Whole school

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Thatto Heath Primary	At Thatto Heath Primary School, drama is considered a very powerful medium to develop confidence, self esteem, speaking and listening and to accelerate learning for all children. The use of drama across the curriculum has proven to be an excellent vehicle for developing storytelling and writing skills at Key Stages 1 and 2. Speaking, listening and writing are identified priorities within the School’s Improvement Plan and drama provides many creative additional opportunities to embed a whole school approach to speaking and listening. This is an ongoing long term objective.
Young Directors (of Shakespeare)	Talented KS4 drama students were challenged to adapt and direct a Shakespeare production. Students studied some of the world’s most innovative stage directors and gave seminar presentations about them. Chris Browning, Drama AST, coached the directors in learning about delivering Shakespeare’s language. The students learnt about ways to create and maintain a company. Young Directors were invited to create casts made-up of students from Years 7, 8 and 9. The casts rehearsed for three months. Young Directors formed ‘teams’ so that the burden was shared and health and safety considerations met.
Aboriginal Performance Art	This exemplar describes an arts project involving Creative Partnerships and our school. We used an Aboriginal artist and performer, together with other professional artists to stimulate and inspire exceptional talented pupils in the arts to create their own drama performances The project was jointly conceived and planned by the arts staff and Creative Partnerships representatives
Specialist Music School	This exemplar describes a specialist Music course at a DfES assisted specialist music school. Our school is co-educational for pupils aged 3 to 18. It is an academic institution with high expectations of its pupils and is one of the schools funded through the government's Music and Dance Scheme (MDS). It has a specialist music faculty, which also includes a Cathedral Choir School. Although there are only 700 pupils in the whole school, over 200 young musicians follow the specialist Programme and almost half the whole school receive music lessons. For those on the specialist course, timetables are tailored to combine practice time with academic work, and are enriched with concerts and master classes covering the whole range of musical experiences. Entry is by a series of auditions.
Promenade Performance	This exemplar describes an 'in-house', self-funded, multimedia, promenade performance in which the audience walked between different sites within the school premises. It involved: dance, music, art and drama departments, and an artist in residence supported by the Creative Partnershipsi scheme. Student choreographers, mentored and facilitated by subject specialist teachers, each created their own dance. The project involved both A' Level and BTech pupils, and was conceived by our performing arts team.
Secondary Arts Summer School	This piece of work describes an art and design summer school that was run on behalf of the LEA for gifted and talented pupils at the KS2/ KS3 transitional stage. Our school, which is a specialist visual arts college, is situated in a large village in rural Gloucestershire and serves a rural and professional population. Seven local primary schools are collectively in partnership with the school.
Visual Arts Summer School	This exemplar describes a visual arts summer school which we held for talented primary school pupils in art and design. It was held at our specialist arts college, in a challenging area, in the centre of a large town in Greater Manchester which serves a population with a diverse ethnic mix. The LEA requires all primary schools to link with another primary school in a different area to serve a contrasting population.