Key words: education through art, personality development, problem solving
This presentation aims to introduce the possibilities, advantages and difficulties concerning the practice of Education through Art (ETA) and the use of art therapy in a primary school in Buda-pest. The experimental program started seven years ago and since then both the teachers and the pupils have gained signifi-cant amount of experience from the process.
The first part of the presentation examines the possible roles of Education through Art in public schools and specifi-cally in the Hungarian education system itself with historical, pedagogical and artistic references through the above-ment-ioned experiment. The analysis of the program points out the essential factors which are necessary to run this program at any primary schools, such as personal and financial questions, flexi-bility, how to make the program official, where to find time and space for the ETA classes at the school, how to organise longer programmes outside the school etc. I also try to find the rea-sons for failures and difficulties – for example the lack of protec-ted space in art therapy, finding places for ETA classes within the official timetable without taking too much time from the “traditi-onal” subjects etc.
Education through art means a certain kind of art educa-tion which uses art as the tool of forming personality. Hence
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comes the questions whether it is necessary to teach art - diffe-rent techniques and skills - when we want to use art in educa-tion? Is it necessary for the participants to have qualifications in the field of arts?
One of the main tasks of school is finding creativity and keeping it alive in every student. Unfortunately, in Hungary the case seems to be something very different: we still want the children to be able to memorize an incredible amount of lexical knowledge which leads them to the feeling of being lost in the system instead of finding themselves. Using art both in peda-gogy and therapy helps the creative processes – but while in education we usually work on making a product, in therapy we work for understanding. As for problem-solving methods, that the next generations are going to use, we can truly say that flexi-bility, team-work/cooperation, receptivity, openness will play the main roles. That is why it is essential to emphasize emotional intelligence and creative thinking in education as well.
Today’s children are definitely very different from those who were at school ten or twenty years ago. They live in an image-determined world, their way of thinking is sometimes closer to pictures than words, many of them have behaviour or learning disabilities, their skills in many fields differs from their peers’, and they often have difficulties in verbal expressi-ons which can be caused by anxiety, tension, changes in social situations, illnesses, loss, separation etc. Using art in pedagogy and therapy can give a secure way for these children to exp-ress themselves without words, to reduce stexp-ress, manage their behaviours and feelings or improve self-esteem. The teachers and class teachers can benefit from watching their pupils in an outside-the-school situation – for example during drama classes or music programmes in theatres and concert halls because the group dynamic is different in these situations.
The second part of the presentation shows two of the short-films that have been made during the programme toget-her with some project photos. In each case, it is important to say when, where, with how old children, for what reason and within how much time the work was done.
• Paper boots – a short film which was made for the 100 year anni-versary of World War I with 8 year-old children. Visual classes, role play, filmmaking.
• Fairy Garden – doodle animation based on Weöres Sándor’s poem Tündérkert with 12-year-old pupils. Visual classes, anima-tion, sound studio.
• Museum learning at the Hungarian National Gallery after explor-ing the exhibition of George Baselitz, Preview with Review with third grade and fifth grade students. Upside down portraits and prints.
• The Book of Vegetables and Herbs – the content of the book was connected to the Science Curriculum for fourth grade students.
The illustrations were made with different techniques (sketches, studies, ornaments, fantasy drawings, silk paintings) after studying and examining the vegetables and herbs. The book can be made into an interactive source on the internet for all students and can be regularly extended with new materials and information. 8, 10 and 12-year-old pupils took part in the 6-week-long project.
Finally, the presentation points out the skills and compe-tences artists, actors, musicians, therapists, artist-teachers, pedagogues must have to be able to be present in the “here-and-now” during the art programmes and classes. If they decide or if they are chosen to take part in Education through Art prog-rammes they must be reachable, open to the world in all senses and open to changes, too. They must be capable of showing the modes of self-discovery and eliciting creativity.
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