Performing Arts Curriculum Intent

Curriculum Vision

Our Performing Arts curriculum is ambitious for all learners and is designed to develop confident, expressive and critically reflective performers, creators and analysts. We ensure equitable access to powerful artistic knowledge so that every pupil can interpret, create and evaluate performance with increasing sophistication.

At Washington Academy, pupils become performers, composers, directors, technicians and critics. Through Drama, Film Studies and Music, pupils develop creative fluency, technical precision and the ability to analyse and refine artistic work.

We explicitly teach both substantive knowledge (performance techniques, dramatic conventions, musical theory, compositional devices, cinematic techniques, genre conventions and historical contexts) and disciplinary knowledge (how practitioners rehearse, compose, direct, analyse, interpret, evaluate and refine creative work). Through structured artistic enquiry and practice, pupils apply this knowledge with increasing independence and confidence.

Curriculum Rationale and Sequencing

The Performing Arts curriculum is coherently sequenced from Key Stage 3 to Key Stage 4 to build secure foundations in performance literacy, technical competence and evaluative thinking.

Across Key Stage 3, pupils develop core skills in collaboration, rehearsal discipline, performance technique, creative composition and analytical discussion. Fundamental concepts such as characterisation, tension, rhythm, genre and structure are introduced and revisited across Drama, Film and Music.

At Key Stage 4, pupils deepen their expertise through GCSE and vocational pathways. They apply cumulative knowledge through extended performance pieces, compositions, scripted analysis and practical assessments. This progression ensures pupils move from supported exploration to independent creative and analytical practice.

Knowledge is deliberately revisited across strands to ensure that creative techniques, subject terminology and evaluative skills are retained securely and transferred confidently to unfamiliar performance contexts.

Drama

In Drama, pupils explore how performance communicates meaning, emotion and perspective. Substantive knowledge includes dramatic techniques, genre conventions, stagecraft and practitioner theory. Disciplinary knowledge includes how actors interpret character, how directors shape performance and how critics evaluate live theatre.

Progression moves from foundational skills in voice, movement and improvisation at Key Stage 3 to independent devised performance, set text analysis and live theatre evaluation at Key Stage 4.

Film Studies

In Film Studies, pupils analyse how film constructs meaning through cinematic language and representation. Substantive knowledge includes camera techniques, editing, sound, genre and narrative theory. Disciplinary knowledge includes how critics interpret film, how directors construct meaning and how audiences respond.

Progression moves from decoding visual storytelling at Key Stage 3 to structured analytical essays and creative production aligned to GCSE expectations at Key Stage 4.

Music

In Music, pupils develop performance, composition and listening skills while exploring diverse musical traditions. Substantive knowledge includes rhythm, harmony, melody, structure, notation and genre. Disciplinary knowledge includes how musicians compose, perform, rehearse and evaluate musical work.

Progression moves from ensemble performance and compositional foundations at Key Stage 3 to GCSE performance, composition portfolios and analytical listening at Key Stage 4.

Literacy and Analytical Development

Subject-specific vocabulary is taught systematically across all strands. Pupils learn to articulate evaluative judgements using precise terminology in both spoken and written responses.

Extended analytical writing is modelled at Key Stage 4 to ensure pupils can construct structured arguments about performance, representation and artistic intention.

Ambition for All

We maintain high expectations for all learners, including disadvantaged pupils and those with SEND. Our curriculum is designed to remove barriers to participation and ensure sustained progress over time.

Adaptive rehearsal structures, scaffolded creative tasks and explicit modelling enable all pupils to access complex performance and analytical content confidently.

Assessment

Assessment across Performing Arts is cumulative and designed to strengthen long-term retention of both practical and theoretical knowledge.

Regular rehearsal feedback, performance reflection and application in unfamiliar creative contexts ensure that pupils refine and embed their learning securely.

At Key Stage 4, assessment is aligned to GCSE and vocational examination criteria and is synoptic in nature, requiring pupils to demonstrate practical competence, creative interpretation and analytical understanding.

Preparation for Future Pathways

Performing Arts prepares pupils for ambitious next steps in further education and creative industries. Pupils explore careers in theatre, film, music production, media, event management, teaching and digital arts.

Through Performing Arts, pupils develop highly transferable skills including confidence, collaboration, resilience, interpretative reasoning, disciplined rehearsal practice and reflective evaluation.