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A U.S. art educator, Arthur Wesley Dow, synthesized Japanese and U.S. culture in his philosophy of art education. This paper portrays the process of cross-cultural interpretation as a way for an individual to make sense of his or her world in relation to those of others. The paper seeks to explain Dow's legacy in terms of the Oriental cultural tradition of art, noting that it is because his ideas were derived from his views regarding the nature of art rather than from a particular conception of children's artistic development that a multicultural heritage of art education is exemplified in Dow's interest in Oriental art. The paper discusses Dow's contribution to U.S. art education and considers interpretations of his transformation of Oriental art, speculating on spirituality and Hsieh Ho's first canon, ch'i, and notan. Contains 41 references. (BT)

This paper begins with the following quote from Michel Foucault: "People know what they do; they frequently know why they do what they do; but what they don't know is what what they do does." The context of the paper and the policy directions considered encompass the past decade and take the National Curriculum as an intervention in curriculum that rehabilitated standards to signify the neoconservative, restorationist, or neocorporate agenda that replaces and works against the progressivist education of the 1960s and 1970s. Although the National Curriculum project did not rely upon the use of standards, the structure and emphasis in the "Elements of the Profile" are on levels, level statements, outcomes, pointers, and work samples. The paper finds that a sample of recent literature and commentary on standards reveals: (1) the currently high levels of popular community support for an education addressing the standards are welcomed by politicians and expressed through statutory authorities; (2) there is a contention about standards in the measurement field; and (3) standards policy frameworks do not guarantee improvement or quality reform. Each of these represents a set of problems for art education. Within art education several attempts have been made to articulate a position about standards that will enable a standards discourse to work for art educators, and it reviews the papers which comprise these attempts. Contains 35 references. (BT)

This case study of artist/researcher Ursula Kolbe was undertaken in 1998 to extend understanding of the complexity of the process of teaching and learning in respect to children's interactions with visual arts materials. The following questions prompted the research: how does a teacher who is also an artist work with young children? and does a background in visual arts influence a teacher's orientation toward children's graphic and three-dimensional work in the way that teacher interacts with children? Data were collected by observation of Kolbe's interactions with children aged 20 months to 6 years at the Institute of Early Childhood, a school at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. Coding patterns of interaction that appeared in transcripts from the audiotaped interactions enabled the researcher to identify the recurrent themes of Kolbe's practice. Interviews with Kolbe allowed perspectives, rationale, and approaches to be clarified. Identification of recurrent themes resulted in the selection of four key principles: (1) furthering skills in visual discrimination and enhancing the aesthetic qualities in children's work; (2) ensuring that physical conditions support exploration; (3) recognizing and acknowledging children's conceptual interests in graphic and three-dimensional work; and (4) extending children's work in visual education. This case study provides an insight into the way an Australian teacher, with a background in the visual arts and a strong interest in the Reggio Emilia approach, works with young children. (Contains 13 references.) (BT)

This paper describes a disruptive model of interpretation which explores positions in discursive practices embedded in visual culture as a means of understanding self and difference. The model understands interpretation as a Foucauldian technique of the self, and its use may give art teachers and students strategies for understanding the social construction of interpretation, self, and difference through discursive positions. The model developed from a deconstruction of the responses from Grade 11 visual arts classes in two high schools in New South Wales, Australia, and emerged from text deconstruction as a tying together of modernist practices of interpretation with a postmodern understanding of the construction of interpretation and/with self. The basis for this disruptive model is found in the dilemma of authoritative (modern) interpretation and multiple voices (postmodern) interpretation. The first part of the model establishes an authoritative interpretation from sources such as artists, critics, historians, and teachers, and an examination of the discursive practices of the interpretation forms the next part of the model. (BT)

This project explored the learning interchanges which took place between early childhood student teachers and young children, provoked by three-dimensional installations within a children's art exhibition. The exhibition, comprising both two- and three-dimensional artworks, contained over 280 artworks from 15 early childhood programs in the southwest region of Queensland. Children aged between 17 months and 6 years came to the gallery to see their own artworks and the artworks of other children. The project focused on the three-dimensional installations, which generated substantial dialogue and creative expression among the children and student teachers. The project encompassed four phases of investigation: (1) children's responses to and interactions with the three-dimensional artworks at the exhibition; (2) student teachers' exploration of symbolic representation within the context of the exhibition; (3) student teachers' extension of children's representations through a process of sharing their own symbolic representations with children; and (4) children/student teacher exchanges of creative works within their respective contexts. (Contains 15 references.) (BT)

Situated at a place where art meets collaboration and speaking to the 1999 InSEA World Congress's "Cultures and Transitions" theme, this paper tells a collaborative story that began as an "art-i-fax/art-e-post" project initiated via the Getty Center's educational Web site and has led to combined art projects and exhibitions across the globe. The initial project (involving the making of collaborative artworks by students of all age groups) led to an interest in the role that collaborative art plays in individual and group practice, as well as in art curriculum. The project has informed the authors' use of technology within the art realm and has led to an awareness of the "technology trail" that exists within and across cultures. The paper itself is constructed as a collaborative project over the Internet and examines the thoughts of an Australian art educator alongside those of a U.S. counterpart. (Contains 10 references.) (BT)

How is the next generation going to live within and use the city? This study of the urban environment provided students with opportunities to learn about the function of architecture and planning, to identify their beliefs and opinions, to consider a range of views, and ultimately to make informed and responsible choices concerning the built environment and community values. This paper is designed to assist teachers to integrate urban study concepts with daily lesson plans. Starting in Hagersten, a suburb south of Stockholm (Sweden), teaching resources are being developed and distributed via CD-ROM and the Internet; these resources will be used in schools from suburbs and cities as a cultural relay. By devising a cultural relay between schools and cities, students and teachers learn to appreciate and study the city. Students and teachers use the city as classroom and textbook, learning about buildings, green spaces, transportation networks, and influences from different cultures and periods. Teachers of social science, languages, arts, and music have all collaborated on the project. Contains illustrations. (BT)

In October 1995, the Australian Parliament received the report of the Senate's Environment, Recreation, Communications and the Arts Reference Committee, entitled "Arts Education." This report was released just prior to an election and, as a result, its recommendations were subsequently ignored. These recommendations, some responsibility of the Commonwealth for arts education, also identifies many that are the province of the states. The only changes in arts education since 1995 have been deleterious ones. This paper highlights key recommendations for visual arts education made in the report and calls for a revival of the initiative. The paper's purpose is to try to ensure that the issues raised before and reported upon by the Committee are not overlooked. (Author/BT)

A study surveyed 99 teacher education students from the Instituto de Educacao de Nova Friburgo (Brazil) by asking open-ended and private questions to know the number and/or the access of students to existing artistic and cultural languages. The research was divided into two stages: (1) an investigation about the information brought by the students from several teaching institutions so that their realities could be known; and (2) a research project conducted by the students themselves about the artistic and cultural languages with the key focal point occurring when each student group presented their results to the class. There were seven languages (music, plastic arts, dance, theater, film, television, and literature) identified for stage two so each class was divided into seven groups to research the languages with different themes. In part two of stage two, the essence of part 1 was maintained, by trying to encircle the country's regional or folkloric knowledge. The general knowledge was limited to the specific one, according to the area or region, changing from the macro to the micro. In part 2, the folkloric languages that permeate Brazilian popular art were emphasized. Results note the difficulties, limitations, and deficiencies of the school and the educational structure of the state and the country. The study noted that students had difficulties in their development of knowledge, with the cultural codes interpretation, and especially with the decentralization of the class over the teacher who knows everything and teaches everything. Includes two graphs with the study's results. (Contains 11 references.) (BT)

This paper reports on the introduction of an exploratory program on emotional development, "Drawing Emotions," through which instructors try to: (1) help the child learn how to deal with feelings; (2) ascertain relational difficulties; (3) apprehend their own questions which were not answered; and (4) interfere in the presence of risks and development crises. To change the conceptions of teaching and learning, the first step was a collaboration among university teachers, elementary teachers, and 8- and 9-year-old students, in which the students made some drawings about emotional subjects that revealed the "difficulty" of social and emotional processes related to daily family experiences. A qualifying analysis of those drawings was made according to the thematic contents of Marge Heegaard (1988) related to family difficulties (traumatic situation, serious disease, death of a family member, separation and divorce, etc.). The "Drawing Emotions" program was organized into 10 modules that were subdivided into large themes, and the paper details the use of those modules and themes. Three hundred drawings showed frequently the use of family models and media, in which were identifiable emotional expressions and normal attitudes in occidental societies. These common figurative drawings could be distinguished according to aspects such as sex and socio-cultural system. Contains 29 references. "Drawing Emotions" program material is attached. (BT)

This paper discusses the relationship between "language" and "visual language." The paper describes two integrated teaching projects (children ages 4-11) in Croatia in which English as a Foreign Language and the visual language are presented as two potential common languages for young people to improve their communication in the process of learning to live together. The visual language is given the role of communication with others (children and elders, locally and internationally), the environment (natural, urban, global, endangered by wars), oneself (own feelings), and artworks (language of art, multiculturalism). The paper concludes that the analogy between a verbal language and a visual language has proved to be quite justified, on condition that the polysemy of visual forms is kept in mind. Contains 25 references. (BT)

This paper seeks to answer two questions: What are the trends in schooling today? and How can the arts help translate these trends into practice? It is said that the successful curriculum of the future will be one that helps students collaboratively perceive, analyze, interpret, and discover a whole new range of meanings. The paper focuses on curriculum, identifying the intellectual tools that will be required in the future: problem solving, critical thinking, motivation for lifelong learning, civic responsibility, and self direction. The paper describes each tool. It then discusses the arts curriculum, citing the worldwide trend to include strands or organizers, which address creating, making, and presenting; arts criticism and aesthetics; and past and present contexts. The paper concludes with some relevant quotes concerning the arts from Garth Boomer of South Australia, cited as an "extraordinarily visionary educational leader." (BT)

This paper seeks to reinterpret the idea of art in daily living in a postmodern stance to keep pace with changes in Korean society. It briefly describes the sociopolitical context for art education in Korea in the 1990s and the internationalization movement. The paper presents a conceptual analysis of art in daily living and explores its application to Korean education. As Korean art education was largely based on the Japanese model, the paper then examines the Japanese adaptation of Western ideas from the United States. (Contains 15 references.) (BT)

This paper seeks to bridge two United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) themes in education: learning to know and learning to do. The paper discusses the place of each theme in art education, interpretting "learning to know" as art's reflective component and "learning to do" as art's productive component. It provides a short history of productive and reflective art education in the Netherlands and furnishes a comparison of concepts in the Netherlands. Through a theory and practice notion, the paper constructs a new classification for arts education. (Contains 3 figures and 15 references.) (BT)

Cultural understanding and intercultural communication are important for young people in today's world. Many communities, including Australia, are still negotiating reconciliation with indigenous peoples and the harmonious acceptance of all cultures within the national community. Addressing the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) education theme, "Learning to Live Together," this paper discusses Brisbane (Australia) Catholic Education's Key Learning Area of Cultural Literacy and Languages. The paper outlines both the curriculum framework and the practical application of the theory. A series of teaching modules has been developed to exemplify the infusion of five key concepts across the curriculum. It discusses two modules used in developing visual arts, "Using the Bible from an Asia-Pacific Perspective" and "Mambo Meets Manga." (Contains 10 references.) (BT)

With the recent recognition by the Singapore government that the country's education system must change radically to meet the challenges of the new millennium, all levels of education, from primary to tertiary, in all areas, have been undergoing close scrutiny and restructuring. Three educational initiatives recently have been launched, emphasizing creative thinking, the use of information technology, and national education in all subjects. This paper looks at the incoming changes in the area of secondary and tertiary art education and examines the various, and often complex, factors for and against their successful implementation. (Contains 11 references.) (Author/BT)

This paper describes an alternative art education methodology grounded in feminist emancipatory epistemology and poststructuralist theory. The paper takes a short journey through the author's research, touching on concerns about epistemology and methodology, and by looking more closely at the application of discourse analysis to the research data. It concludes by addressing implications for art education curriculum. (Contains 22 references.) (BT)

This paper is the work of an international student studying within the School of Art Education at the University of New South Wales, Sydney (Australia), who has undertaken doctoral research on the teaching and learning experiences of international Asian graphic design students within the setting of an overseas university. It identifies the nature of the students' cultural transition and the particular difficulties and dilemmas encountered. The paper considers the researcher's own experiences while teaching "outside her culture" at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, some years before. It finds that underpinning the way educators communicate in design is the use of coding systems and semiotics and that, to function in Malaysia, new systems were needed. The researcher/teacher contends that the experience of teaching in Malaysia caused her to re-evaluate her teaching strategies and psychology and her previously held perceptions of her subject. (BT)

Among African cultures, the creative process is regarded as the most important because it is usually done jointly as a culturally shared communal activity. For Africans, art is normally functional and the artifacts carry more meaning when they are in use. This paper focuses on the communal making of art, rather than just the aesthetic appreciation of artifacts, in an effort to highlight this activity as an important social phenomenon among African people. The paper presents the author's own experience of making and playing with these artifacts, followed by an analysis of the interpretation of this process by other authors. It concludes with some speculations about the cultural, personal, and educational effects of the loss of this cultural activity among the present generation of the Nguni young people to which the author belongs. (BT)

This study uses document analysis and comparison to investigate the connotations of National Standards for Visual Arts of the United States and Taiwan. The major difference between these two sets is the content structure. The U.S. standards focus on the differentiation of students' abilities by grade based on six content areas of arts disciplines. The Taiwan standards emphasize the differentiation of subjects by grade based on three aspects of arts disciplines. An analysis of the structure reveals that the Taiwan arts curriculum standards cultivate expression/creation, comprehension, and practical application skills, while the U.S. standards cultivate performance, comprehension, and the skill of incorporating art into other subjects. Suggestions are made for the development of art curricular reform in Taiwan. (BT)

This paper discusses the development and implementation of the system-wide assessment of arts learning in primary and secondary schools that took place in Western Australia in September 1996. The paper describes the background to the assessment, the design brief, and the assessment package as a whole, focusing on the visual arts tests. It discusses issues that arose during the development of the test and outcomes highlighted in the data analysis. (BT)

In general, children between the ages of four and eight criticize works of art based on their subject matter, color, pattern, or related combinations of these criteria. Between the ages of 8 and 11 children begin to notice their feelings, the artist's ability, and the expressive qualities of a picture. After the age of 11 children become increasingly interested in the evocative qualities of a work. This paper compares how children and adolescents of different grade levels respond differently to works of art, focusing on the following areas: (1) describing works of art; (2) the manner in which they state their preferences; (3) what kind of criteria they use for judging works of art; and (4) the differences between the preferences and judgments they made in responding to works of art. The paper reports that 517 students in grades 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, and a university were randomly selected from three public schools in Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China, three schools in Kinman, and one university in Taipei. Each subject was asked to respond to three types of paintings by answering three structured interview questions. The paper presents and discusses findings from the study. Findings suggest that when the individual's aesthetic ability has developed to the highest point, then the individual may no longer separate preference concept from value judgment concept. Contains a figure and 22 references. (BT)

This paper presents a narrative of a case study conducted in an Ohio middle school as part of a 5-year nationally funded reform program, Transforming Education through Art Challenge (TETAC), which features the arts as central in integrated/interdisciplinary curriculum planning. In the school the paper reports on, there are approximately 64 teachers involved in the study from various disciplines, as well as two university researchers. The paper states that as a group the educators are constructing a concept of school reform as a continuing process. It explains that they are looking at the operational and managerial aspects of schooling to enable the arts to play a pivotal role in the development of integrated curriculum. The paper identifies and illustrates the myths and realities of school reform programs with partial tales of experiences from this case. It states that a developmental explanation of integrated curriculum will be introduced and applied in this case. (BT)

This research project outlines the role of art education as a part of the professional identity of people working in different fields of art and education and explains the relationship between the productive and receptive dimensions of art education. Also, the project presents a theory on the relation between visual and verbal conceptualization. The main goal of art education is seen as the development of the learner's personal and cultural identity. The project uses an experiential-constructivist model of art learning that evolved in the wide context of visual culture. The project consists of case studies and interviews that explore the elements of identity formation. First, the project approaches the cultural and social identity of kindergarten through university students through the concept of multiculturalism and assesses the role of social background, nationality, ethnicity, gender, and different groups in producing and interpreting images. The second part focuses on the construction of an art educator's professional identity. The third dimension investigates classroom interaction from the point of view of visual conceptualization. Finnish art works from the 1980s-90s are used for assessment. (Contains 25 references.) (BT)

This paper considers the artistic and literary movement called "Postmodernism." Noting that postmodernism is intellectually grounded in the premise that its discourse must expose positions of privilege and power relations in society, the paper asks of art education, How much has the postmodern condition, a thesis of cultural relativism that denies that we can step outside of custom to judge custom, affected our domain? The paper first discusses the early 20th-century movement called "Dada" as a precursor to the postmodern condition. It explores Marcel Duchamp's "art making," when he abandoned painting and began to work with industrial or commercially produced materials that suited the expression of his ideas and his iconoclasm. Duchamp attempted to escape the realm of aesthetics, but in doing so he created a new aesthetic field. The paper then discusses the ideas of several postmodern theorists, including Pierre Bourdieu, Jean Baudrillard, Jacques Derrida, Arthur Danto, Fredric Jameson, and Robert Dixon. It contends that the notion of postmodernism as it applies to visual arts needs to be clearly defined and that the greatest danger art education faces is the inability of many educators to unravel the complexities of postmodern discourse and put into perspective its role in artistic discourse. (Contains 20 references.) (BT)

This paper discusses artistic and educational events that have occurred in Slovenia during the last two years, including a graphic art exhibition of children's work. The paper introduces the author's work over the past two years and tells why these artistic events have a fundamental importance for his future research and advising work. It explores some prevailing influences of art competitions that often undermine student motivation and change teachers' basic understandings of art education aims. The paper presents some details from the author's ongoing research regarding student motivation in art classes with 12- and 13-year-old students. (Contains 12 references.) (Author/BT)

For decades there has been no formal evaluation system to ensure the quality of art teaching in Hong Kong. Additionally, although the syllabi for art are open and flexible, art teachers do not have adequate knowledge to develop a balanced curriculum. This study investigates what constitutes good art teaching and the extent to which art teachers can develop criteria for evaluating art teaching and use these criteria to reflect upon and improve their teaching. Three paths comprise the research: (1) preliminary interviews to establish a Hong Kong context for evaluating art teachers; (2) Part 1: a survey of secondary art teachers' perceptions of knowledge and competencies; and (3) Part 2: an action research project to test the working hypothesis that developing standards of good art teaching through reflective inquiry will help teachers to evaluate and improve their practice. Synopses are provided of the preliminary interviews and Part 1. Part 2 is discussed in detail. The paper explains the test module and the theoretical framework. The test module consists of four principles: (1) Good art teaching as a frame; (2) Practice-into-theory; (3) Dialogue journals as tools for reflecting on/improving practice; and (4) Developing and using standards of good practice for self evaluation. The paper discusses three themes that emerged from the study: (1) reflection on practice; (2) learning from peers; and (3) teacher change. (BT)

This paper aims to investigate the New Zealand assessment and qualifications reforms at the senior secondary school level within the political contexts of educational reform of the 1990s and the resulting effect for assessment in art education. These reforms involved a swing to an outcomes based model of assessment and the resulting qualifications were structured into a series of levels, described as "The Framework" (Ministry of Education, 1994). The development of The Framework and standards based assessment systems in New Zealand gave rise to a dramatic polarization of views that occurred between various educational groups and exposed a basic conflict of interest as to how assessment should be managed and how inclusive it should be. Standards based assessment is defined as that which measures the performance of a learner against set standards of achievement or competence; unit standards are descriptive statements of what an individual should know and be able to do. A table shows comparisons of art assessment at the senior secondary level (15-18 years old) under both traditional and standards based assessments. Contains a 21-item bibliography. (BT)

This study investigates what thinking skills are needed to be a good artist or art student, particularly in a secondary school art course. Following a review of the literature, a qualitative approach was used to identify, describe, and classify the thought processes that are seen by the participants as being conducive to success in visual art. The principal methods of data gathering employed were participant observation, open-ended interviews, and examination of personal documents. The study addressed two related populations in a 2-stage model using what Sullivan and Hawke (1996) have described as the novice-expert paradigm. Stage 1 involved research with eminent practicing professional artists. Stage 2 involved research with art students in their final year of secondary school in Australia. Findings from the study are summarized and discussed. (Contains 3 tables and 11 references.) (BT)

This paper focuses on some of the issues from a study that questioned the validity of the proposal advanced by the influential North American curriculum movement referred to as "Discipline-Based Art Education" (DBAE); that the methods and understanding of artists, art critics, aestheticians, and art historians can be represented in a model of artistic knowledge that is framed as a coherent and integrated system of naive to sophisticated performances. The interpretation of data focused on the pedagogical dialogue about the authentic representation of artistic practice, specifically the role of the journal, or process diary, as an example of the way in which answers to empirical questions are more often than not counterintuitive. It reports that the study's two respondents are at best intuitive in their meta-representations of their performances and at worst misrepresent what they do, albeit in an unconscious and therefore concealed way. It finds that the manner in which the two produce their works, including process diary use, is sophisticated in ways that do not align with the characteristics and categorizations set out in DBAE. The paper elaborates on these findings and on the two respondents' methods of producing art works. Contains 18 references. (BT)

While creating an art form which is foreign to an artist's cultural expression may seem like taking a risk in today's world, it may provide a way to successfully negotiate a fulfilling living and working space on this diverse planet. Movement into a foreign space, often referred to as a border crossing, can be understood as a central meeting space. This paper discusses the 1998 exhibition at the Maitland Art Center in Florida, "Ofrendas/Border Crossings," where 20 Latino and non-Latino artists made ofrendas, or Day of the Dead altars. The exhibition can serve as a model for multicultural education beyond the code signifying the inclusion of non-white races and ethnicities, which negatively reinforces a white/other binary dynamic. The paper tells the stories of many of the artists who made and exhibited ofrendas, finding that all of the artists felt they had traveled to a new space and had negotiated the territory for their benefit. It suggests that this new space can act as a "contact zone" that dissolves bigotry based on simplistic cultural conceptions. Contains 14 references. (BT)

Descriptions of the creative disposition are caught in a dilemma. If the spontaneous origination of ideas is a product of discrete mental dispositions, then how are these intentional traits made intelligible within conventional discourse? On one hand art students are obliged by teachers to find creative authenticity inside their own intentional resources. On the other hand students begin to realize that the originality of their achievements is rewarded in conformity with art educational convention. This paper tackles the contradiction of "learning to be creative." It presents a pilot study that posits creativity as misrecognition within the practice of art education, specifically that misrecognition of creative autonomy in various emergent forms takes place in the transaction between teachers and students, students and students, teachers and teachers, as well as teachers and others. Detailed observations were made of some 75-minute lessons in which a visual arts teacher introduced a new unit to a senior (Year 11) class (n=19). Presents in detail the theoretical framework. Discusses the results in terms of symbolic capital, focusing on the teacher's strategic command of the classroom. (Contains 42 references.) (BT)

This paper explains the method and value of critical aesthetic inquiry when researching the teaching of art. The paper contends that teaching is an art, and the only appropriate way to research art practice is through an artistic approach to critical inquiry. The paper explains how art education research is distinctive from scientific research. It then explains the framework of critical aesthetic inquiry, including the basic theory, data gathering instruments, and methods of analysis. It addresses the methodology's limitations and realms of effective application. (Contains 27 references.) (BT)

This paper reports on research-in-progress motivated by the need to educate Visual Aesthetic Education (VAE) teachers. The research asks, how VAE teachers can find a referential to orient their pupils' work in this time of aesthetic controversy and technological/economic pressures and do this adequately for a class of 30 pupils. The paper summarizes two earlier reports that asked what VAE development is possible and actually takes place in the classrooms. The paper then presents, from the research-in-progress, a synthesis of the emergent valuation referential, drawn from a qualitative analysis of student dialogues in which the teacher tried to remain a mirror-mentor. (BT)