A number of modifications have occurred within the area of arts instruction, leading to a redesigning of the whole curriculum. A few transformations involve modern trends like literacy training via art, worldwide popular culture, 21st-century abilities, social justice, art evaluation, cultural diversity, and interdisciplinary approaches.
Teaching Literacy through Art
According to Moody-Zoet, art-teaching offers distinctive and useful intellectual behaviors and skill sets which aid in the learning of other academic disciplines. The following skills are introduced, cultivated and honed by arts education: craft creation capacity; task involvement and determination when it comes to task completion; envisioning, expression, and seeking of a vision for oneself; observation; reflection; stretching; exploration; and understanding of the art community/world. Arts education represents a vital component of every learner's holistic scholastic literacy. The arts, after all, are entrenched in representation and cognition, in addition to be profoundly involved in the way education expands as well as deepens people's meaning in life.
One means to instruct students is by making them curious, attentive, interested and speculating about the topic of study. It is found that students learn best if they are allowed to speak, move about freely and study by touch. The use of art for teaching comprehension approaches enables students to apply various channels of learning and, most notably, employ the approached within a written text-free setting, prior to utilizing them in learning textual matter. The integration of reading, speaking, visual literacy, and writing tactics into syllabi of visual arts courses combines numerous learning techniques. Innumerable interesting and efficient approaches are available that help children to ponder over and read, write and speak about instructional content (Moody-Zoet).
Further, Moody-Zoet claims that it is imperative to take into consideration which kind of approach is adopted: indirect or direct. For aiding students in grasping key philosophies, theories, and abilities, educators must necessarily offer direct instruction in the form of offering students information, demonstrating specific skill-based classroom activities, demonstrating inner speech or inquiry forms linked to reflective learning, and explaining and offering corrective feedback. Meanwhile, indirect instruction entails educator engagement in directing children in undertaking investigations individually as well as in groups. Children learn best through active engagement in academic activities; thus, instructional strategy design must offer students appropriate involvement opportunities. Direct and direct classroom instructional strategies include book clubs, journaling, literacy-based tasks, bell ringers, provision of professional magazines in the field (like Scholastic Art), visual thinking strategies and book arts.
Global Pop Culture
Art instruction deals with the need for appreciating and understanding modern society's visual components. Visual media have assumed increasing significance and constitute a prominent element of communication, economic progress, knowledge attainment, work-related practices, entertainment, creative growth and cultural identity. These form the fundamental facets of mankind's relationship with the overall society, reflecting their capacity of taking part in and contributing to culture. Cultivation of the aforementioned skills proves critical to all modern academic systems (Arts Education Victoria).
Therefore, in arts education promotion via worldwide popular culture, restructuring of the instructional domain have deemed instruction quality to be the key factor in enhancing child achievement. Funding of superior-quality art instructor training is vital to guarantee the creation of competent graduates who can provide stimulating, meaningful school-level art programs.
Suitable opportunities for professional growth prove imperative to the cultivation of specialist skills, knowledge upgrading, and earning of advanced degrees. Every child must independently create art as well as respond to peers' creations. Inspection, communication, insight, expression, imagination and technical skill constitute the bases for every kind of art instruction and modern life-skills. By means of art, children acquire long-term skills of creative thinking, cultural awareness, liberalism, progressiveness and technical ability. Syllabus design has to create sufficient time for arts instruction, to allow the cultivation of such qualities among children (Arts Education Victoria).
For achieving requisite visual understanding levels in modern culture and ensuring superior quality education, school resourcing is vital. Within the context of art instruction, this implies specialist visual arts training from educators skilled at covering art's conceptual as well as practical facets, technology and library resourcing, and specialist schoolroom resourcing, for keeping up with advances in culture (Arts Education Victoria).
Social Justice
In Driskell's view, the social justice concept is explicitly related to inequalities in the following contexts: democratic themes, cultural and economic conditions, citizenship, activism and social responsibility. Artists typically employ visual imagery's strengths for highlighting societal inequalities and wrongs. Visual arts may be utilized as a force to stimulate and transform society. Protesting artists ascertain youngsters' and adults' inner emotions and give these a central position when interpreting and informing community members as they gain awareness of their significance within and to the community. Such art expresses overall community needs rather than individual expression.
Social justice instruction must attempt at producing a community feeling, expressing overall community needs and actively engaging students at school as well as in society. For understanding the way social justice instruction is applicable to arts education, considering multiple art training movements dealing with cultural and social subjects is necessary. Multicultural, postmodern, social reconstruction and visual cultural arts instruction represent visual arts training strategies which urge learners to raise questions with regard to their presumptions and to engage in critical thinking with respect to social issues. The implicit objective is societal reconstruction via action in learner communities. Present theoretic concepts from the disciplines of anthropology, theology, political science, sociology, etc. shape the above movements (Driskell).
According to Driskell, social justice elements of art instruction encompass inquiry, examination, and action, with the former component being youth-driven. When posing issues, educators question children on matters stemming directly from their lives. Inquiry outcomes shift from distinct scenarios to a more generalized, society-wide context. Students personalize, deliberate on, and generalize their problems. Analysis entails observing others' complex contexts and discussing potential resolutions to their issues. Students collaboratively and critically analyze artwork in relation to the issue presented, concentrating on examining every aspect of the issue and on developing consensus. Art creation and action emerges directly out of this analysis. Art creation forms a communication channel and a means by which learners raise awareness among community members and come up with and express potential resolutions to problems. In social justice-linked art instruction, learners mingle and communicate with community members, contributing to culture formation.
Arts Education Victoria. "Art Education and Contemporary Culture." Arts Education Victoria, 2016, http://www.aev.vic.edu.au/art_education_and_contemporary_culture.pdf. Accessed 14 November 2016.
Driskell, Catherine A. "Critical Voices in Action: Teaching for Social Justice in Community-based Art Education." Georgia State University, 20 November 2008, http://scholarworks.gsu.edu/art_design_theses. Accessed 13 November 2016.
Isa, Badrul. "Multiculturalism In Art Education: A Malaysian Perspective." UNESCO, 2005, portal.unesco.org/culture/en/files/29700/1137685935. Accessed 13 November 2016.
Moody-Zoet, Erin. "Integrating Art Education and Literacy Education: A Curriculum for the Secondary Level." Western Michigan University. 2014. http://scholarworks.wmich.edu/ masters_theses. Accessed 14 November 2016.
North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. "Arts Education and 21st Century Skills." North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, 2006, http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/docs/curriculum/artsed/resources/21stcentury.pdf. Accessed 13 November 2006.
Sabol, F. Robert. "Seismic Shifts in the Education Landscape: What Do They Mean for Arts Education and Arts Education Policy?" Arts Education Policy Review, Vol 114, Issue 1, 26 Dec. 2012, pp. 33-45. Taylor & Francis Online, HYPERLINK "http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10632913.2013.744250" http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10632913.2013.744250.
Suraco, Terri Lynn. "An Interdisciplinary Approach in the Art Education Curriculum." Georgia State University, 3 August 2006, scholarworks.gsu.edu/ art_design_theses. Accessed 13 November 2016.
