Renaissance in the Classroom: Arts Integration and Meaningful Learning

by Gail E. Burnaford (editor), Arnold Aprill (Editor), Cynthia Weiss (Editor)

This book invites readers to consider the possibilities for learning and growth when artists and arts educators come into a classroom and work with teachers to engage students in drama, dance, visual art, music, and media arts. It is a nuts-and-bolts guide to arts integration, across the curriculum in grades K-12, describing how students, teachers, and artists get started with arts integration, work through classroom curriculum involving the arts, and go beyond the typical "unit" to engage in the arts throughout the school year. The framework is based on six years of arts integration in the Chicago Arts Partnerships in Education (CAPE).

Renaissance in the
*fully explains the planning, implementation, and assessment processes in arts integration;
*frames arts integration in the larger context of curriculum integration, problem-based learning, and the multiple intelligences;
*provides the theoretical frameworks that connect standards-based instruction to innovative teaching and learning, and embeds arts education in the larger issue of whole school improvement;
*blends a description of the arts integration process with personal stories, anecdotes, and impressions of those involved, with a wealth of examples from diverse cultural backgrounds;
*tells the stories of arts integration from the classroom to the school level and introduces the dynamics of arts partnerships in communities that connect arts organizations, schools, and neighborhoods;
*offers a variety of resources for engaging the arts--either as an individual teacher or within a partnership; and
*includes a color insert that illustrates the work teachers, students, and artists have done in arts integration schools and an extensive appendix of tools, instruments, Web site, contacts, and curriculum ideas for immediate use.

Of primary interest to K-12 classroom teachers, arts specialists, and visiting artists who work with young people in schools or community arts organizations, this book is also highly relevant and useful for policymakers, arts partnerships, administrators, and parents.

312 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2001

Reviews

[Hannah Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great for mobilizing my thinking about the importance of an arts-integrated curriculum for all subject and about the role of public education in general. It is good because it has a concise but helpful summary of the development of public schools in the U.S.A, to start off with. The authors discuss the "pendulum swings" of the values that have been applied to education- which basically go between learning for the sake of learning and learning for the sake of serving the capitalist system. Then, they spend a good time discussing John Dewey and progressive education, and the theories that are at the centre of all alternative schooling methods (Reggio Emilia, Montessori etc).

I love that with the case studies of the CAPE program, the authors included lesson plans, summaries, evaluation charts, documentation of student work, reactions of students and teachers to the programs, etcetera...it has given me so many ideas already. I am also really glad that they focused on public schools, not private or solely charter ones. Of course, it's difficult to implement a curriculum like this in a high-stakes testing environment, but I'm interested to read more about how Chicago has done it so that I could be part of encouraging progressive methods here in Richmond. Highly recommended!