How might repeated significant encounters with the arts be used to
combat standardization and dehumanization?
Maxine Green argues that meaningful exposure to and study of the
arts is critical to developing persons
who “live more ardently,” who are roused from the stupor that results
from unquestioning, passive reception of superficial societal messages that
focus on consumerism, technology, and a view of human beings as ‘human
resources.’”
Yet, even some “educational experts” seem to buy into the idea that
the arts are frivolous. In December
2010, Grant Wiggins posted his opinion on his ASCD blog. Wiggins felt that schools should ban most
fiction books from the curriculum altogether, on the premise that they don't
prepare students for the future and that the bulk of reading adults do is
non-fiction. He also claimed that fiction bores boys, and he recalled “with horror
having to read Jane Austen and Nathaniel Hawthorne as a student.”
Do you agree with Green that the failure to expose students to
works of art that force us to confront the complex and the uncomfortable will
most unabashedly lead to “a desperate stasis?” Or do you side with Wiggins in
his belief that our job is to prepare students for their future work in a high
tech world?
If you agree with Greene, how do you personally act to help your
students avoid intellectual numbness?
If you agree with Wiggins, how do you respond to Greene's concerns?
I’m pretty sure that everyone probably knows where an English teacher would stand on this issue. As Green puts it, “Participatory involvements with the many forms of art does enable us, at the very least, to see more in our experience, to hear more on normally unheard frequencies, to become conscious of what daily routines, habits and conventions have obscured.” I view the importance of my subject matter in a profound way. In my view, the basic goal of education, it would seem, is to move towards a better understanding of this world we inhabit. Before we may grasp such diversity and vastness however, we must begin by developing some measure of understanding about ourselves. In studying literature, we are introduced to universal models of human experience that can lead to generalizations about life and human behavior. Literature can help us answer the questions, “Who am I? Where have I been? Where am I going? And, how shall I live my life?” The study of literature shows us, through images and symbols, the commonalty and universality of human experiences. It helps us to move from specific instances to larger generalizations about life and human behavior. My class discussions are an outlet for my students to explore the four major questions which govern all human inquiry. These are: From whose perspective is this seen? How do we know what we know? And, what are the connections between the items? In these discussions, students learn the importance of supporting their assertions with evidence from a text. If they agree with someone, they help defend their classmate’s assertion by providing more evidence. If they disagree, they need to provide counter-examples. This is the way knowledge is created and acquired in the world. I try to incorporate aspects of this into my lessons every day. I want my students to learn how to create justifiable hypotheses about literature; that is, to make educated guesses about what they read. This is a skill that applies to every facet of their lives, both academic and personal. It is essentially my hope that in the course of my teaching, my students develop a better understanding of themselves, of others, and of the world through language and literature. The skilled learned in this process are needed for decision making, negotiating, and problem solving.
ReplyDeleteIf I jump off of the soapbox for a moment (and I apologize for ranting yet again this week…), I believe that the study of the arts is essential for molding our students into active, critical thinkers that can make connections and develop true understandings about the world we live in. Just today, I asked my class to analyze the Greek myth of “The Muses.” The Muses are the personification of the importance of the arts to an ancient Greek society. The Ancient Greeks created gods to explain things in the world. The Muses were nine goddesses (yes, they were women) that explained the creation and importance of: poetry, music, the alphabet, reading, writing, astrology and astronomy; just to name a few… Only a civilization that deeply valued the arts would create such creatures. In our modern day, American society, the arts are the first things cut when money is short. An Ancient Greek society would never subscribe to this. Education was art; art was education. There is no separation between them; they are one thing. Even their concept of “science” (such as astrology or astronomy) was actually considered art, not science.
ReplyDeleteIn conclusion, I think that in the past twenty years or so, we moved away from teaching through the arts because of the rapid technological advances that have swept across our world. Our focus shifted drastically and now we question why our students lack critical thinking skills and why they are more passive and apathetic then ever before? I don’t think it’s a mystery. Because our students rely on machines that can think for them, obviously they do not develop the ability to independently think on their own. The question really is, in the absence of technology, can they think their way out of a paper bag? The foundation of education, I believe is in the arts. It is what makes us human.
The students need to have an exposure to not just the arts but to a little of everything to help them to become well rounded. I feel that children should have an exposure to a little bit of everything. I know that everyone does not feel the same about it. I know that some teachers and some schools ban their students from learning about great composers or other great people. I feel that the children should be exposed to different things. Because, if you keep them in a bubble and they do not see and experience things then when they become older they will not know about certain things. In the different standards and goals that are set for education the people who have written them have tried to include the arts more and more. There have been arguments with doing this because, they want education geared towards other things. The idea of having several arts involved in learning would help to release the imaginative capacity and to give it play. This does not always happen naturally. It is a process and must be done in different stages and levels.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Green that students should be exposed to not just one thing. It is part of their learning and development process to be exposed to many different things in their educational career. I feel if they are not exposed to different types of things in their education then they will not know a lot of things. I feel that is if technology has changed education in some ways and the students. I feel that technology and all electronic games have changed the children's lives a great deal. Some students have not developed their fine motor skills due to technology and electronics. When the students need to be able to cut, draw, or color some if them do not have those skills to accomplish things like they used to be able to.
I share experiences with my students all the time through my life experiences. I try and relate things to my students lives and to their level since, they are Second Graders. I teach them a variety of many different things each day. I try to be creative and use different types of things with my teaching and concepts. I think it is good to do a variety of things with them. I try to present critical thinking questions for my students.
I wholeheartedly agree with what Maureen and Amy said. Students at all grade levels need and deserve exposure to all art forms--fiction, plays, musicals, museums, etc.
ReplyDeleteJust yesterday, I took 47 students on a French Field Trip to Manhattan to a French restaurant and to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, to look at the awesome French Impressionist paintings. My students don't get to New York much, and the looks on their faces on the bus, at the restaurant and in the museum convinced me that they NEED, WANT and DESERVE these types of trips.
Students need exposure to art, music, literature, etc.. in order to become well rounded individuals. I think everyone agrees with that. The arts teach critical thinking skills and can make learning other subjects easier or more interesting. When I was a kid I was a horrible speller. My music teacher taught me to sing spellings out. I have a student that couldn’t measure using a ruler until I taught her how to use it, I believe that she was motivated because she really wanted to do the project and knew she would need to measure in order to do it. Now she can measure with a ruler, so a skill she has learned in art will carry over to math.
ReplyDeleteI am now teaching my 5th graders how to critique art. We are talking about emotions, how certain colors relay certain feelings.. etc. I was introducing Picasso and someone said the paintings looked sad, another said angry, I then got to speak on the fact that he was making his art during the Spanish civil war and that he was painting what he saw. I think it really creates a deeper understanding for the human condition. Students need these sorts of experiences, they are just as important as learning anything else.
I feel that the arts are very important to the education of all students. In all my years of teaching students with Autism the arts has always been something that I use with my students. It is a way for them to express themselves when words have failed them. When read the text and the other posts I had three students that I have had come to mind. One student was an amazing artist, he could recreate images from memory of places that he has seen when driving with family or on the bus. This students was non verbal with very aggressive behaviors, no one ever thought to look at his art as a way to communicate of teacher him. When he was in my class I allowed him to use his art to learn new skills, and this opened him up to a world that he never knew. I was able to teacher him aspects of history and about his community by using different pieces of art and allowing him to show me his understanding of this by drawing out answers to questions. I have used music to help increase a student’s speaking ability. This was a younger child that had limited speech but once I discovered he loved music I used music to teach reading skills, to increase his vocabulary and spelling skills. Another student I had behaviors decreased with the use of music and art. Once given the opportunity to draw of make music as an outlet for his aggression, his aggressive behavior deceased. I know that this may not be exactly how most people use the arts in education or even how they would think the arts would aide in education, but for myself and my students this is the most valuable use of the arts. So I guess you can say that bottom line I feel that the arts only enrich the education of our students in so many different ways. That is what the great thing about the arts is, there is not always a right way, it may not always effect a person in the same. It is an expression of emotions and feelings that an individual may not express another way.
ReplyDeleteI happen to agree with the comments above as well. The arts are very important especially when it comes to helping students think outside the box and fostering creativity. These are some of the many skills needed for students to become strong critical-thinkers and problem-solvers. If we solely teach students to use computers to perform certain tasks, for example, then we are basically promoting vocational training. I believe that it is a chain reaction from here where lack of creativity leads to weak problem-solving and critical-thinking skills, which leads to poor performance both in class and with standardized test scores. For these reasons, I am in support of the arts.
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ReplyDeleteI do also agree with all of the comments above. All students do need to be exposed to the arts. I think it is a way to get the students to think outside the box as Kanchan has said. The arts are all around us. The buildings we see, the music we listen to, the books we choose to read, and children are exposed to this everyday in some aspect. Some children can express themselves better through the arts and helps them with other subject areas. As Amy said they need a little bit of everything, they need that real life exposure to become the higher level thinkers that we want them to be. Since I teach Kindergarten, I use a variety of materials and concepts throughout my day. We sing, we dance, we make projects, we go on virtual field trips, we put on puppet shows etc... It enriches them, makes it interesting and exciting for them.
ReplyDeleteI too believe that all children should be exposed to visual and performing arts. The arts foster asthetic appreciation, self-expression and interpretation of ideas concepts, and emotions that cannot be accessed through other forms of academia. I remember the story of Peter and the Wolf; as a child I was amazed at how instruments were used to represent each animal in the story. In addition music was used to convey emotions and build suspense, which I thought was amazing. In addition to exposure to the arts I believe students should be creators of art in all forms.
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