The Arts
The state developed Essential
Academic Learning Requirements are the guiding principles behind art instruction
at Cascade. Each art class is designed to help the student grow in the four
areas identified as essential in the EALRs. Beginning
this year we have added guitar and advanced art to offer students more choices
in learning about the arts.
Introduction
to the Arts
The Arts for Today and Tomorrow
“The Arts are an essential part of public
education. From dance and music to theatre and the visual arts, the arts give
children a unique means of expression, capturing their passions and emotion,
and allowing them to explore new ideas, subject matter, and cultures. They
bring us joy in every aspect of our lives.
Arts education not only enhances students’
understanding of the world around them but it also braches their perspective on
traditional academics. The arts give us the creativity to express ourselves,
while challenging our intellect. The arts integrate life and learning for all
students and are integral in the development of the whole person.
The Arts communicate and speak to us in ways
that teach literacy and enhance our lives. We must continue to find a place for
arts programs and partnerships not only for what it teaches students about art,
but for what it teaches us all about the world we live in.”
Dr.
Terry Bergeson
State
Superintendent of Public Instruction
November 2001
What are the Arts?
The Arts Defined
– The arts are creative expressions using sound, image, action and movement.
They are a means to satisfy the human need to communicate thoughts, feelings,
and beliefs.
Purpose – The arts engage
those capacities most characteristically human – imagination, creativity, the
ability to conceptualize and solve complex problems – by stimulating skills,
which are essential to learning. The arts are catalysts for change. They are
vital in this rapidly changing multi-media age. They facilitate and encourage
the exchange of views, reflecting and shaping cultures. As technology changes,
so do the tools and materials of the arts. Students are prepared through visual
arts, music, drama, and dance to interact effectively in a dynamic world, with
joy, confidence, and a sense of fulfillment.
The Arts and Education – Whether our
civilization can remain dynamic, nurturing, and successful will ultimately depend on
how well and how fully we develop the capacities of our children, not only to
earn a living, but also to live a life rich in meaning.
Intellectual Development – the arts
represent one of the primary modes of thought used to do essential work in a
world at large. Through the study and practices of the arts, students employ
sound, image, action, and movement to learn to solve problems, make decisions,
think creatively, and use imagination.
Social Development – The arts
represent a legacy of common achievement, a heritage of civilization that
teaches us about ourselves and others. Arts education
is essential to enable students to make sense of both historical and contemporary
cultures. It also provides students with knowledge of past cultures,
recognition of their place in contemporary culture, and insight on roles and
responsibilities regarding cultural change.
Personal Development – Study of the
arts also produces personal benefits, including motivation, self-discipline,
and perseverance, willingness to take risks, cooperation, collaboration,
productivity, craftsmanship, and thus, self-esteem.
Aesthetic Development -
The arts provide benefits not available through any other means. Through arts
education, students learn how to express themselves through the arts, interpret
works of arts with deeper understanding, and more fully appreciate the natural
designed world. Study of the arts provides unique opportunities to work with
student’s individual differences in learning styles, personalities, and ability
levels while challenging those students in a process of continuous refinement
and growth with the goal of achieving the highest possible standard of their
work. This process not only leads to understanding of one’s own work and that
of others in the arts, but also develops skills, which are highly sought after
in the world of work.
Essential
Academic Learning Requirements —The Arts
2.
The student demonstrates thinking skills
using artistic processes.
To meet this standard
the student will:
2.1.
Apply a creative process in the arts:
·
Conceptualize
the context or purpose.
·
Gather information
from diverse sources.
·
Develop ideas
and techniques.
·
Organize arts
elements, forms, and/or principles into a creative work.
·
Reflect for
the purpose of elaboration and self-evaluation.
·
Refine work based on
feedback.
·
Present work
to others.
2.2. Apply a performance process in the arts:
·
Identify audience
and purpose.
·
Select artistic work
(repertoire) to perform.
·
Analyze structure
and background of work.
·
Interpret by
developing a personal interpretation of the work.
·
Rehearse, adjust, and refine through
evaluation and problem solving.
·
Present work
for others.
·
Reflect and evaluate.
2.3
Apply a responding process to an arts
presentation.
·
Engage actively and
purposefully.
·
Describe what
is seen and/or heard.
·
Analyze how
the elements are arranged and organized.
·
Interpret
based on descriptive properties.
·
Evaluate using
supportive evidence and criteria.
3.
The student communicates through the
arts.
To
meet this standard the student will:
3.1.
Use the arts to express and present ideas
and feelings.
3.2.
Use the arts to communicate for a specific
purpose.
3.3.
Develop personal aesthetic criteria to
communicate artistic choices.
4.
The student makes connections within and
across the arts to other disciplines, life, cultures, and work.
To
meet this standard the student will:
4.1.
Demonstrate and analyze the connections
among the arts disciplines.
4.2.
Demonstrate and analyze the connections
among the arts and other content areas.
4.3.
Understand how the arts impact lifelong
choices.
4.4.
Understand that the arts shape and
reflect culture and history.
4.5. Demonstrate the knowledge of arts careers and the knowledge of arts skills in the world