ARTful Teaching

ARTful Teaching

Dr. Cynthia Vascak

Teaching with heart and from the heart is a concept that resonates easily; one we can readily identify with.  “Artful”, on the other hand, is a more difficult descriptor to grasp and is loaded with stereotypes and individualized understandings –often used to describe others but not ourselves.  Consider how you interpret the words ART, ARTISTIC, and ARTFUL…….

These words are usually associated with special objects, things, performances, or events we can see or view such as paintings, sculptures, sonatas, dramatic performances or dance – and the artists who make them – not with teaching and learning. – ourselves.

Instead, Let us re-consider “Artful” as describing many kinds of activities and behaviors that we all do everyday – describing what we do whenever we fully engage in activities with inspiration, care, connection, and mindfulness.  I have a colleague from Korea who has told me that the Korean word for ‘ART’ is a combination of two concepts:  Beauty and Skill thus Art is understood as creating beauty through skill. We could be baking a cake, preparing a garden, reading a book, ironing clothes, writing a letter, savoring a dessert, or walking in the woods. When we do so artfully, we engage our sense of wonder, imagination, and capabilities of care – bringing our heart, mind, and spirit all into play.

The anthropologist, Helen Dissanayake, believes that we, as human beings, each have an innate capability to create, invent, imagine, and discover. Without these capabilities we would not have survived as a species (Dissnayake 1988).  In essence, we each have the seeds of creativity and artfulness planted within our genetic make-up. These seeds of creativity and artfulness can be watered and cultivated until they thrive and flourish or they can be neglected and inhibited until they either wither, are forgotten, and become dormant. But the miracle of the seed is that its life force is still present just waiting for the conditions needed for sprouting and growing.

Artfulness belongs to each of us. It is not reserved to the ability to create special works of Art, but is a way of living and behaving and of transforming the ordinary into something special  - consider the evolution of the earliest Paleolithic tools from purely functional to elaborately decorated and embellished.  Consider how you move into a dwelling and immediately start the transformation from dwelling into home.  Making special is also a fundamental human need and proclivity. Be this as simple as cooking a special meal, wearing special clothes for a celebration, finding ways of saying or doing something in a special way.

I learned this so poignantly from my mother-in-law when she stayed with us for three months:  As a child, my chore was to do the ironing…I think my mother saved all the ironing and kept in a crumpled mountain all week – and every week I uncrumpled the pile. I hated ironing with a passion. As an adult, I have always avoided ironing and did so on an as essential basis.  My mother-in-law asked to do the ironing – she wanted to do the ironing and when she ironed she sang –I asked her why ironing was so pleasureful for her?  She answered, “ because I take this – all wrinkled and terrible looking – and I make it beautiful…She engaged her self as an artist whenever she ironed. To this day, ironing has also become an artful activity for me and I thank her for that lesson.

Story:  I am an Artist

            I have shared these understandings of Art with my students across all levels from first grade to CAGS - Many of my students have developed an habituated stereotypical attitude towards Art and Artistry which represents, I believe, our cultural norm of elitist Art and art makers and which represents a narrow conception of “real” Art as photorealistic painting, drawing, or sculpting.  As early as first grade, I found that my students believed that art was the making of exquisite naturalistic-representational pictures by special adults called artists.  I wanted to help them be able to value and cherish their personal art images and to see themselves as artists - to believe in themselves as artists.  I read them the book, I Am An Artist by Pat Lowrey Collins.  The story begins:

“ I am an artist when..... I stop and listen to sound of crunching snow in the still forest, when look for falling stars in the night sky, when I look at an orange until I feel round too.......and ends,  “ and you are an artist too whenever you stop and look and listen carefully to the world ...”                                         

Following this reading, we brainstormed in three small groups: when were we artists?  Their ideas included:

            I am an artist when I am coloring and making patterns...

            I am an artist when I see a deer running into the dark woods...

            I am an artist when I go over a jump on my sled and feel like I am a rocket

            shooting off all the way to the moon...

            I am an artist when I jump out of a tree and pretend I am parachuting....

The children proudly proclaimed themselves to all be artists from that day forward.  I have also shared this same book with my students at Plymouth State
University who attended my course, Visual Literacy, an Art Integration course designed for Elementary Education Students .  One of the components of this class included the weekly reflective writing and responding to our readings, class discussions, and studio explorations.  Most of my students had never entertained even the slightest or remotest possibility of considering herself as even being a tiny bit artistic.  One student wrote:

 “All my life I was led to believe that I was not a good artist, but I learned in this class that no matter what you do, you are an artist.  Just playing on the soccer field, as I did all my life, I was an artist on the field.  I had my own style of playing and I played with grace, skill, and coordination.  Just because I was not using art materials does not mean I was not being an artist.”

Similar stories emerged:

“In many classes that I have had before, I have never felt confident that I could draw or do art.  It was always not right, because it had to be what the teacher wanted it look like, or it was just something you colored in and if it was the wrong color, then you would get laughed at.... those teachers made me think that I could not make art no matter how hard I tried.”

“The greatest thing this class has done for me is taught me to overcome my fear of art making and the sense of “ I can’t” which often accompanies one’s doubts.  I was able to think about my own perceptions and misconceptions about art and myself as an artist.  I’ve learned that I am an artist.”

“ For many years I ignored my artistic interests because I was afraid of failure (from a previous experience with a rather harsh art teacher).  Creating art has allowed me to open the doors to creativity, and has allowed my imagination to run wild.  I have unveiled a new confidence in my artwork, and I am no longer afraid of failure.  I have finally realized that there is nothing to lose, as long as you give it your best shot.”

One of my personal favorites:

“ I remember one quote form the Corita book by Meister Ekhart and it was, the artist is not a special kind of man, but every man is a special kind of artist.  That quote was one of the first things I learned from taking this class and I only wish I had learned it earlier.  The quote means to me that art is something that comes from your heart and soul.  It is something that you create to express yourself.  The art you make can mean something to you but something totally different to someone else.” ( All of these writing are from my personal collection of student writings from PSU).

The voices of these students remind us that not only is art making a basic human drive, it is a fundamental need – and  also how fragile when not supported or valued. As educators, we must ask ourselves how and why our  innate capacity for creating art slowly diminishes and erodes to such an extent that by the time our children graduate from High School,  most of them no longer believe in themselves as artists or creative spirits..  Even more poignantly, can we ask ourselves how can we, as educators, nurture this capacity and guide it to flourish and blossom continually?

The root of the word creativity means to find connections and relationships.  This we do everyday (Kent 1986).  Finding connections and building relationships is what good teaching is also at the heart of what artful teaching is all about. Just think about the special teachers in your own life who have inspired you. Recall the times when you have inspired others. Let us begin to look at teaching through the lens of artfulness. 

Simply watch children at play. Their world is one of wonder, discovery, imagination, and possibility.  Their innate artfulness bubbles out of them as pots and pans become an orchestra, the space under a draped table a magical kingdom, and the top of a tree, a sailing ship.  Most children arrive at the doorsteps of schools with the fullest of creative spirits, a longing for discovery, a heart and mind full of questions, and a fascination for learning.  Our federal institutions demand that no child be left behind and that America will achieve 100% literacy.  Yet they do not address the vast difference between not being left behind and success for all students, between rote performance on standardized tests and the sense of wonder and awe of individualized learning, between the meeting of literacy standards and infusing children with a love and passion for reading, composing, discovering, creating, and learning for fulfillment throughout their lives. Between conformity and finding one’s unique talents and capabilities.

Artful teaching emphasizes creative process as inherent in all learning experiences. When we engage students through artful teaching, learning becomes infused with inspiration and meaning. We shift from habituated consciousness and habits of mind to a state of heightened perception, connection, discovery, and envisionment. We open ourselves to the wonder of the world around us – the world of nature, ideas, inventions, things made special, Self, and others…

I would like to close with two quotes:

From St, Francis

“He who works with his hands is a laborer

He who works with his hands and his mind is a craftsman

He who works with his hands, and his mind, and his heart, is an artist.”

From Parker Palmer

“ Good teachers possess a capacity for connectedness. They weave the connections between themselves, their subjects, and their students on the loom of the heart.”

Thank you