Karin Abromaitis on sun 29 aug 04
The Kennedy Center in Washington DC has an extensive education department=
and program that is national. I think their programming is very inclusi=
ve and tries very hard to advocate and educate for arts education, arts i=
n education and artists in education. I've been an artist/educator for t=
he Kennedy Center for 4 years now and I know how hard I work to support t=
eachers and their efforts to maintain and bring arts into their schools. =
There are several arts advocacy organizations around-check them out.
For the Kennedy Center go to www.kennedy-center.org then go to the site =
index and look for the education links. Arts Edge in their online suppor=
t program. The Kennedy Center will send artist educators to just about a=
nywhere in the US-I've been there. Rural and small towns are NOT exclude=
d. =20
The information on the importance and usefulness of arts education and ar=
ts in education is abundant and persuasive. As I've seen so often on thi=
s list, many of us are always finding ways to advocate for kids and the a=
rts, we need to keep doing it.
Ok, my rant is over now. Its alot of words from a mostly lurker.
Karin A.
Lee Love on mon 30 aug 04
You know, we probably shouldn't blame it all on the art teachers. I
heard someone interviewed on NPR who has a new book out on drawing. He
said that what they have discovered, is that at a certain level of
development, a child's language ability expands explosively and
outstrips their ability to draw. This causes them to get frustrated with
drawing, and they lean more toward language for their expression. He
also said, that while most people think that drawing is a "right brain"
task, they have found in MRI research, that in gifted artists, drawing
it is a forebrain task. There is a lot of frontal activity trying to
cognize images in their heads and transferring them to the paper or
canvas. In unskilled drawers, drawing is a rearbrain activity, mostly a
motor activity.
I also heard Dr. Temple Grandin interviewed. She is an animal science
professor and is autistic. Her recent book is titled Thinking In
Pictures. You can read a little about it here:
http://www.grandin.com/inc/visual.thinking.html
She said that she didn't know that other people thought
with words until she heard a scientist say that before language, human
beings could not make things because they could not think the process
out before they did it. Grandin thought this was absurd, because she
always thought in images and not words and this is also how she works
out creating new equipment to use with livestock. So after hearing this,
she started asking other persons how they figured out problems and they
all said to her that the used language to solve problems.
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