Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. THE COMPLETE EARLY CHILDHOOD ART PROGRAM Chapter 9

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. The Importance of Arts Education The arts are worth studying simply because of what they are. Their impact cannot be denied. Throughout history, all the arts have served to connect human imagination with the deepest questions of human existence: Who am I? The arts are used to achieve a multitude of human purposes: to present issues and ideas, to teach or persuade, to entertain, to decorate or please. The arts are integral to daily life. The arts are all around us, from the design of the cereal box at breakfast to the format of the late-night talk show. The arts offer unique sources of enjoyment and refreshment for the imagination. They explore relationships between ideas and objects and serve as links between thought and action. There is ample evidence that the arts help students develop the attitudes, characteristics, and intellectual skills required to participate effectively in today’s society and economy. The arts teach self-discipline, reinforce self-esteem, and foster the thinking skills and creativity so valued in the workplace. They teach the importance of teamwork and cooperation. Arts education benefits the student because it cultivates the whole child, gradually building many kinds of literacy while developing intuition, reasoning, imagination, and dexterity into unique forms of expression and communication.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. In Kindergarten through Grade 4 Young children should experiment enthusiastically with art materials and investigate the ideas presented to them through visual arts instruction. Creation is at the heart of instruction. Students learn to work with various tools, processes, and media. They learn to coordinate their hands and minds in explorations of the visual world. They learn to make choices that enhance communication of their ideas. Their natural inquisitiveness is promoted. They learn the value of perseverance.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. A Complete Early Childhood Art Program Sensing and experiencing Aesthetics Making art Learning about art, artists, and their styles

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. In other words, a complete art program for young children includes: 1.Sensory experiences 2.Beautiful and creative experiences 3.Time, space, and materials for making art 4.An introduction to the world of art, artists, and a variety of art forms and styles The first three components should be emphasized during the early years, and the fourth component gradually introduced.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Sensing and Experiencing Children may be uncomfortable discussing, writing about, or drawing things they have never directly experienced. It is dangerous to assume that all children know about and have experienced libraries, hospitals, airports, stadiums, skyscrapers, elevators, cathedrals, post offices, seashores, or museums. Encourage parents to take children places and discuss what they have experienced. In your classroom, provide as many hands-on experiences as possible through field trips, classroom visitors, and real objects that the children can explore and manipulate.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Aesthetics Aesthetics is the study of beauty—not the Hollywood view of glamour, but beauty in color, form, and design.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Aesthetics (continued) Children can use their senses and their bodies in their pursuit of beauty. Classrooms or centers can be aesthetically pleasing places and models of beauty. The room should be clean, bright, and colorful without being chaotic, cluttered, and gaudy. It should appeal to the senses and have things to look at, listen to, touch, smell, and taste. Flowers, plants, animals, soft pillows, a rocking chair, and a piece of sculpture add an aesthetic touch to the room.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Making Art Young children need to be personally expressive and creative and to experience success through art. Teachers can help children see the relationship between art and experience. Teachers can encourage children to give artistic form and substance to their ideas, urges, wishes, dreams, fears, or interests.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. A Simple Breakdown of Artistic Styles Realistic or naturalistic—attempts to represent people, places, and objects exactly as they appear. Abstract—bears only a partial resemblance to the object being represented; the object is somehow streamlined or distorted. Nonobjective—involves a creative play with color, shape, line, and design; it is abstract art pushed to the limits; what is produced bears no resemblance to any actual object.

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Art Critique First, a teacher provides some background information about the particular piece: –Who made it ? –What the artist was like ? –What the world was like at the time ?

Copyright 2015 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. Five Points for Art Critique 1.What is it? –Is it a painting, drawing, batik, weaving, or print? What are its physical properties? Is it big, small, square, round, solid, moving, or framed? –What is it made out of? Did the artist use paper, paint, metal, clay, or yarn? 2.What do you see when you look at this work of art? –Encourage children to focus on the artist’s use of line, color, shape or form, mass or volume, design, pattern, space, balance, and texture. How are these artistic elements used? What shapes do you see? What colors were used? Can anyone find lines? 3.What is the artist trying to say? –Try to put the artist’s picture into words. What is the message? Pretend that this is a book with pictures. What words go along with the picture the artist has given? Discuss what you see: people, animals, buildings, or events. 4.How does it make you feel? –Do you feel happy, sad, angry, scared, or funny? What does the artist do to make you feel this way? 5.Do you like it? –Why or why not? What is it about the work of art that makes you like or dislike it? How would you change it?