Integrating Arts In The Classroom

Music, dance, drama, painting and drawing teachers try to incorporate academic lessons into their art classes. Students can be learning both art and academic topics at the same time. This can benefit the students extremely because it will not only engage the students in helpful activities, but it will keep them interested in learning the different topics. For example, schools may play music in the halls to introduce the students to culture that may help them to be open to learning new things in all of their classes. The painting teacher may have her student’s paint a picture of a historical event they learned about in their history class and discuss it in front of the class. The music teacher may ask the students to pick a certain song that reminds them of a book they read in their English class and explain to the class why the song reminds them of that certain book. The dance teacher might assign a dance to the students that will get them thinking of a subject to write their paper on for writing class. The possibilities are endless as to how to mix academics into the arts. It is important to do so to keep the creative juices flowing in the young minds of the students in public schools. By participating in an arts course, students are fueling their cognitive developments and are

Additionally, Paula struggles staying focused and on-task during class instruction. Paula frequently gets lost and distracted with the material in front of her, but Paula makes up for it with her dedication to answer the question correctly. Frequently, Paula observes her peers respond during whole class discussions and also answers some of the questions asked during these discussions. The teacher uses these opportunities as a learning opportunity to highlight the correct answer or guide the students into saying the correct answer. It is great that Paula wants to participate in classroom discussions because she remains fully engaged and frequently offered the opportunity to state his own understandings about the concept or skill he is being taught. Drawing on this observation and the use of intervention work, the teacher can plan future opportunities to allow the students to not only communicate their understandings about the content they are being taught, but to also further drive in the content he is being

As a student, Sara becomes noticeably distracted in class when she must listen to information that has been repeated to her. Sara’s capacity to quickly store new data in her inventory the first run through compared to her classmates’ capacities to do so explains why she tends to tune out and drift away. Sara’s teacher should make an adjusted instructional plan for Sara, for instance, assigning Sara with small tasks such as counting down from ten to keep her engaged while the other students transition into the next session of class or allow Sara to read every other page to the class to engage her in the story-telling process.

Silverstein and Layne (2010) define arts integration as “an approach to teaching in which students construct and demonstrate understanding through an art form. Students engage in a creative process which connects an art form and another subject area and meets evolving objectives in both.” Arts integration combines curriculum and teaching among dance, music, theatre, and visual art while interconnecting the arts with non-arts subjects. Integration takes many forms as teachers from different subject areas collaborate for rich curricular connections.

When used well, the arts are the cement that brings all the disparate curricular areas together. In the best schools, this is often the case. The arts are valued for their interdisciplinary potential. The result is a more cohesive curriculum in which students explore relationships across disciplines. . . . the arts in conjunction with other aspects of the curriculum afford students more complete and compelling conceptions. (p. 7)

“The arts are an essential element of education, just like reading writing, and arithmetic…music dance, painting, and theatre are all keys that unlock profound human understanding and accomplishment” (William Bennett, Former US Secretary of Education).

The warm sunshine that was streaming through the classroom window was doing nothing to help my concentration as I sat in class trying to pay attention. The teacher’s monotone voice droning on about some dead men who fought in a battle hundreds of years ago was slowly putting me to sleep.

Arts education is something that thrives off knowledge and experiences in which students are allowed to have artistic expression. Integrated arts plays a significant role in fostering the development of self expression, and confidence (Hassan). This means that an arts education facilitates students in learning how to understand things through creativity. Arts students who are provided an opportunity to do something artistic task individually, will take initiative. Being allowed to produce original art fosters creativity and creative skills, which help students in developing decision-making skills, making them more confident in their own abilities to enter the real world and be productive and efficient.

When it comes to literature and the arts is very beneficially to the learners as well as the teachers. Knowing that art integration is an instructional style and not just another activity will help teachers smoothly incorporate it into lessons. Also, knowing the types of fine arts can help with students intellectual, social, personal, and emotional skills. Students will be able to communicate better and use their cultural understanding to be greater achievers.

Art education has been proven to help with “cognitive ability, critical thinking, and verbal skills” as well as “motivation, concentration, confidence, and teamwork” (Smith). Having the ability and patience to sit down and paint a masterpiece or work through a song on the piano requires high focus and dedication. Students willing to do this will in turn have stronger skills to focus and be dedicated in other subjects. The mixture of all these abilities gained from participation in art programs lead to higher test scores and overall better performance in school. Still, these are only a few of the assets provided by art education.

Schools that offer fine arts classes have lower dropout rates and raised attendance. The fine arts positively impact students of lower socioeconomic status more those of a higher  status. The fine arts have no barriers for race, religion, and culture when it comes to being involved in the arts. Everyone is welcome and encouraged to be involved (Katy Independent School District). Without the arts these students have no outlet for creative capabilities and no way to express their talents. Students who need this way of expressing themselves are overlooked and they are the ones who need it the most (Dickson). When viewing the participation of arts in the eyes of a ten-year old, “It cools kids down after all the other hard stuff they have to think about” (Arts and Smarts: Test Scores and Cognitive Development).

After carefully evaluating three possible solutions that were presented in the previous section on implementing arts integration into the classroom, this paper will recommend the solution be, hiring an art teacher. As stated before, hiring additional teachers, for most tend to be very helpful. It can relieve stress and any additional preparation that comes with arts integration. The teacher would be able to divide the work load with the hired art teacher.

“People are forgetting that math is taught when a child is playing an instrument. English is taught when a child is reading or writing a script. Critical thinking is taught when a child is analyzing art” (Sabrina Holcomb). There is a significant correlation between participating in the arts, and success in school. Multiple studies have shown that there is a strong correlation between playing an instrument, and an increase in scores in mathematical subject. In these studies, it was also noted that students who were more creative were better problem solvers than students who were not as creative. All of these characteristics are sought after in the work force, meaning that the arts not only help during the school years, but in work and business as well (Ron Whitehorne). Also, it is important to note that “Low-income students who had arts-rich experiences in high schools were more than three times as likely to earn a B.A. as low-income students without those experiences. And the new study from the National Endowment reports that low-income high school students who earned little or no arts credits were five times more likely not to graduate from high school than low-income students who earned many arts credits” (Tyleah Hawkins). The arts have always been used as a form of expression and inspiration for people across the world, the arts have also been shown to improve high-risk student's outlook on their schooling. Research has shown that the arts help improve standardized test scores like the ACT or SAT (Tyleah Hawkins).People who support the arts believe that quality art education can help engage at-risk students in ways that other subjects such as math, science, or reading cannot. This is why it is believed that the arts are a key tool in the prevention of high-school dropout. There are many studies that point to a lower dropout rate for students who participate in

For many years schools have mainly focused on the importance of standardized test results and not about how well the students know the material. Students are just cramming for exams and then as soon as they take that test the information is lost. The need is to come up with a better solution for the students to learn. With arts integration, this goal can be achieved. This will give students a different approach to their learning which is fun and enjoyable and will make the students want to learn more. Arts integration is related to “structural, conceptual, and philosophical notions that are connected to curricular movements in schools” (Burnaford, Brown, Doherty & McLaughlin, 2007, p.1).

Children face many educational struggles while attending school, which could make schooling less enjoyable. Students attend school to learn and gain knowledge through standardized curriculum. The curriculum is mandatory for teachers to implement throughout the school year. Arts integration is designed to help the students with learning new material and to make the students feel less overwhelmed by school. Many people are affected by the outcomes of this issue and those include: students, teachers, administrators, and parents.