2009 - Volume 28: Number 2
Creativity: Delusions, Realities, Opportunities and Challenges
JOHN STEERS
Volume 28.2
This article considers the background and provisions of the New Secondary Curriculum in England. Attention is drawn to the extent of the policy changes by comparing the ten-year old demands of the Swift & Steers 'Manifesto for art in schools' (1999) with the new legislation and guidance. In particular, while there is strong support for overdue recognition of the importance of creativity in the curriculum it is argued that its inclusion remains problematic because the 'risky thinking' involved will be difficult in the many schools that have become risk averse in the face of ever increasing accountability. Nevertheless, there are very significant opportunities for art and design provided a number of key challenges are faced and acted upon.
Understanding Young Children's Three-Dimensional Creative Potential in Art Making
VICTORIA PAVLOU
Volume 28.2
This article explores aspects of young children's three-dimensional development in art making. Understanding young children's three-dimensional awareness and development is often a neglected area of early childhood educators' education and practice and often children's creative potential is not fully realised. The present article is based on a small scale qualitative study which focused on understanding 5–6 year-olds' representational intentions in three-dimensional artworks, understanding of visual/design concepts and expressive use of media (scrap paper and mod roc). The findings of the study suggest that young children are able to create satisfying three-dimensional representations giving emphasis on forms, uprightness, balance, movement and modelling of multiple sides.
'I'd rather be seen as a practitioner, come in to teach my subject': Identity Work in Part-Time Art and Design Tutors
ALISON SHREEVE
Volume 28.2
This article explores issues of identity as part-time tutors engage in teaching in further and higher education. It is based on a phenomenographic research approach that examines variation in experience. Based on interviews with 16 creative practitioners who also teach, it draws on the narratives of identity resulting from the interview process. The five possible ways that the relationship between practice and teaching can be experienced can also be associated with five different experiences of identity. The research also draws on case studies more aligned with one category of experience than another, enabling aspects of identity work to be related to the worlds of practice and teaching and to individual histories of participation in these worlds. Factors that help to contribute to particular forms of identity are therefore discussed, as well as the impact that tutor identity can have on the students' learning experience.
Performance Art at Secondary Level
SHERIDAN HORN
Volume 28.2
This article considers the far-reaching potential and the particular characteristics of performance art within the secondary art curriculum. It discusses the means by which an art department has incorporated it into their teaching curriculum at a state secondary school with reference to installations and the work of different performance artists in residence; details of their performances, methods and artistic intentions are discussed. After consideration of the varied responses from staff and students within Trinity Catholic School, the values and significance of direct experience are discussed. In its transience and its reflecting of the performative acts common to ordinary life, performance art offers a challenge to young people's thinking and creativity.
The Artist-Led Pedagogic Process in the Contemporary Art Gallery: Developing a Meaning Making Framework
EMILY PRINGLE
Volume 28.2
Drawing on recent research which examined how selected artist educators perceive themselves as arts practitioners and analysed how these constructions inform their pedagogy, this article proposes a framework of meaning making in the art gallery. Art practice is defined as a process of conceptual and experiential enquiry which embraces inspiration, looking, questioning, making, reflective thinking and the building of meanings. The pedagogic process instigated in the gallery resembles art practice in that artists seek to 'teach' skills including questioning and critical reflection and promote experiential learning. Hence artist educators function as facilitators enabling learners to engage directly with art works (which are seen to embody the knowledge of the artist creator and contribute actively to the construction of meaning), whilst sharing their knowledge through dialogic exchange. The devised Meaning Making in the Gallery (MMG) framework encapsulates the pedagogic relation-ship between artist, learners and artworks in the gallery and proposes a model of creative teaching and learning which has potential application within cultural institutions and beyond.
Critical Perspectives on Colonisation of the Art Curriculum in Korea
JEONG-AE PARK
Volume 28.2
This article examines some characteristics of art education in Korea. It takes the form of a historical overview using a postcolonial lens. The findings were that the predominant Western aesthetic concepts and theories as central culture embodied in Korean art education as local culture are: (i) ideas of art as self-expression developed in Europe and the USA between the 1920s and 1950s; (ii) the concept of art in daily living in the USA in the 1930s; (iii) design elements and principles by Arthur Wesley Dow in the USA in the 1920s; (iv) Bauhaus design theory in Europe in the 1920s; and (v) the appreciation of nature beauty by John Ruskin in the late nineteenth century in England. These educational ideas have been influential on policy-making in Korean art education, and therefore new concepts are integrated with these elements for curriculum changes. In this way, the characteristic of the colonised Korean art curriculum is so hybrid that it is difficult to understand the concepts and the practical implications of the various policies for art teaching. Consequently, it has not served the issues of cultural diversity and pluralism that are so problematic in twenty-first century Korean society.
The Way They See It: An Evaluation of the Arts Across the Curriculum Project
GLEN COUTTS, REBECCA SODEN AND LIZ SEAGRAVES
Volume 28.2
This article reports on an evaluation to interrogate the efficacy of a Scottish Government sponsored initiative to introduce an arts-infused education model to primary (elementary) and secondary (high) schools called Arts Across the Curriculum. Between April 2005 and December 2007 the evaluation team gathered data about this three-year pilot project, using a variety of instruments including surveys, structured observations, interviews and video diaries. This article presents some of the findings from the evaluation and in particular it focuses on the artists' views of the efficacy of the project; in short we wanted to know how they 'saw it'. It should be noted that the research team that evaluated the initiative had no say in the design of the project.
F. M. Courtis Collection: A Window on Teacher Education at Bendigo, Australia
PENELOPE COLLET
Volume 28.2
For the best part of the last millennium collections have been used in universities in Europe to support teaching and research. European authors have referred to university collections as 'windows on the university'. This article uses the European context to historically situate art collections in Australian teacher education institutions. The F.M. Courtis Collection at La Trobe University exemplifies how such teaching collections continue to contribute to teaching and learning today.
The Creation of the 'Hong Kong Visual Arts Education Web' and the Use of the Inquiry-Based Teaching Approach
ANITA NG HEUNG SANG
Volume 28.2
This article describes a collaborative action research conducted by a lecturer and several primary school art teachers, who between 2001 and 2006 created the Visual Arts Education Web ('iii web') in Hong Kong. The creation of the 'iii web' was accomplished through research that employed questionnaires, focus group discussions and individual interviews. Teachers' perceptions of using websites in teaching were examined, art education websites from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Mainland China and the USA were compared, in order to create a website that could meet the needs of Hong Kong primary school art teachers. Inquiry-based learning is one of the important teaching approaches that were introduced during the Hong Kong Education Reform in 2003. An example of using the 'iii web' to teach public art is described to illustrate how the teacher and students used inquiry-based learning in art education.