Exploring Partnerships in Creativity
We at Rockman et al have been studying the role and impact of incorporating visual, musical and performative arts in K-12 education. Through independent evaluations of education programs led by the San Jose Museum of Art, SFJAZZ, and Silicon Valley Creates, we’ve examined what happens when outside teaching artists partner with schools, teachers, and young people to infuse art, music, and other forms of creative expression into learning? What kinds of creativity and learning transpire? What constraints hinder or enable student learning, in particular among youth who have limited access to art and music production?
While research has pointed to diverse educational benefits of integrating arts, many public schools have seen the dramatic decline of arts education.(1) When schools are forced to cut budgets, music, art, and drama education are often the first areas to suffer. In addition, more than a decade of policies focused on high-stakes standardized testing in English literacy and math has inadvertently narrowed the curriculum.(2) Schools identified as in need of improvement under No Child Left Behind (NCLB), and those serving predominantly communities of color, are more likely to have experienced the loss of arts education.(3)
To address these trends, some cultural institutions have developed strategic partnerships with local schools to bring qualified teaching artists into the classroom. In 2013, the San Jose Museum of Art launched Sowing Creativity, an integrated visual arts residency program that supports STEM learning through hands-on art-making projects. “We knew we wanted to draw on our strength as an art institution,” Alysia Caryl Manager of Education and Youth Programsexplained. “Our focus is to use art making as a bridge to discovery and interest in STEM.”
Rockman’s evaluation of Sowing Creativity found that the initiative nurtures students’ interests in creative pursuits, while facilitating new experiences in artistic and STEM practices. The process of making art alongside a passionate studio artist can capture students’ imagination and help to build their creative confidence. We have observed students, who struggle to maintain interest or focus academically, become completely absorbed in their art projects. Teachers have capitalized on increased student engagement to motivate the participation of sometimes reluctant learners in other subject areas.
Across our studies, the research has also illuminated how art making serves as a tool to support the development of young people’s soft skills, such as building self-esteem, empathy, positive risk-taking, and self-regulation. A classroom teacher in San Jose Unified School District observed:
“Doing art helps some students to gain better control during stressful times. When they’re feeling overwhelmed, most students choose drawing to help themselves calm down. We talk about ways to cope with stress.”
Student participants realized that making art can help manage their emotions:
“When I’m mad or whatever, sometimes I draw…It doesn’t really matter what…It makes me like take my mind off the thing.” (4th grader)
“If I’m stressed out, drawing helps me calm down.” (4th grader)
Similarly, research on music education in schools has illuminated how learning music facilitates learning other subjects and enhances skills that children inevitably use in other areas.(4) Since 1983, SFJAZZ has reached out to youth with a variety of immersive and interactive educational programs. From jazz concerts, to hands on learning in classrooms, SFJAZZ’s School Programs have provided students access and exposure to the rich and deep history of jazz as an essential and unique American art form. In late 2017, SFJAZZ received a generous grant from the Stupski Foundation that provided funding to expand their school programs to more than 23,000 students in 70 schools in San Francisco and Oakland.
SFJAZZ’s Jazz in the Middle residency sends jazz musicians and poets into middle school humanities classrooms to present history of jazz from a social, historical, and creative perspective. At an elementary school in San Francisco, Rockman researchers followed a local jazz teaching artist and classroom teacher who collaborated on a semester-long curriculum focusing on Puerto Rican and Latin American music and culture. Through lecture, media and performance, students were introduced to the history and significance of regional musical genres. Students learned percussion, and created presentations featuring their own personal spoken word performances.
Students were willing and excited to experiment with different forms of musical expression. They incorporated difficult personal themes into their performances, which served as a catalyst for discussion of complex topics such as domestic violence, gender identity, bullying and mental health. The shared learning and performance experiences through music brought the class together, stripped away social boundaries, and provided a safe space for personal self-expression. At the end of the semester, the class performed their work for the entire school at a student assembly. Three students performed their spoken word pieces in front of a live audience at the SFJAZZ Center in San Francisco. Students who at the outset of the semester were shy and fearful, expressed powerful sentiments about their lives and the world around them.
The teaching artists across these program approach creativity as a source of positive social change. In San Jose,many of the youth who participated in Silicon Valley Creates’ The Studio“face huge hardships—addiction, poverty, crime—that create inconsistencies in their lives,”an artist said. Creative expression was used a tool to tackle real-life challenges and give voice to young people’s identities. Youth life circumstances offered openings to analyze and rethink important issues in their lives. Students learned strategies and get support to express themselves and cope through positive risk-taking. A teacher explained:
“You can watch some them [students] start to change over the project. These tough kids start to let their guard down. Many of them have such huge issues they’re dealing with. I think art lets them express themselves without having to talk about it.”
The scope of social-emotional problems that the young people confront requires an instructional approach that can “flow like water,” said a teaching artist. The Studio’s educators intentionally drew on student struggles as learning opportunities.
Incorporating visual and performance practices into the curriculum can offer a powerful means to promote young people’s curiosities, personal expression, and life skills. To read more about the diverse benefits of arts education, check out our evaluation of SV Creates’ The Studio.
If you’d like to discuss setting up an evaluation of your program or seeking funding to do so, contact us.
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1. Bowen, B. & Kisida, B. (2019). Investigating Causal Effects of Arts Education Experiences: Experimental Evidence from Houston’s Arts Access Initiative. Houston, TX: Kinder Institute for Urban Research.
Catterall, J. S. (2009). Doing well and doing good by doing art: A 12-year national study of education in the visual and performing arts: Effects on the achievements and values of young adults. Los Angeles, CA: Imagination Group/I-Group Books.
Luftig, R. (2000). An investigation of an arts infusion program on creative thinking, academic achievement, affective functioning, and arts appreciation of children at three grade levels. Studies in Art Education, 41(3), 208-227
2. Ravitch, D. (2016). The death and life of the great American school system: How testing and choice are undermining education. Basic Books.
Berliner, D. (2011). Rational responses to high stakes testing: The case of curriculum narrowing and the harm that follows. Cambridge Journal of Education, 41(3), 287-302.
3. United States Government Accountability Office (2009). Access to Arts Education: Inclusion of Additional Questions in Education’s Planned Research Would Help Explain Why Instruction Time Has Decreased for Some Students. Available at: https://www.gao.gov/new.items/d09286.pdf
4. Brown, L. (2014) “The benefits of music education.” pbs.org