Research indicates creative arts, including music, dance, drama and art significantly impact cognitive development, increase self-esteem, and actively engages everyone in learning.

At Moreland, we believe that the arts offer opportunities for children to explore, express and communicate their feelings whilst gaining experiences of the wider world. Through experiencing the arts, children develop their creativity, self-esteem and confidence.

Children at Moreland Primary School are provided with a broad and rounded education. All pupils are given opportunities linked to a wide range of arts experiences as part of and in addition to the curriculum. We employ specialist music and dance teachers and all children have the opportunity to learn an instrument during their time at Moreland as well as taking part in performances and concerts both in and out of school including the Young Voices Concert. We believe all children should have equal access to the arts and we are committed to offering our children the chance to visit many of London's cultural venues and work with well-known arts organisations such as the Musician's Company and London Symphony Orchestra. All the children take part in the National Gallery's Take One Picture project in the summer term as part of an art-led enquiry project based around a painting in the National Gallery collection.

As well as providing a creative and enriched Arts curriculum, we also provide a range of exciting clubs for children, including many that are arts-based (choir, performing arts, dance, art and drumming).

                              Take One Picture Project

In the summer term each year, children participate in the National Gallery Take One Picture Project. 

Take One Picture is a national programme for primary schools, which aims to inspire a lifelong love of art and learning.

Every year,  the National Gallery chooses one picture from the collection to inspire cross-curricular work in primary classrooms.

The project includes the following elements: 

• Painting links: Work links back to the focus painting
• Investigative approach: Projects are shaped by child-led research
• Process: Children have the opportunity to learn a new process inspired by the painting
• Cross-curricular learning: Projects make meaningful links across the curriculum
• Community: Learning often involves people or places in the local community or partnership working

In the Autumn term we hold an exhibition of all the children's work that is open to the school community and wider community partners to view. We also submit a portfolio of work to the annual Take One Picture exhibition which takes place at the National Gallery. The exhibition is held every summer and is a great way to celebrate children’s creativity and showcase their responses to the focus painting. Students have the unique opportunity to see their artwork exhibited at the heart of a world-leading gallery. 

Look below to see how we have celebrated Take One Picture across the Arts subjects. Photographs of children's art work can be seen in the galleries on the left of the page. 

2023 A Shipwreck in Stormy Seas

We were lucky enough in 2023 to be chosen to exhibit in the Take One Picture exhibition. In addition to this, a group of children from Moreland were invited as one of two schools to participate in designing the exhibition with the National Gallery staff and were invited to the opening of the exhibition to talk with visitors about their work. They even opened the exhibition.

 

 

A Ship Wreck in Stormy Seas  -  A Soundscape by Year 4

The children in Year 4 worked with The Musician's Company to compose and record a soundscape to accompany the painting.

Islington Dance Festival Performance
The children choreographed a dance based around the painting "A Shipwreck in Stormy Seas" and performed it at the Islington Dance Festival.

Islington School's Dance Festival

 

2024 - Surprised!

Again in 2024, we were chosen to exhibit in the National Gallery Exhibition. The tiger made by Reception Class was on display all summer in Trafalgar Square.

   

Islington Dance Festival Performance 

The children choreographed and performed a dance inspired by the painting at the Islington Dance Festival. 

2025 - A Courtyard of a House in Delft

Year 3 children's composition work created with the Musician's Company (listen below) was included in the 2025 exhibition at the National Gallery.

A Soundscape by Year 4

The children in Year 4 worked with The Musician's Company to compose and record a soundscape to accompany the painting.

       

 

Islington Dance Festival Performance

The children choreographed and performed a dance inspired by the painting at the Islington Dance Festival. 

2026 - A Regatta on the Grand Canal

‘Big Up’ the Canal

Year 5 students liked that Canaletto celebrated the Venice canal in his painting. They decided to create a spoken word piece to celebrate Regent’s Canal in London which is situated near the school and explore their own experiences and connections to it. They also photographed elements of the canal that they connected to accompany their poetry performance. Their work was chosen to be displayed in the National Gallery exhibition in Summer 2026. 

Our children were also chosen to make a video with the National Gallery about the painting.

A Soundscape by Year 4

The children in Year 4 worked with The Musician's Company to compose and record a soundscape to accompany the painting.

  

Islington Dance Festival Performance

The children choreographed and performed a dance inspired by the painting at the Islington Dance Festival.