Artsmark can help unlock the potential of children and young people, help to develop character and talent, and increase their knowledge and understanding.  That's why Artsmark was created: to bring ambition to life in every classroom.

We are delighted that we have been accepted onto the programme to further develop our creative curriculum.  The awarded will help us to continue to deliver a high quality arts and cultural education.

David Attenborough Day

The whole school came together on Friday 8th May to celebrate the incredible milestone of Sir David Attenborough turning 100 years old. Our day began with a special assembly honouring his lifelong dedication to protecting the natural world and inspiring generations of young explorers.

To mark the occasion, our wonderful kitchen team baked a celebration cake and a selection of beautifully decorated biscuits, which the children enjoyed after the assembly.

The excitement continued as every class headed outdoors for a grand woodland exploration adventure around the school grounds. Equipped with binoculars, the children searched high and low for hidden animals tucked among the trees, bushes, and pathways. Each animal carried a letter, and once all were discovered, the children worked together to reveal a special mystery word hunt in honour of Sir David.

Choir Collaboration

Our school choir enjoyed a fantastic afternoon at Sevenoaks School on 6th May, taking part in a vibrant choir collaboration alongside several other local schools.

The event brought together young singers from across the area to share music and celebrate the joy of performing.

We were incredibly proud of our children, who were the youngest participants at the event. They rose to the occasion beautifully, singing with enthusiasm and focus.

Trip to Leeds Castle

Our EYFS classes enjoyed a trip to Leeds Castle and took part in an interactive 'Swan Princess workshop' where they learnt all about heroes and fairy tales. They explored the beautiful grounds, ducked under the portcullis and enjoyed a hunt for George the Mouse in the Castle walls!

Bandoola

Our school took part in a special joint book read this week with Amherst, diving into Bandoola by William Grill — a beautifully illustrated true story about courage, compassion, and the extraordinary bond between humans and elephants.

Across classrooms, children produced beautiful artwork and poems for a collaborative display in the hall.

World Book Day

World Book Day was a fun day, inspired by the book 'Bandoola: The Great Elephant Rescue' by William Grill. It was fantastic to see the children arrive in such imaginative animal costumes, the effort and enthusiasm made for quite a buzz in school.

We were also delighted to welcome Jo Stokes in last Wednesday to lead Poetry workshops for every year group, Throughout the day, each year crafted their own verse, contributing to a whole-school poem that was performed at the end of the day to celebrate the joy of storytelling. Thank you for your generous donations which help us continue to create these memorable experiences for the children.

Arts Week

It was a fantastic week with some incredible activities for our Arts Week.

We began with a visit from a Junk Model Orchestra (Rockin & Recyclin since 2012 ) running workshops with each class before bringing the whole school together for an energetic assembly. Using recycled materials to create impressive sounds, the children loved experimenting with the junk instruments.

Their enthusiasm carried into the classroom, where each class designed and built their own junk‑model instruments, resulting in some wonderfully creative and imaginative designs.

We were delighted to welcome several exceptionally talented musicians from our parent community to perform for the children. They were completely absorbed as they enjoyed a wonderful variety of performances, including violin, cello, guitar, piano, electric violin, opera singing, drumming, composing, and even bagpipes, along with insights into the performers’ creative processes.

It was a real pleasure for our children to witness such diverse creative talent—an experience that may well inspire them in the future.

We were lucky to also have a visit from the ‘Iroko Theatre Company’  The Iroko Theatre group is a well-established company who are very experienced at bringing African culture into schools. The day began with an assembly where a traditional African fable was brought to life using live drumming, dance, songs and chants.

This storytelling workshop introduced pupils to various elements of oral storytelling, including call and response, whilst the drumming and dance workshops use songs, chants and games to explore the musical traditions of Africa. 

Superhero Day

We had a wonderful start to the new term with Superhero Day, linking with our topic ‘Helping Hands’ and one of our many enrichment days that are a memorable way to enhance learning. Both the teachers and children dressed up and had the opportunity to  share which hero they had come in and why in their classrooms. We had a special assembly hosted by the local fire brigade. The children loved hearing all about the role of a firefighter and were thrilled to see and explore the fire engine in our carpark until it was called away on a real emergency!

Mini First Aid Course

Year 2 took part in a mini first aid course. They were taught essential first aid skills to help them to respond confidently in an emergency. This practical class was lots of fun and involved many activities for the children to enjoy as well as learn from.

Music Wall

As part of our Arts Mark journey we would like to create a Music Wall in the playground to further enhance the children’s outdoor play and OPAL. Mrs Browning had a meeting with the schools’ Art Ambassadors to discuss their ideas of what a music wall is, why we should have a music wall, where it should go and what recycled objects we would need to create it. They understood a music wall to be a wall with ‘things on that make music’, ‘not actual instruments – tubes and pans’ and ‘lots of different things that have been reused that can be hit to make a noise’. I asked why it would be a useful addition to our playground and one child said ‘Yes, it will be so satisfying because it will make so many different noises because we don’t have any music things in the playground’. They agreed that it should be up against a fence down by the football cage or kitchen garden. The children agreed that it should be ‘colourful, fun, noisy and interactive’. The children decided together that we would need some wood and old pots and pans and pipes. One child said we needed ‘some paint to paint pictures on the hanging wall’ and another said  ‘we will need sticks and metal bowls – not glass otherwise it would smash’.

The ambassadors will now present their ideas to their class and everyone will have an opportunity to design their own music wall.

International Day

The children came into the school dressed in an array of different outfits for International Day, celebrating all the diverse nationalities we have at our school. We started the day with a special assembly to celebrate different countries and some parents kindly came in to speak to our children about their cultures and traditions.

December 2025 

Our Art Councillors enjoyed making clay decorations impressed with natural forms and painted in Christmas colours. Lynne Fitzgerald also came in to enjoy the fun. We then walked to St Mary's Church to decorate the 'Riverhead Infants' Tree ready for the Xmas Tree Festival at the weekend.

Elf Day

We had a truly memorable time celebrating Elf Day on 6th December. Classrooms were a hive of activity as the children carefully wrapped gifts to donate to the Salvation Army.

Father Christmas then came in to school to collect the donations and it was wonderful to see our pupils experience the joy of giving and understand how their kindness can make a meaningful difference to those less fortunate than themselves.

As well, our Reception elves baked beautiful Christmas cakes and as they whisked, each child made a special Christmas wish! Year One prepared magical reindeer food, ready for Christmas Eve, and Year Two created hot chocolate & marshmallow pouches. All of these delightful handmade gifts were then sold at our Christmas Carol event after school which was a great success! The evening created a perfect way to begin the Christmas season.

Choir singing at Bligh's Meadow

On Friday 28th November, the Year 2 Choir started off Christmas with revelry and song! They sang Christmas songs and carols at Bligh’s Meadow, to their parents, carers, families and to the delight of the passing public! It was wonderful to see so many happy faces (children and adults) and the children really did Riverhead proud with their behaviour, efforts and singing talent. What a fantastic way to start the festivities!

Starlight Safari

Our annual Year One event was a thoroughly enjoyable evening, including singing round the campfire, making an Autumn crown & sparkle wand, story telling in the reading retreat and enjoying a hot chocolate, marshmallow and star biscuit!

Thank you to all our Year One staff and helpers who make this a magical event that we hope the children remember for a long time.

Children in Year 2 used the book The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds for inspiration for their own art work.

Our Ceramic Project

In March 2020 before lockdown, the children began an inspiring project with the ceramicist Deborah Tompsett.

The vision of the project was to create ceramic art as the focal point for a new well- being area in a dull area near the ancient oak tree. This idea has become all more the relevant following the impact of COVID on the school community.

Deborah made some beautiful initial sketches to develop ideas with the children and staff.

Riverhead Art Competition

It was wonderful to see all the hard work and enjoyment that went it your children's masterpieces for our Art Competition. With so many original ideas and different mediums used it was very difficult to choose the winners.

However, we congratulated the following children:-

Hayley, Hester, Arthur and Amy from Falcon

Sofia and Ollie from Kestrel

Mikkel from Hawthorn

Henry C and George C from Elder

Samuel and Sienna from Bramble

Rose from Hedgehog

George B from Rabbit

Year Two Study Georgia O'Keeffe

During their art lessons, the children researched the artist Georgia O'Keeffe. They learnt about tertiary colours, mixing one part of a primary colour with half part of another primary. Using this information they complimented and contrasted colours to create some stunning artwork.

Year One Moving Cards

In their DT lessons, the Year One children continued their transport theme by creating a moving picture of Grace Darling using different paper mechanisms.

Reception's Empty Pots

The children made their own coil pot and wrote instructions for their friends to follow as our focus book was "The Empty Pot". The story about a boy who loves flowers but is unable to grow one in the emperor's contest. It show's how Ping's seeming failure is turned around into a tale of honesty rewarded

Term Five

Year Two Ferris Wheel Designs

In D&T they discussed and designed the appropriate materials to use to build a Ferris wheel.   Following their detailed designs, the children constructed their Ferris wheels using lolly sticks, cardboard, skewers, egg boxes and yoghurt cartons. The brief was that the wheel had to rotate and have pods for passengers, which they all successfully achieved.

Year Two Search for Strange Creatures!

The children were asked to investigate something strange and unusual which had been spotted in the woodlands! After their investigations they decided to write to the local community describing their findings and asking them to keep a look out for strange creature! They also drew pictures of what they thought the creature might look like! 

Year One look at Aerial Views

During their geography lessons the children looked at aerial views. They learnt how to draw a map of an aerial plan adding basic symbols as a key.

The Green Man

During their art lessons the children researched the origins of "The Green Man". Firstly, they studied and considered proportion and facial features.  They then learnt techniques of how to roll and pinch clay, and also, how to make marks in the clay.    They used these skills to create their own artistic versions of a 3D Green Man.

Reception visit to Wakehurst

The Reception children visited Wakehurst and collected twigs, leaves, tree bark and petals to decorate their own crowns and wands just like the Garden Fairy's.   They also made ephemeral art sculptures.

Term Four

Year One Studies Henri Rousseau

During their art lessons they have been learning about the different techniques of collage. Using Henri Rousseau as they inspiration, they have been studying household plants and practising their line drawing.

Wonderful Water in Reception

The Reception topic for Term Four was Wonderful Water.  They focused on some brilliant books such as, "The Lighthouse Keeper's Lunch" and "The Fish that Could Wish".

They practised their weaving skills on their lighthouses and built simple circuits to light them up and wrote their own shopping lists just like the Lighthouse Keeper.

Thinking about the crazy wishes that the fish made, they made their own wishes and wishes for others and wrote captions for the pictures in the story.

Art in Architecture

We were delighted to be asked to attend an exhibition in memory of the late architect Roger Fitzgerald entitled ‘Art in Architecture’. Mr. Fitzgerald was a local Sevenoaks resident and passionate advocate for the town; he was also the man responsible for designing our wonderful school building. Sadly, Mr. Fitzgerald passed away last year and the exhibition at the Kaleidoscope Galley celebrated some of his favourite and most iconic work – including Riverhead Infants’ School! 

   Some of our Year Two School Councillors represented the school as they were introduced to the work of Roger FitzGerald and they reciprocated the invitation by asking the curators of the exhibition to visit us for tea!

Year Two Science Topic

The Year Two Children focused on materials and explored the stability of different structures. Discussing how different materials can be changed. How grouping together the same material can make a strong structure. Ernie in Neptune Class was particularly pleased about how strong the cardboard tubes were when he had to stand on them unaided!

Year One Kandinsky Subject

During their art lessons the Year One Children experimented with colours and learnt how to make different tones of a secondary colour. They used these skills to make some artwork in the style of Kandinsky.

Year One Lego Workshop

The children had an exciting learning opportunity taking part in the Lego Robotics workshop. They worked in pairs learning about algorithms to design and bring to life working models of a fairground ride.

Year One Draw with their Feet!

As part of their Toy Topic, Year One learnt how to improve their observational drawings of a teddy bear through learning how to create textures using a 2B pencil. Falcon Class discussed our school value of determination and learnt that some artists with disabilities use their feet draw. The whole class had a go at holding a pencil with their toes and they realised how challenging it is.

Fire Safety Day

With all the excitement of bonfire night drew some fantastic firework pictures and made some amazing firework rockets!

Year Two Building Designs

David Gamble talk to the children about a book he had written called BucQUEENham Palace.  He also talked to them about someone else who shared a link to both the book and our school. The cover illustration for BucQUEENham Palace was created by another local resident – Roger Fitzgerald. As well as being the illustrator for this book, Roger was the architect responsible for designing the ‘new’ Riverhead Infants' School that was opened in 2009.  We ran a competition with the children to draw a picture of the school.  

Reception Art

To celebrate Diwali, the Reception children learning this important Hindu festival and made diva lamps to guide Rama home!

Super Silver Award!

We are incredibly proud to announce that we have been awarded the Silver Artsmark . This has been a long journey ,over a number of years, for the children and Staff at Riverhead and has involved a number of projects accumulating into this achievement.   It was celebrated that as a school we have set out a range of developments to foster our children's creativity and autonomy whilst increasing the presence and the profile of the Arts in our curriculum. The OPAL playtimes and school well-being garden were two of the main developments and we are so pleased with the positive impact they are having on our children's learning and well-being.