Through the course of Art 325, I have been able to develop and expand my personal teaching philosophies, and come to better understand the importance of art education specifically. Going into this course, I knew I wanted to teach art because I have a passion for art and want to help others who do. I also knew that art has the power to help people explore and express themselves in a way that words or other ways can’t. However, if someone who doubted the importance of having art education in schools asked me why they should care, I am not sure I would be able to put it into words until now. In this course, we studied many of the philosophies and theories for art instruction. This helped me to understand the importance of providing art education to all students, and how to teach it in the most effective ways. Through the service-learning portion of the class, I was able to apply these methods through the process of lesson planning, teaching and reflecting, and see how they work in practice.
One of the first big reading we did in this course was Marilyn Zurmuehlen’s Studio Art: Praxis, Symbol, Presence. Through reading and discussing this, I began to have a greater understanding of what an art-making experience is, what it should be, and how I can promote that in my teaching. The reading suggests that making comes before conception. Children should be provided with the resources and materials to “play,” and by doing so can learn about the process. When reflecting back on my earliest art-making experiences, they did not occur as a result of instruction, no one was telling me what to do or what I was making. Instead, I was just given the space and time to experiment for myself and learn to problem solve and make connections. The key difference in doing and making is that making is the result of the originator instinct. In the Zurmuehlen reading, Martin Buber explains that “What the child desires is its own share in this becoming of things,” (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. 3). When the inspiration and desire to create is coming from within the child, that is when the most learning is done. So, why are we teaching art in such a formulaic method with specific instructions that result in all students ending up with the same result? In my teaching for Artistic Abilities, we focused on encouraging the originator instinct. While we provided prompts and specific materials, we encouraged students to explore the materials rather than focus on the end result. We gave them ideas of things they could do, but all end products where welcomed.
In order for the originator instinct to be present and best used, it is important that art is passionate, personal, and pertinent. This can be explained by the idea that “I am what I do,” or “I am what I make” (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. 18). Not only children but all art makers must feel a personal connection to the art they make in order to learn from it and develop their artistic passion. When thinking about a typical art classroom in primary school, it is not uncommon to imagine the clotheslines with identical replicas of the same project strung across. These projects are often intended to teach students the basic principals and techniques for art thinking, and while there are important for the development of artists, the majority of students in primary school will not go on to be artists. Thus, it is more beneficial to spend time teaching students to “think” like artists rather than “be” artists. This is best learned when art has a personal connection to the students and allows them to explore and problem-solve creatively. When teaching our Artistic Abilities classes, we made sure to encourage students to chose subject matters that were important to them. We prompted them with questions about their favorite places, hobbies, colors etc. and asked them what their favorite music was so we could play it as they worked.
One way to also ensure that art and the art-making experience is personal for each student is through differentiation. It is important to realize that all students learn in different ways. Thus, modifying assignments for students and offering multiple options to help students to remain more engaged in the process because it is a better fit for them. In Artistic Abilities, we made sure to always have a number of options for students. Based on their abilities, interested and learning styles we tried to best accommodate all students.
We also read some of the theories about early childhood development by Viktor Lowenfeld and Rhoda Kellogg. Both examined the stages of artistic development, which allowed me to better understand how children learn and the importance of each stage of the process. Kellogg collected over a million drawings from children and was one of the first to realize the importance of scribbling. She discovered how scribbling helps to develop children’s visual and linguistic skills (Koster, 1997, p. 75). Many adults may have previously thought, or still, believe that scribbles are not “good” and encourage children to draw figuratively sooner. However, without going through the process of scribbling, to basic shapes, to compounds first, children will not understand the essentials of how to see and think visually. In Artistic Abilities, we encouraged all types of exploration. We did not push students to draw or paint “something” and welcomed abstraction, experimentation with colors and materials. At the end of the classes during the discussion, we asked “what did you learn?” or “what is a problem you solved?” instead of “what did you make?”
It is also important to understand the importance of the relationship between the teachers and the students. Children want to please adults, so when they are told something is “good” they will just want to repeat that same thing instead of continuing to develop their ideas. According to How Should Teachers Respond to Young Art Verbally, it is better to offer positive feedback through descriptive statements such as, “I noticed you used many different colors in your painting,” (Koster, 1997, p. 46). By doing this, the teacher helps the student notice things about their own work and think about why it is that way. When teaching Artistic Abilities, we often had students ask “does this look good?” and “do you like this?” It was important to think about how to respond instead of just saying “yes.” Instead, we tried to say things like, “I like how you mixed the colors to make a brand new color.”
Overall, this class taught me a lot about the background of childhood development and art-making. In addition, it helped me understand and formulate a way to explain the importance of art education and how it should be taught in an early academic setting.
Works Cited
Fountain, H. (2014). Differentiated Instruction in Art. Worcester, MA: Davis Publications.
Koster, J. (1997). Growing Artists: Teaching Art to Young Children. Albany, NY: Delmar.
Zurmuehlen, M. (1990). Studio art: Praxis, symbol, presence. Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.
One of the first big reading we did in this course was Marilyn Zurmuehlen’s Studio Art: Praxis, Symbol, Presence. Through reading and discussing this, I began to have a greater understanding of what an art-making experience is, what it should be, and how I can promote that in my teaching. The reading suggests that making comes before conception. Children should be provided with the resources and materials to “play,” and by doing so can learn about the process. When reflecting back on my earliest art-making experiences, they did not occur as a result of instruction, no one was telling me what to do or what I was making. Instead, I was just given the space and time to experiment for myself and learn to problem solve and make connections. The key difference in doing and making is that making is the result of the originator instinct. In the Zurmuehlen reading, Martin Buber explains that “What the child desires is its own share in this becoming of things,” (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. 3). When the inspiration and desire to create is coming from within the child, that is when the most learning is done. So, why are we teaching art in such a formulaic method with specific instructions that result in all students ending up with the same result? In my teaching for Artistic Abilities, we focused on encouraging the originator instinct. While we provided prompts and specific materials, we encouraged students to explore the materials rather than focus on the end result. We gave them ideas of things they could do, but all end products where welcomed.
In order for the originator instinct to be present and best used, it is important that art is passionate, personal, and pertinent. This can be explained by the idea that “I am what I do,” or “I am what I make” (Zurmuehlen, 1990, p. 18). Not only children but all art makers must feel a personal connection to the art they make in order to learn from it and develop their artistic passion. When thinking about a typical art classroom in primary school, it is not uncommon to imagine the clotheslines with identical replicas of the same project strung across. These projects are often intended to teach students the basic principals and techniques for art thinking, and while there are important for the development of artists, the majority of students in primary school will not go on to be artists. Thus, it is more beneficial to spend time teaching students to “think” like artists rather than “be” artists. This is best learned when art has a personal connection to the students and allows them to explore and problem-solve creatively. When teaching our Artistic Abilities classes, we made sure to encourage students to chose subject matters that were important to them. We prompted them with questions about their favorite places, hobbies, colors etc. and asked them what their favorite music was so we could play it as they worked.
One way to also ensure that art and the art-making experience is personal for each student is through differentiation. It is important to realize that all students learn in different ways. Thus, modifying assignments for students and offering multiple options to help students to remain more engaged in the process because it is a better fit for them. In Artistic Abilities, we made sure to always have a number of options for students. Based on their abilities, interested and learning styles we tried to best accommodate all students.
We also read some of the theories about early childhood development by Viktor Lowenfeld and Rhoda Kellogg. Both examined the stages of artistic development, which allowed me to better understand how children learn and the importance of each stage of the process. Kellogg collected over a million drawings from children and was one of the first to realize the importance of scribbling. She discovered how scribbling helps to develop children’s visual and linguistic skills (Koster, 1997, p. 75). Many adults may have previously thought, or still, believe that scribbles are not “good” and encourage children to draw figuratively sooner. However, without going through the process of scribbling, to basic shapes, to compounds first, children will not understand the essentials of how to see and think visually. In Artistic Abilities, we encouraged all types of exploration. We did not push students to draw or paint “something” and welcomed abstraction, experimentation with colors and materials. At the end of the classes during the discussion, we asked “what did you learn?” or “what is a problem you solved?” instead of “what did you make?”
It is also important to understand the importance of the relationship between the teachers and the students. Children want to please adults, so when they are told something is “good” they will just want to repeat that same thing instead of continuing to develop their ideas. According to How Should Teachers Respond to Young Art Verbally, it is better to offer positive feedback through descriptive statements such as, “I noticed you used many different colors in your painting,” (Koster, 1997, p. 46). By doing this, the teacher helps the student notice things about their own work and think about why it is that way. When teaching Artistic Abilities, we often had students ask “does this look good?” and “do you like this?” It was important to think about how to respond instead of just saying “yes.” Instead, we tried to say things like, “I like how you mixed the colors to make a brand new color.”
Overall, this class taught me a lot about the background of childhood development and art-making. In addition, it helped me understand and formulate a way to explain the importance of art education and how it should be taught in an early academic setting.
Works Cited
Fountain, H. (2014). Differentiated Instruction in Art. Worcester, MA: Davis Publications.
Koster, J. (1997). Growing Artists: Teaching Art to Young Children. Albany, NY: Delmar.
Zurmuehlen, M. (1990). Studio art: Praxis, symbol, presence. Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.