Here is a paper that Kathy Douglas and I wrote for the 2010 Hofstra Symposium on Play.
The art room is humming with
activity as the teacher moves about collecting electronic portfolio data with
his camera, snapping images of children engaged in a variety of art activities.
Four first grade girls are working with wooden blocks at the “architecture
center.”
The teacher asks, “What did you
ladies build?”
“A hotel and tower,” answer two girls simultaneously.
“You built a tower?” replies the art teacher.
“It is a thousand years old,” one block artist explains.
Another collaborator has a different reply, “It is a dozen years
old.”
“That’s really old. Who lives in your building?” asks the teacher.
The four girls look at each other and in unison reply with
giggles,
“OBAMA!”
In another part of the room
at the “construction center” six children are creating airplanes, catapults and
stick puppets with glue and cardboard. Near the “drawing and painting center”
more children work with a combination of tempera paints and drawing materials
on large sheets of paper creating compositions with colorful lines and shapes.
A six-year-old girl marches up to the teacher and proudly presents her painting
to him. The teacher asks, “What’s going on here?”
With a big grin she exclaims, “It’s a play set!”
The teacher studies the painting containing a composition of
carefully arranged lines and spaces. “A play set? What kind of play do you do?”
With a tone of seriousness, the student points to different areas
of the painting and responds, “You play on stuff, like that’s a play set, and
that’s a play set and this is a big play set.”
“Really?” replies the teacher.
“Yeah, you can take a picture of it,” exclaims the conceptual
artist.
The snapshot of the painting is taken and the young designer hauls
her treasure away.
Choice-based art teachers
understand that play provides critical pathways to intellectual and creative
growth and are able to observe the influence of play in the development of
artistic behaviors. Play is a natural means for children to extend their
imaginative and creative realms (Brown, 2009; Greenspan & Shanker, 2004,
Kindlon &Thompson, 1999, Vygotsky, 1978).
Choice–based art education pedagogy provides for instruction, materials,
time, space and opportunity to facilitate dynamic learning experience generated through
self-directed action and play.
A rationale for choice
Art educators have known
for some time there are cognitive and behavioral differences among the
students they serve. Viktor Lowenfeld first described the visual and haptic
characteristics of learners in art education programs in 1939. Later, Howard
Gardner proposed the multiple intelligence theory. Steven Pinker and other
evolutionary psychologists have written about the role of genetics in the
development of mind. More recently, brain-imaging research shows profound
differences in the rhizomatic constellations of neurological structures within
the human brain. This work provides compelling evidence for the need to
differentiate learning experiences in children's educational experiences and has broad implications
for pedagogy, curriculum and instructional design.
The psychological
foundations of meaningful learning are based on the stimulation of the senses
and emotional attachment. Choice teachers who work with heterogeneous
populations understand that opportunities for constructing new
knowledge and skills into long term memory require emotional connectivity. Learning must have integrity and credibility with the students who experience
it. Students have to care about their learning, or it goes into one ear and out
the other. Authentic learning
experiences are personal and profound. Choice-based art teachers provide
students with the knowledge, tools and opportunities to engage in authentic
artistic experiences.
The first things that students construct
in TAB art programs are ideas. Students learn that ideas can be generated from
within by observing and seeing, through feelings and emotions, recalling
memories, and exercising imagination. Students engage in experimental processes
with concepts, materials and art making techniques, which often include play. Students view choice based art rooms as special places,
where they are safe to express in their art what they are feeling and thinking in the moment.
In TAB learning environments, children know their ideas are important and the teacher is
in their corner (Douglas, Hathaway & Jaquith, 2007). A first grade
boy explains to his teacher in detail, how his toy invention works.
Joe:
“It’s an airplane that shoots from there, and it has a little ladder here.”
Teacher:
“Show me how it works?”
Joe:
“Actually this thing is for flying.”
Teacher:
“It’s for flying?”
Joe:
“Ya, so it doesn’t get away from you, and you throw it into the wind. You can
hold on to it.”
Teacher:
“That’s amazing. Where do you come up with these ideas?”
Joe:
“I even decorated the wings.”
Teacher:
“You decorated the what?”
Joe:
“The wings!”
Teacher:
“Does that help it fly?”
Joe:
“No. I just decorated it. I even decorated the gun.”
Teacher:
“Oh. You decorated the gun too, that’s important.”
Joe:
“I colored it.”
Teacher:
“You sure did.”
Joe:
“Guess what else? I did that side, and that side.”
The choice-based art room is one of the most important spaces in
the school. It is an umwelt (Cunningham, 1992), a place where
children have permission to individually and collectively construct illusory
ideas and imaginary worlds. Students
connect, transform and internalize art education content, knowledge and skills
with ideas that have actual meaning to them. It is no wonder that many students
in choice-based art programs are compelled to make unscheduled visits to the
art room, to volunteer their time, visit and chat with their teacher, over the
course of the school day. They feel an emotional attachment to their art room.
Choice art rooms are
designed as 21st Century (http://www.21stcenturyskills.org)
learning environments. Unlike traditional classrooms designed for didactic
pedagogy, 21st Century learning environments support, accommodate
and optimize individualized learning experiences and promote the positive
interactions and interpersonal relationships between children and teachers.
Choice teachers empower students to become innovative, creative thinkers on
their own terms in natural and holistic conditions. Play is a necessary psychological component
in the generation of authentic art ideas, and our students have that option
because freedom, trust and responsibility are distinguishing features of choice
art programs. Choice classrooms are carefully designed to stimulate the senses
while informing learners about art education content. These environments are
powerful settings where students learn about art on self- directed pathways.
Learning in the choice
art room is consensual. Teachers respect children’s individuality. Students are
able to control and direct their art making activities. Supporters of
traditional art programs, where students are restricted or coerced to
comply with teacher-directed activities simply cannot make that claim. An interview with a 5th grade student reveals
much about the quality of his experience in a traditional didactic art
education program:
Matt: “Well, when I was at my other school, being creative was
especially frowned upon.”
Teacher: Uh huh.
Matt: “I made an alien clown and I got a D!!! One time we were
making self portraits, and they said if you don’t do it right, you will have to
do another one. I used red, and they said, don’t use red. And then they said,
OK, we are not gonna give you another one, until you get a bad grade, because
you did it a wrong way.”
Teacher: “You’re kidding me?”
Matt: “No”
Teacher: “How did that make you feel?”
Matt: “My…it made me feel like; it just makes me feel mad. My art
wasn't appreciated there.”
Art learning should be something you do, not something done to
you.
Learning art content and much more through play
Fourth graders Evan and
Mark are at the block center.There are Frank Lloyd Wright and Frank Gehry
posters on the wall and illustrations of other building forms along with key
words and information on architecture, geometry and engineering. Their
choice-based art teacher has had conversations with them about the importance
of balance, gravity and structure in their block building experiments. An
examination of their dialogue during a block play session reveals not just
their understanding of how critical balance and structure is in building
design, but other more important behaviors critical to their success as adults
in the 21st Century:
Evan: Oh wait, Ohhhh, there’s a boo boo…(Entering a critical phase
in the construction of an experimental tower about three feet tall.)
Teacher: You’re playing with high stakes risks.
Evan: Ok, ok…Hold on, hold on, hold on (Reminding Mark to be
patient while adding another block to the tower.)
Teacher: You might lose it all.
Evan: Hold on, hold on, hold on.
Mark: Let’s try to do it this way.
Evan: It’s curving this way; we need to add more weight on this
side.
Mark: Yes!! Yes! (Successfully balancing another block on the
tower.)
Evan: We need to add more weight on to this side Mark.
Teacher: Mark, you only had two little blocks holding up the whole
thing!
Evan; Ok, ok. Ok, if we apply any weight to this side, then we
have to apply another part of a weight to the other side (classmate John
appears on the scene).
Mark: John! John! John, John, look at this!
Evan: Here is the time of truth.
Mark: John, look at this! Those two little blocks right there are
holding up the whole thing!
Evan: Ok, Here is the time of truth! (Tension building as Evan
tops the block tower off with two more blocks).
Mark: Yes!!
John: Bang!
Evan: Ok. (Block tower begins to tilt.)
Teacher: Oh my gosh!! Oh my gosh!! (Gravity takes over and the
tower crashes onto the floor. Blocks explode everywhere.)
Evan: That was awesome!!
Teacher: Mark, Mark, what happened? Evan, what happened?
Evan: Not enough balance. But it was cool in the making.
Mark: Ya.
Teacher: Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh, you lost it all.
Mark: This is the block I was about to add.
Evan: All right. These two blocks were holding up the whole thing.
The boy’s block
play experience reveals many things: not only immediate, relevant learning
about balance and architectural structure, but also collaboration and
cooperation. Evan and Mark were able to build a tower with very little
foundational support and then identify and create solutions for keeping their
tower up in the air as long as possible. By utilizing their knowledge of
balance, the boys were able to build a fairly tall structure. The unifying of thought
and action or praxis, is critical for motivation and provides students
opportunities to develop their own personally relevant, emotionally profound
learning opportunities (Gude, 2007).
Test vs. play
With all the benefits of
student-directed play—social, intellectual, skill building, one would think
that play experiences would be an integral part of school, at least in the
lower grades. Some people say that play
is gone from schools because teachers lack time, money, and smaller class
sizes. And even at the Kindergarten
level many teachers report that unstructured play has given way to paper/pencil
test prep exercises. Under intense
external pressure to prepare for standardized tests children in schools across
the U.S. endure a curriculum that values conformity and the memorization of a
laundry list of isolated facts, over activities that promote authentic
learning, creativity and innovation.
We feel strongly that this is
counterproductive. Over use of tedious, paper/pencil test prep activities does
not address 21st Century learning skills nor do they meet the needs of the
whole child. Nearly 25% of all American children do not graduate from high
school (U.S.Dept.Ed, 2008)—many discouraged because learning is narrowly
channeled. Diverse learner’s needs are
not met. Tightly controlled behaviorist approaches to learning are completely
at odds with scientific research that shows children learn best through sensory
based, experiential and stimulating play-like activities.
Even in traditional art programs
play experiences may be fundamentally inhibited because students have less
control to direct their own learning. Many art educators feel students learn
best while solving teacher-designed problems and projects. However, when considering
that throughout the school day, children are told what to do in their regular
classrooms, when it is time to experience art education in the traditional
program, students are told once again, what to do, and are coerced into doing
it by authoritarian art teachers who expect compliance. We have observed that
many children do not find relevance in such activities and are turned off by
art class. Child-initiated play on the other hand, allows students to become
problem finders, and lets them feel
the “need to know” that can result in deep learning. An interview with a former
student who has experienced both traditional and choice based art education
experiences sheds light on this phenomenon:
Madison: “I was expecting to come into this class,
and have you tell me what to draw and you gave me free art, and because of
that, I found out what I want to do for the rest of my life.”
Teacher: “Whoa!”
Madison:
“Actually for a while, I was getting into sports and stuff, and into biking,
and actually, I got a video camera, an old, old video camera, and I got some
tapes for my birthday, and on my twelfth birthday, what I did, I went out into
the desert, with a bunch of guys who were jumping over ramps, and I like, in
between two of the trick runs, and ok go! And I would watch them go over and
film in different angles, and I got like a long vertical. Now I didn’t break my
camera, but actually I taped it to the tip of my long board, and went around
like that and got different views and moving the angles.”
Teacher:
“So you are in the desert doing experimental photography with friends and you
taped a video camera onto your skate board? So you are getting into video and
still photography also?”
Madison:
“Actually, for Exchange City, I was our video operator in both 6th
and 7th grades.”
Teacher: “When you were in fifth grade here, and you
were a new student here, and I allowed you to use that camera. Do you remember
that little digital camera?”
Madison:
“I do. I fell in love with that camera the first time I used it.
That
is it. And I remember the big one. That one is my favorite. I fell in love with
that camera the first time I held it. I felt like I could see through it a new
perspective and energy and a different world through the lens of a camera. And
it opened up so many new doors for me. I loved it.”
The choice approach provides regular
opportunities to investigate and solve self-initiated problems and to explore
and express ideas conceived through the sensory, emotive and imaginative
realms. Executing the steps to realize an idea and representing it in two,
three, or four dimensions requires an individual to pay attention to a vast
array of quality control details. If child-directed play is valued as a
psychodynamic means to develop artistic behaviors and intellectual capacity,
choice-based pedagogy provides educators with a potent alternative to
traditional teacher-centered art education models. Play, with all its benefits,
is taking place now in choice-based art studio classrooms across the world.
Over 900 educators are members of the Teaching for Artistic Behavior online
professional learning community (www.teachingforartisticbehavior.org)
dedicated to supporting choice-based art education teachers and their programs.
Choice Studio Approach: Who’s in Control of the Art?
Choice-based art teachers are sensitive to cognitive diversity in
the heterogeneous populations they serve (Douglas & Jaquith, 2009). Choice
art programs are structured for individualized learning. Classrooms are
designed with studio centers--teacher-created learning environments set up for
self -directed learning with available media. A choice- based art class usually
starts with a mandatory five to ten minute lesson or demonstration for the
whole group. During this teacher-lead instructional event, essential knowledge
or artistic problems are shared with learners. Immediately, afterward, students
may work from knowledge or ideas disseminated during the whole group lesson or
conduct art activities independently at one of the studio centers. Materials
and techniques in these centers have previously been introduced in earlier
whole-group lessons so that students have prior knowledge of the materials,
procedures and techniques involved in working at the center. This is the
hallmark of the choice art education approach. Individuals have opportunities
to choose learning activities according to their needs and make decisions
regarding the material, content, ideas and direction represented in their art.
In this vibrant setting, students learn from the teacher, from resources and
directions in the centers, from peer coaching, and from their own explorations.
In a choice-based teaching for artistic
behavior (TAB) classroom students work at their own speed and from their
strengths. They can follow a line of thought over time and often develop
a working style. They can use what they know to show what they know, as
their interests are explored in visual form. Students learn from and work
with their peers, often forming cooperative groups and engaging in positive
social interactions.
Teachers provide time, space, materials, instruction and spirit.
When students work independently, teachers can observe what students know and
can do. Because students are encouraged to make art about their interests
and passions, their toys and games and imaginations play a huge part in their
subject matter. When students have a play idea, they often use the choice
studio as a venue for creating what they need.
Centers can include paint, printmaking, fiber arts, collage,
construction, masks, puppets—often with simple performance spaces, bookmaking,
digital art, as well as drawing. Architecture centers offer block play,
and digital cameras capture amazing ephemeral events.
Conclusion
Placing students at the periphery of curricular decision making,
coercing them to comply with assignments and educational activities of which
they have had no input, and rendering them as passive recipients of knowledge is
problematic. Not only does it limit the possibilities of what students are
capable of creating and learning, it removes them from the experience of
designing and solving their own problems. From an art advocacy perspective,
this is poisonous. One cannot make the claim that art education experiences
empower students to become independent, innovative, creative thinkers if they
are left out of the decision making processes central to the ideas they
express. Play is a critical component in the child’s development of creativity
and higher order thinking skills. Children are the designers of the adult.
Educators should not be afraid to harness the dynamic psycho-emotional forces
of play when designing curriculum and educational activities. One of the most
important things policy makers and educators should be doing is supporting the
personalization of educational experiences and facilitating a love affair
between the student and his or her learning. Choice-based art teachers
understand that intellectual rigor and creativity are best developed from the
inside out and provide a flexible curriculum within dynamic, stimulating
environments that enable meaningful cooperative and self directed learning
experiences.
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