the minds of your students.
If you are working towards Arts Award with your group, the insights into roles in the professional arts world offered in this way - combined with student’s own research into creative careers - can all count towards their awards.
Not only using curriculum time, but promoting take up of arts subjects in an extracurricular capacity can really encourage GCSE engagement. Building a culture promoting the arts can be done in a very visible, physical way with clubs posters, assemblies, taster sessions and exhibiting the work around school buildings. Using exciting branding for each club can really help students see the importance of committing to the arts, as Formby High School does:
This doesn’t have to mean increased energy from staff, however, as Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset, explains:
‘Our older students (Year 8) run all of our clubs – clay modelling, digital coding, drama, creative writing, sustainable fashion, drawing clubs – you name it, we have it! Students have to fully plan sessions with a visual aid such as handouts, run a risk assessment, prepare resources, then run four consecutive sessions over four weeks. They take a register and run loyalty card schemes, then their friends evidence everything. Teachers who supervise are told they don’t need to do anything: the club’s success is up to the students.’
Running a cultural passport or membership card scheme enables students to try multiple art forms and cultural experiences, and to feel ownership over their choices. A cultural passport initiative can ensure that students are participating in a range of cultural experiences. These could be organised by the school, completed as enrichment opportunities or as part of the curriculum – or completed outside of school with family and friends. When feeding back to staff about their experiences, students might receive a sticker or stamp of acknowledgement in their passport, or this might be a digital passport with electronic badges. It could even be shared as a 12-in-12 scheme, whereby students are challenged to experience 12 cultural experiences or activities across 12 months of the calendar year.
It’s also a great idea to encourage students already doing GCSE to act as arts ambassadors and mentors, so KS3 students can hear their peers advocating for the arts and get a snapshot of what’s available to them higher up the school. This has two-way benefits, as Victoria Harrocks, Dance Teacher and Community Arts Practitioner at Formby High School, highlights:
‘Older students come and run the dance club for three months to gain work experience from it for their Personal Statement, and then it’s great for the younger students to look up to older students and see what’s possible in KS4 dance – it's a win-win for everybody.’
If there’s an appetite for an arts topic, allow students to start a club around it and see where it goes – it can even lead to helping you achieve wider school goals, such as being awarded Artsmark status.
By giving students responsibility and ownership of their arts education, they’re far more likely to dedicate themselves to these subjects long term; if they feel like their effort matters and they’re positively impacting the wider school, then the impact of the arts is evident to them. As Claire observes in her students:
‘Their mindset is then ready to approach the higher-level skills in the arts, and they’re better prepared to continue their pursuit of the arts when it comes to choosing their GCSE options.’
Many arts teachers find it valuable to work collaboratively across all creative subjects in your faculty. This will allow for stronger recognition and pooled resources, which will ultimately make for more impactful arts events and a greater impression on students and parents. Working with other arts departments to put on larger-scale events such as Arts Weeks, exhibitions or shows will have an impact on students and give them insights into the practical role that arts can have.
It’s important to find cross-curricular pathways with non-arts subjects, too – if students see there are commonalities between the arts and all areas of study, they may be more likely to see themselves as an “arts person” and consider taking an arts subject beyond KS3. Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset has used a success cross-school project to achieve this:
‘We’ve recently set up an annual Arts Week where all teachers delivered one lesson to each of their classes with an arts theme. Not only does this show the accessibility and relevance of art across all areas of the curriculum, but it shows students that Maths, Geography and Science teachers have skills and interests in the arts, too – it’s just part of life and should be for everyone.’
There are also benefits to using arts and creativity as part of the wider curriculum which enhances the teaching of other subjects (such as history, English and PSHE). This then cascades across overall learning outcomes in core subjects. Arts Council England conducted research on the value of arts and culture across schools in the US and found:
‘Schools that integrate arts across the curriculum… have shown consistently higher average reading and mathematics scores compared to similar schools that do not.’
Claire explains that finding commonalities across subject areas at their school can result in more than just a themed week:
‘We’ve taught integrated units before, where three subjects are grouped together, and students spend a dedicated day finding a hook which unites them all, then decide the creative outcome they’ll present, which parents were then invited to – so it becomes an exhibit or show to celebrate the findings.’
By forging these cross-curricular links and helping students to avoid seeing subjects in unrelated silos, schools can increase the interest in arts subjects at KS4, showing that arts is part of life and as crucial to the world as maths, science, humanities and languages.
Encouraging students to start preparing for GCSE during Key Stage 3 can also provide powerful evidence for Ofsted. It can contribute to whole-school priorities and your school improvement plan; it shows that you recognise how arts, culture and creativity can have a positive impact on wider school priorities and development. This is especially true when it comes to evidencing measures to improve student wellbeing and offering a rounded, balanced education. Nicolas Serota, CH, Chair of Arts Council England says:
‘At a time when the mental health of children and young people is of concern, there is ample evidence of the value and importance of creativity in supporting wellbeing. Young people can find strength, inspiration, consolation and community in their shared experience of creativity.’
Not only can the arts lead to career opportunities for students, but by practising the arts now, students are exposed to strategies that can improve wellbeing and mental health which can last a lifetime. Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset, found:
‘During the pandemic when we were doing online schooling, we had some students with such high anxiety that they refused to do any school work… apart from their arts work. And when we did make it back into classrooms, we found that giving students a little notepad on their desk where they could doodle and sketch as they listened in lessons really helped manage anxiety levels.’
Schools should try to craft a reputation in the community for the range of arts they offer as well as student wellbeing: if your school becomes known for its diverse and rigorous arts offer in the community, this contributes to the overall reputation of the school, creates a differentiator with other local schools and encourages students to want to attend. This approach can be particularly powerful in areas surrounded by competitive grammar schools.
Victoria Harrocks, Dance Teacher and Community Arts Practitioner at Formby High School, is local to the area and remembers the reputation of her school, even when she was a student:
‘We have a long history of being very engaged in the arts. I remember, even as a child, Formby High School was putting on large-scale theatrical productions and it just seems to be something that the school has embedded in it. It's in the culture of the school and I always wanted to go there… it really is all-singing-all-dancing and we have a great reputation for the arts, but it's not without a huge amount of work from the staff.’
Having a great arts provision, and creating a culture to be proud of, cannot happen in a vacuum – the community has to be engaged with exhibitions and performances, Victoria adds:
‘We love taking the work out into the community because it's really important that parents can see and hear what we’re doing.’
Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset suggests inviting the community into your school:
‘We planned an Arts Afternoon where we ran performances, exhibitions and workshops around the school, showcasing the arts and we invited parents and visitors to wander round and immerse themselves in the experience.’
Your arts provision needs to be evident everywhere in order to encourage students to participate and take their skills out into the community, and can even be used to support an existing or new Artsmark journey application, Claire adds:
'We’re always looking for ways we can showcase the arts – and because we’re a Gold Artsmark school (currently working toward Platinum status ) we’re used to auditing our offer. We strongly believe in the idea of: ‘How can you be something if you don’t see it?’ If kids can’t see performances in music or drama, or artwork in exhibitions, then how can they want to achieve it for themselves?’
Of course, this all takes a lot of planning and execution, so the teachers recommend getting those beyond the arts faculty engaged. Find out which people across all departments have availability and passions they’d like to teach; the arts shouldn’t just fall to arts teachers, but to anyone with an interest, Victoria explains:
‘There's a French teacher that has a passion for swing dance at our school. Every so often, we bring her in and she does some swing dance workshops for our students. It's all about finding who you've got within the school with the resources you have.’
Using a blend of teachers and students from across your school enables you to grow your arts reputation communally, instead of allowing everything to fall on the shoulders of the arts faculty. In this way, the best talent available becomes involved, and students are reminded once again that the arts run through the fabric of their school, and into the world beyond.
Schools can prepare students for academic studies via assessments, to help them become more routine events. One option is graded exams in arts subjects (music grades or drama graded exams) or offering a qualification such as Arts Award which encourages:
Arts Award can be done during curriculum time – for example, in Year 9 lessons – to allow students to really live and breathe the arts. Victoria Harrocks, Dance Teacher and Community Arts Practitioner at Formby High School, says:
‘We offered Bronze Arts Award on the curriculum for Year 9 last year – we called it a Discovery Year. We orientated it towards musical theatre so the students were studying Music, Dance and Drama, putting on short showcase productions. That then impacted the uptake of those subjects at GCSE because those students had a year where they were having a real taste of it.’
Alternatively, you can offer Arts Award as part of your extra-curricular clubs, offering a couple of intakes per year so students can participate when they feel ready as Claire Everett, Art & PSHCE Leader at Cranborne Middle School in Dorset, suggests:
‘We deliver it through clubs and there are two opportunities for them to take it in Year 7, and two in Year 8. It’s the only qualification we offer at our school and the students come out with a certificate which is better looking than most degree certificates! It helps them understand the value of what they’re doing.’
We discussed the importance of ownership and individualisation earlier in this article, and Arts Award allows for these themes to continue, as Victoria explains:
‘Students can specialise, so they could say – “I want to do my Bronze Arts Award in technical theatre during weekly technical club” or “I want to base my Arts Award around costume design”. So they can link it to those existing clubs which is a really positive, personalised approach.’
It’s not only the Arts Award tasks themselves that can be student-led, but the ways in which they present their evidence, as Claire adds:
‘We encourage students to present their Arts Award work in a way that feels right for them – whether that’s through Google slides and an accompanying spoken presentation, through a video diary or in writing and art. We get to know students really well and expose them to ideas from previous year groups so they can gain inspiration and settle on something that’s individual to them – it’s all about the ownership.’
The beauty of this individual approach is that students aren’t in competition with one another – if anything, they are more open to advising one another, helping with evidence, and collaborating on ideas. Because of the nature of the award, there’s never any rivalry: everyone is just focused on taking ownership for their own project, and getting out of it what they choose. It’s simple to have these contrasting styles co-existing in a club or classroom because of the simplicity of the Arts Award assessment criteria, as Claire explains:
‘The criteria is really clear and rigorous and hasn’t really changed in the eleven years I’ve been running Arts Award – this makes it really straightforward for teachers to get their heads around. When I show colleagues the criteria, they can’t believe how simple and easy it is to implement. There’s a trust between the adviser and moderator, where the adviser’s judgement is valued.’
By using arts education opportunities to gain a formal qualification, students are reminded of the value of the arts and given something to really feel proud of.
Arts Award can be used as a stepping stone towards academic qualifications like GCSEs, A-Levels and beyond, while offering students space to experiment and simply enjoy themselves – which is what the arts surely comes down to. Because once young people find true joy in the arts, we are setting them up for a lifetime of appreciation, consumption and contribution to the creative world, and there’s really no greater gift we can impart.
