Craftspace

Creative Partnerships is a national programme to build sustainable partnerships that impact upon learning between schools, creative and cultural organisations and individuals. Craftspace has worked with a cluster of five schools; Wilson Stuart Special School; Beaufort Special School; Paget Primary School; Heathlands Primary School and Castle Vale Secondary School, in Birmingham over five years.

We have partnered artists and makers with schools, sometimes for up to a year, to explore creative processes, develop learning resources and make physical changes to the environment to stimulate learning. Experimenting with new ways of working has also enabled professional development for teaching staff.

I remember the first time I saw these things (mud drawings) I was completely shocked, I thought this is what primary art is all about. This is about children being creative and expressing themselves in different kind of ways and it’s changed my whole view of what we can do with art, because this has now been translated into a product outside... Everyone feels that this is now their own product and I’m sure some of the children here now who go past that structure in 10-15 yrs time will say I built that.

Kevin McCabe Head teacher Paget Primary School: