On Art and Art Education~by Rama Hughes
What does Art teach? by Elliot Eisner
1. The arts teach children to make good judgments about qualitative relationships.
Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules prevail, in the arts, it is judgment rather than rules that prevail.
2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.
3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.
4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and opportunity. Learning in the arts requires the ability and a willingness to surrender to the
unanticipated possibilities of the work as it unfolds.
5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The
limits of our language do not define the limits of our cognition.
6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.
7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.
8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities
to find the words that will do the job.
9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling.
10. The arts' position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the young what adults believe is important.
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press. Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.
Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules prevail, in the arts, it is judgment rather than rules that prevail.
2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.
3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.
4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and opportunity. Learning in the arts requires the ability and a willingness to surrender to the
unanticipated possibilities of the work as it unfolds.
5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The
limits of our language do not define the limits of our cognition.
6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.
7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.
8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities
to find the words that will do the job.
9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling.
10. The arts' position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the young what adults believe is important.
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press. Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.
Become Visually Literate!
What is Visual Literacy?
Visual literacy is the ability to evaluate, apply, or create conceptual visual representations. Skills include the evaluation of advantages and disadvantages of visual representations, to improve shortcomings, to use them to create and communicate knowledge, or to devise new ways of representing insights.
Visual Communication- The everyday use of visual images, objects, places and experiences. Counterpart to reading, writing and mathematics. Signs and Info graphics, etc.
Art- The deep exploration of oneself through visual means. It may have no particular function or preconceived expectations. The quality, production or expression of what is beautiful, appealing or of more than ordinary significance. Explore visual media and what it means to be human the way scientists explore life and the universe.
Design- The application of visual thinking to solve problems and enhance the quality of life for others. 2D and 3D product design-counterpart to applied science. Cars, tools, etc.
Visual Culture- The everyday visual world of folk art, crafts, pop culture, vernacular architecture, mass media and all other images, objects, places and experiences we maintain as part of our cultural id. Counterpart to social studies.
Visual literacy is the ability to evaluate, apply, or create conceptual visual representations. Skills include the evaluation of advantages and disadvantages of visual representations, to improve shortcomings, to use them to create and communicate knowledge, or to devise new ways of representing insights.
Visual Communication- The everyday use of visual images, objects, places and experiences. Counterpart to reading, writing and mathematics. Signs and Info graphics, etc.
Art- The deep exploration of oneself through visual means. It may have no particular function or preconceived expectations. The quality, production or expression of what is beautiful, appealing or of more than ordinary significance. Explore visual media and what it means to be human the way scientists explore life and the universe.
Design- The application of visual thinking to solve problems and enhance the quality of life for others. 2D and 3D product design-counterpart to applied science. Cars, tools, etc.
Visual Culture- The everyday visual world of folk art, crafts, pop culture, vernacular architecture, mass media and all other images, objects, places and experiences we maintain as part of our cultural id. Counterpart to social studies.