Renee,
I so agree with you. I have been in education for along time. Long
enough to see all types of educational practices. One of the
strategies that I disliked the most was this. We did it back in the
80s and children that disliked school began to hate it. I was in
middle school and the children who loved music and art and were low
were not allowed to participate in any of these classes. It was not
beneficial. I think it would be better to teach these teachers how to
teach reading and writing in their separate classes Yes, the students
might need additional practice in reading,, writing and math, but so
much better to do it as part of an enriched curriculum where all
students are learning about art, music, drama, and dance. For many
students this is the only time in life hey will be exposed to the
arts. The biggest problem I have with this is if we know how to teach
reading why have they not learned how to read? How will more of the
same help them to become better readers? Reading is the way to
become a better reader not filling out worksheets, which is what
reading means to many .
PatK
On Jul 17, 2011, at 7:54 AM, Renee wrote:
Oh my..... I SOOOOO disagree with this! No child should be excluded
from equal access to the curriculum, and that includes Art, Music,
P.E., or whatever else, no matter where they are performing. In
fact, I would say that low-performing children might need these
parts of curriculum most of all.... to help them see and experience
the grand intertwining of all parts of learning. Children who are
"underperforming" according to some standardized assessment
shouldn't be punished and have their curriculum narrowed down.
Children don't need *more* reading instruction, they need *better*
reading instruction (and in my opinion, that means more actual
reading and less actual drilling).
I understand too well the frustration of having students pulled out
of class for small group instruction and in fact I am not
particularly supportive of trading students around among teachers
that people do so much of these days. But narrow the curriculum
because a child is reading below grade level? Sorry..... can't
support that one.
Some food for thought:
10 Lessons the Arts Teach
1. The arts teach children to make good judgments about qualitative
relationships.
Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules
prevail, in the arts, it
is judgment rather than rules that prevail.
2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one
solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.
3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and
interpret the world.
4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving
purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and
opportunity. Learning in the arts requires the ability and a
willingness to surrender to the unanticipated possibilities of the
work as it unfolds.
5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal
form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The limits of our
language do not define the limits of our cognition.
6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large
effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.
7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.
8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them
feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities to find the words
that will do the job.
9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other
source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of
what we are capable of feeling.
10. The arts' position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the
young
what adults believe is important.
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In
Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale
University Press. Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants
reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper
acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.
Renee
On Jul 16, 2011, at 3:13 PM, Amy Lesemann wrote:
We had arguments about this, and I lost until a new teacher came in
and
supported me. Frankly, if a student is 2 or more years- even less,
frankly -
then they really do need to sacrifice music, or art, or another
special for
extra reading instruction, and stay in the regular class for
regular reading
instruction. Before I got that extra vote in the faculty meetings,
the
remedial kids were getting pulled out of their regular classes to
meet with
me...so they were getting exactly the same amount of instruction as
everyone
else. That's not the idea. They should be participating in reading
and
writing workshop, and then going to the specialist to target their
weak
areas - in phonics, using context clues, and so on.
Good luck!
--
Amy Lesemann, Reading Specialist and Director, Independent Learning
Center
St. Thomas the Apostle Elementary School
" What was once educationally significant, but difficult to measure,
has been replaced by what is insignificant and easy to measure. So
now we test how well we have taught what we do not value."
— Art Costa, emeritus professor, California State University
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PatK
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