Children from an early age enjoy making marks (Matthews, 2003). Many theories have been comprised on children’s development however when talking about the arts eduction one theory is closely linked (McAuliffe, 2007). Work by Lowenfeld and Bittain (1987) describes 4 stages that can help educational practitioners engage and understand more about a child’s work. Although with times changing and children coming from various backgrounds and environments it is not as easy to simply put a child in a specific stage (McAuliffe, 2007). As we grow many of us loose touch with our imaginative and creative abilities however to a child a simple line on a piece of paper could be an intrepretation of their whole world, thoughts and feelings. That scribble that we may see as a mess could be a monster flying on a rocket ship to planet Mars.

 

Being a creative person myself I find it upsetting that as adults many of us feel that drawings and creative pieces of work need to be “perfect” or represent something that we as adults understand and see in our lives.

As children develop they begin to focus on features and many have a fear of not being accurate (McAuliffe, 2007).

We also need to understand that as teachers we can incorporate the arts into various areas of the curriculum. Literacy and numeracy often take priority in educational environments however enabling children to engage in these subjects can be done by incorporating the arts into these areas. Giving children a story to read or a short passage from a piece of literature that they are studying and allowing them to doodle or draw both on or around that piece of writing allows children to interact with the document and express what they understand and feel without giving words the priority.

In most classrooms a child is asked to write a sentence and draw a picture about their sentence however what if as educators we allow children to express their understanding of literature through art.

It is clear that the arts allow children to develop in all areas of the curriculum and no matter what sage of development a child is at there ‘mark making’ matters.

Music Matters

I always loved the thought of being able to play a musical instrument and read musical notation. I tried my best to learn the guitar and keyboard however I struggled and multiple experiences throughout school made me doubt my ability.

Music can be used as a tool to express our thoughts and feelings. During a seminar as a class we listened to 5 different pieces of music and discussed how these made us feel. It was interesting to note that we all had our own interpretations. Music can create a setting in our head and it is interesting how our imagination begins to work when we hear music being played. We got the opportunity to listen to a piece of music and create a story board based on the music.

Cross-curricular

Art and music are linked because they both allow an escape from reality and an opportunity for us to express ourselves. Within a classroom setting we can integrate music and art into various areas of the curriculum, for example children could listen to a piece of music and create a picture on what the music made them think of. After creating their art work they could write a story on top of the picture.

References:
Matthews, J. (2003) Drawing and Painting: Children and Visual Representation. 1st ed. London: SAGE publications.
McAuliffe, D. (2007) Fondation and Primary Settings. In Teaching Art and Design 3-11. (Edited by Sue Cox, Robert Watts, Judy Grahame, Steve Herne and Diarmuid McAuliffe) London: Continuum