Kelvingrove is a fantastic place for people of all ages, experiences and walks of life to come and learn and be absorbed in art and culture. As it is free to enter, the museum is off limits to no-one. The building is full of inspiring and educational work and resources, accessible to all.

“Being introduced to art and culture with a global perspective develops cultural awareness, sensitivity and appreciation of diversity, this is sometimes called ‘cultural literacy’…” (Cox and Watts, 2007, p.6)

As part of this module, we paid a visit here to look specifically at the Egyptian room to gain a greater understanding of how we can utilise art to link with other curricular subjects; in this case, maths. Due to the Egyptians using drawings / symbols to depict their number system, we are able to link together the use of art and mathematics.

It is crucial to encourage and allow for inter-disciplinary learning;

“A distinguishing aspect of arts integration is its interdisciplinary connections. Connections are made between a specific art form and a specific curriculum area”. (Sliverstein, p6. This was the purpose of our visit; to see how we can help our students to learn and thrive through the Arts. Taking pupils out on a trip can be both fun and educational also, for example, at Kelvingrove, you can arrange for a guided tour and they can help explain some of the various works on display, or a class teacher could easily show their class the Egyptian room and carry out some teaching using the resources in the room.

I am very much interested in finding ways to educate children out with the classroom and allowing them the opportunity to experience different places to help support their learning. I also think there are many different ways in which the arts can be successfully linked to other areas of the curriculum.

References:

Watts, R., & Cox, S, (2007) Teaching Art and Design 3-11 Continuum International Publishing Group Ltd.

Defining Arts Integration (2010)  Silverstein, L, & Layne, S  The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts