Carmela Dutra's Blog - Posts Tagged "imagination"

Before I was writing I was and will always be an artist. Everything about it, how you can take something and create wonderful works of your imagination. You can take your inner most feelings and let them out for all to see it through your eyes. The arts are an essential part of education, a vital aspect of learning that is sometimes overlooked.

Some may regard art education as a luxury, simple creative activities are some of the building blocks of child development. Learning to create and appreciate visual aesthetics may be more important than ever to the development of the next generation of children as they grow up.

Motor Skills and Language Development are two areas that are greatly impacted by art. Many of the motions involved in making art, such as holding a paintbrush or scribbling with a crayon, are essential to the growth of fine motor skills in young children. For very young children, making art or just talking about it provides opportunities to learn words for colors, shapes and actions.
What about Visual Learning? Drawing, sculpting with clay and threading beads on a string all develop visual-spatial skills, which are more important than ever. Art education teaches students how to interpret, criticize, and use visual information, and how to make choices based on it.

Inventiveness: Have you ever really noticed how excited they become when they can just jump right in with their hands and start creating something. It be nothing of much clarity, but it’s what they see, feel, and are expressing. When kids are encouraged to express themselves and take risks in creating art, they develop a sense of innovation that will be important in their adult lives. Learning not to be afraid, but to express themselves how ever best they can.
The human brain is wired in such a way that we can make sense of lines, colors and patterns on a flat canvas. Artists throughout human history have figured out ways to create illusions such as depth and brightness that aren't actually there but make works of art seem somehow more real.

Our biggest contributors to history are in fact artist. Can you imagine where we would be if we didn’t have ones like; Seurat, Rembrandt, Di Vinci the list goes on. Art is what molded and shaped them, shaped our world. We owe it to our children to encourage the Arts, just as much as we do reading.

We can even take the time to teach them about both. Introduce them to books on Art, about artists and their lives. Show them the things these individuals created, and help to spark their inner artist.

Wish you all a little art in your life.

Carmela Dutra
Author of the Adventures of Lorenzo the Bear

www.lorenzothebear.com

www.blogforyourthoughts.com

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