Eye On Education: Work by Castle Hill schoolchildren to be show at National Gallery

MEET the art pioneers of Huddersfield’s Castle Hill School.

Since 1995, London’s prestigious National Gallery has challenged primary schools from across the UK to use paintings in the classroom as a focus for cross-curricular learning.

Hundreds of schools have taken part and submitted work to the Take One Picture spring showcase at the gallery each year.

This year Italian Renaissance painter Andrea del Verrocchio’s Tobias and the Angel has been the focus for work.

And Castle Hill School, in Newsome, is leading the way.

It is one of only 20 schools in the country, one of only three in the North of England and the only school for children with special needs to have their work shown in the exhibition.

Indeed, three Castle Hill students Peter Maloney, Kirsten Wilkins and Saarrah Akudi will be among those performing the official opening of the exhibition on May 13.

And on June 8, a group of 10 pupils who have been involved in the project and their parents will visit the exhibition for a private viewing session.

A video featuring the school’s dramatic interpretation of the Old Testament story from which the painting is taken, which was filmed at Castle Hill, will be shown as a multi-sensory film on a continuous loop.

Senior teacher and Castle Hill’s arts co-ordinator Alison Deering said 33 students had taken part in the project during the autumn term from year six through to year 12.

She said the picture had been the focus for a large range of activities including investigations about medieval life and food.

Students had also made shields and bows and arrows and re-enacted a battle. The Christmas show took the theme of a medieval wassail – a festivity of goodwill.

Two artists have been working with students creating crocheted sandals and threaded belts, which are represented in the classic painting.

Students with profound learning disabilities were treated to hot stone foot massages to represent what it felt like to walk on stones as represented in the Tobias picture.