Key Stage 4: Photography
Curriculum Intent
The aim of this curriculum is to actively engage students in the creative process of art through the medium of photography, in order to develop as effective and independent learners and as critical and reflective thinkers with inquiring minds.
The curriculum aims to develop creative, imaginative and intuitive capabilities when exploring and making images and become confident in taking risks and learn from experience when exploring and experimenting with ideas, processes, media, materials and techniques.
Students develop critical understanding through investigative, analytical, experimental, practical, technical and expressive skills and learn to develop and refine ideas and proposals, personal outcomes and solutions with increasing independence.
Curriculum overview
The students will gain an understanding of how sources inspire the development of ideas relevant to photography including:
- How sources relate to historical, contemporary, social, cultural and issues-based contexts and external considerations such as those associated with the cultural industries and client-oriented requirements.
- How ideas, themes, subjects and feelings can inspire creative responses informed by different styles, genres and aesthetic considerations and/or an individual’s distinctive view of the world.
The ways in which meanings, ideas and intentions relevant to photography can be communicated including the use of:
- Figurative and non-figurative forms, image manipulation, close up, and imaginative interpretation.
Visual elements such as those listed below will also be studied:
- colour
- line
- form
- tone
- texture
- shape
- pattern
- composition
- scale
- sequence
- surface
- contrast.
Year 10 students will learn how to manipulate the Aperture, Shutter Speed and ISO of a DSLR camera in order to get a desired outcome. They will learn different composition techniques and gain an understanding of the formal elements. The students will learn how to develop a project from a given starting point and develop an independent outcome. The students will gain an understanding of post-production and editing techniques using Photoshop.
The Year 11 students will spend more time learning to work independently by developing a portfolio of work.
All of the students will create a website portfolio which they will need to update both in school and at home as they complete independent learning projects.
Murray Park School has a dedicated photography website which contains the projects and resources that students will use throughout the course.
Extra-curricular activities
The students will have the opportunity to visit the FORMAT Festival; FORMAT is the UK’s leading international contemporary festival of photography and related media. It organises a year round programme of international commissions, open calls, residencies, conferences and collaborations in the UK and internationally and welcomes over 100,000 visitors from all over the world to its biennale.