Introducing our new drawing units!
Kapow Primary is thrilled to announce updates to our drawing curriculum for Years 1 to 6.
This brand-new unit offers fresh, engaging content designed to reinforce key skills, inspire creativity and support pupils’ artistic development. The updates include a clearer and more structured progression of knowledge and skills, broader exposure to diverse artists and new educational videos for both teachers and pupils.
In January 2026, the current Year 5 unit Drawing: I need space will be archived and replaced with this updated unit Drawing: Depth, emotion and movement. For more details on these updates, see the Art Progression of knowledge and skills (pages 29-32) and the Art Long term plan (pages 18-19).
Unit outcomes
Pupils who are secure will be able to:
- Use various types of lines to emphasise emotion or draw attention.
- Describe how artists have shown emotion.
- Use colour and line to convey emotion or movement in their sketch.
- Design a print, considering the composition carefully.
- Use a combination of marks to create tone and depth.
- Describe how artists use tone to show depth in their artwork.
- Create an effective printing plate.
- Reflect and improve their sketchbook experiments and final work.
Suggested prior learning
*Updated* Drawing: Exploring tone, texture and proportion
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Lessons
Lesson 1: Expressing movement
Lesson 2: Showing emotion through line
Lesson 3: Showing depth through mark making
Lesson 4: Composition for printing
Lesson 5: Printing
Optional: Every picture tells a story
Key skills
Generating ideas:
- Developing ideas more
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Key knowledge
Formal elements:
- Shape: Shapes can
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Key vocabulary
background
composition
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Related content
Unit resources
Vocabulary display: Drawing: Expressive drawing and mark making
A display version of the vocabulary from the unit 'Drawing: Expressive drawing and mark making'.
Knowledge organiser: Drawing: Expressive drawing and mark making
Aimed at pupils, two pages providing key facts and definitions from the unit.
Subject resources
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Cross-curricular opportunities
- English: Spoken language.
- RSE: Mental wellbeing.
- British values: Mutual respect.