Integrating Arts into the Curriculum to stop Apathy

As a high school English teacher, I have always been puzzled (and frustrated) by my students’ apathy toward learning. Some students still care about doing well and feel good about turning in their work. They really appear to be driven from within. These intrinsic learners are rare, however. Most of my students do not care how they perform. They fail to see the value in doing well.

My own kindergartener comes home from school, excited about learning. What is the difference? An emphasis on the arts, I believe, is the difference, along with the time to explore how one learns. In the primary grades, kids are still encouraged to do art. My child brings home all kinds: teacher directed projects such as specific worksheet-directed art, more obscure samples of art where I have him tell me what the “assignment” was, and stories of music and gym class. He is tested at the kindergarten level, however, on his letters and decoding skills and will be assessed again in the spring, and I am sure that thinking creatively through the art he is participating in will enable him to enhance his mandated test scores in the future. Right now, he has a love of learning. What scares me as a parent is the very real possibility that he will end up as a student in my classroom, apathetic to his own education, driven only by the test.

The value of arts in education is not really an arguable at all. When looked at objectively, it is a must, a non-negotiable, a mandate that our schools need to embrace. It’s all about the money, though, and art is seen as nonessential. Eric Jensen (2001) says, “There’s good evidence that (art) activities are not only what makes school interesting to many students, but what also can help boost academic performance”...

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...th these things. Once familiar, our students can go out into the world ready for anything. And if a tiny thing like art can do all of this, isn’t it valid? I think so.

Works Cited

Armstrong, T. (2000). Multiple intelligences in the classroom (2nd ed.).

Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Catterall, J.S. (2002). Overview: Arts and the transfer of learning. Critical Links. Retrieved October 7, 2007, from http://www.aep-arts.org/resources/research.htm p161-172 PDF The overview

Gallas, K. (1991). Arts as epistemology: Enabling children to know what

they know. Harvard Educational. 61(1), 16-26. Retrieved October 10,

2007, from ProQuest database.

Jensen, E. (2001). Arts with the brain in mind. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Style, E. (1996). Curriculum as window and mirror. Retrieved October 7,

2007, from http://www.wcwonline.org/seed/curriculum.html