Art: Why Art Education?

What does art education do for the individual and for society? Why do we teach art? How does art contribute to education at all levels?

There are many good answers to these questions, but three points stand out as crucial in today's social and economic climate. We believe that art (and, therefore, art education) means three things that everyone wants and needs.

1. Art Means Work
Beyond the qualities of creativity, self-expression, and communication, art is a type of work. This is what art has been from the beginning. This is what art is from childhood to old age.

Through art, our students learn the meaning of joy of work…work done to the best of one's ability, for its own sake, for the satisfaction of a job well done. There is a desperate need in our society for a revival of the idea of good work: work for personal fulfillment; work for social recognition; work for economic development. Work is one of the noblest expressions of the human spirit, and art is the visible evidence of work carried to the highest possible level.

Today, we hear much about productivity and workmanship. Both of these ideals are strengthened each time we commit ourselves to the endeavor of art. We are dedicated to the idea that art is the best way for every young person to learn the value of work.

2. Art Means Language
Art is a language of visual images that everyone must learn to read. In art classes, we make visual images, and we study images. Increasingly, these images affect our needs, our daily behavior, our hopes, our opinions, and our ultimate ideals. That is why the individual who cannot understand or read images is incompletely educated.

Complete literacy includes the ability to understand, respond to, and talk about visual images. Therefore, to carry out its total mission, art education stimulates language-spoken and written-about visual images.

As art teachers, we work continuously on the development of critical skills. This is our way of encouraging linguistic skills. By teaching pupils to describe, analyze, and interpret visual images, we enhance their powers of verbal expression. That is no educational frill.

3. Art Means Values
You cannot touch art without touching values: values about home and family, work and play, the individual and society, nature and the environment, war and peace, beauty and ugliness, violence and love. The great art of the past and the present deals with these durable human concerns.

As art teachers, we do not indoctrinate. But, when we study the art of many lands and people, we expose our students to the expression of a wide range of human values and concerns. We sensitize students to the fact that values shape all human efforts, and that visual images can affect their personal value choices.

All of them should be given the opportunity to see how art can express the highest aspirations of the human spirit. From that foundation, they will be in a better position to choose what is right and good.

This article is courtesy of the National Art Education Association, www.arteducators.org.

Product Roundup

AMACO Air Dry Modeling Clays
AMACO Air Dry Modeling Clays are available in white, gray, or terra cotta. These moist clays are ready to use right out of the box for sculpting, hand modeling, or even throwing on a potter’s wheel. Any clay tool can be used to shape or cut designs into the clay. Allow finished pieces to completely air dry slowly and evenly on all sides before decorating. Use school paints, temperas, acrylics, and liquid crayons for decoration.
www.amaco.com

ARTS ATTACK
ARTS ATTACK is an award-winning DVD-based visual art curriculum for grades K-8. Its objective is to teach every child how to express himself/herself through art. This demands that students learn to see and experience the world in a different way. The language of art, like that of words, requires the learning of skills and concepts that will allow the free flow of expression.  The goals of ARTS ATTACK are to teach the elements and principles of art and drawing in a developmental and sequential way, as well as to study the art of other artists, cultures, and historical periods.
www.artsattack.com

Creativity Express
Created by former Disney animators and professional educators, Creativity Express is interactive visual literacy software for children ages 7-12. The program is a blend of animated storytelling and interactive activities that teach the principles of art and provide the tools for creative self expression. The program contains 16 modules that explore the elements of art and creativity, and projects that allow children to put these concepts to use in artwork that they can create on the computer with the digital paint software included, or with their own traditional art supplies.
www.madcaplogic.com

Scene-A-Rama
Scene-A-Rama Classroom Packs are educational art-integrated learning kits that encourage students to think outside the assignment, increase knowledge application skills, and reinforce comprehension and retention. Choose from four different subjects: Erupting Volcano makes Earth Science class explode with total student involvement; Tepee Village strengthens knowledge of Early American studies as students create their own unique settlement; Cell Structure reinforces science fundamentals from nucleus to ribosome and Creative Mask helps students learn about cultural influences through artistic design.
www.scenearama.com

Trampoline
Take your students on a journey through art history, from cave art to the present with Trampoline Learning Programs for Young Minds. Teachings focus on great movements in art, as well as the influential artists and works of art that emerged in each period. Each lesson features pertinent vocabulary and hands-on activities that allow your students to become artists themselves. Teacher's Guide Books include: Prehistoric & Ancient Art; Gothic Art & the Renaissance; Baroque & Rococo; Neoclassic Art & Romanticism; Realism, Impressionism & Post-Impressionism; and Fauvism & Modern Art. 
www.trampolinelearning.com

Jonti-Craft Paper Tray Cubbies
Tired of wrinkled paper? These efficient paper-tray cubbies are designed so that 8.5-inch by 11-inch sheets of paper lay without wrinkling. They are great for assignments, art paper, and computer centers. Cubbies are available in 12-tray, 24-tray, or 36-tray units.  They feature freckled gray laminate with edge-banding and matching trays and are available in nine colors.  They are caster-mounted and mobile. Write-n-Wipe recessed back is standard. 
www.jonti-craft.com