me arts ed

Information Shared by Bangor High School Visual Arts Educator Kal Elmore

The Wallace Foundation has a report available called “The Quality of Qualities: Understanding Arts in Education” that you can access the 136 page report by clicking here. Here is the summary:

For many children in the United States, arts education, if offered at all, is uninspired and infrequent. What do arts educators and others think are the key attributes of “quality” in arts learning in K-12? Researchers at Harvard’s Project Zero explore this question through interviews, case studies and a literature review. Excellent arts education, they conclude, is “not simply a matter of adopting a research-proven set of ‘best practices.’” Rather, it requires educators and others to reflect deeply about a range of issues, including the many possible purposes of arts education, from helping students develop aesthetic awareness to helping them grow as individuals. The report includes a set of tools that can assist in making decisions about achieving and sustaining quality arts education.

BOOK- “Doing WELL and Doing GOOD by Doing ART” by James Catterall

This book sounds very interesting, here is a short review on the book. I found it on Amazon for $19.00.

This is a 12-year national study of education in the visual and performing arts on more than 12,000 students and shows powerful correlations between later-life results and participation in what he terms “arts-rich” school environments over the 12 years.  And the effects of the arts are found to be the same for low SES students.  His findings are summarized under three main observations: Involvement in the arts and academic success; Music and mathematics achievement; and Theatre arts and human development.

Remember that there is a page on the meartsed blog that has other research information.