National Art Education Association

EditorialAuthor(s): Jerome J. HausmanSource: Art Education, Vol. 43, No. 1 (Jan., 1990), pp. 4-5Published by: National Art Education AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3193191 .

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More recently, I have been impressed with Robert Fulghum's All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten (New York: Villard Books, 1989). These are essays that reaffirm the wisdom embedded in everyday and ordinary experience. What are some of the simple observations offered by Fulghum? "Share everything. Play Fair. Clean up your own mess. Live a balanced life - learn some and think some, and draw and paint, and sing and dance, and play and work every day some." (p. 6,7)

Among other things, Fulghum has worked as an art teacher. There is a kind of freshness, spontaneity, and candor that he articulates that I have come to associ- ate with the good art teachers that I have known. They always had a way of cutting through a verbal maze; they spoke with the authority of things they knew about and could do. Reading Fulghum's book has helped remind me of these individuals as well as the power and persuasiveness of clear thinking about what it takes to make and/or respond to art.

? Vivienne della Grotta 1982

4' '' -~

Ours is a time when many are making statements about the importance of the arts in the education of all students. There seems to be consensus that great improve- ment is needed. Of course, it is not those marvelous art teachers that opened new imaginative possibilities and taught us the joys of seeing and making what we have in mind. Rather, what is being referred to are the schools with no art teachers or situ- ations in which there are individuals teaching who do not possess the neces- sary knowledge or enthusiasm to convey the power and spirit of art or situations in which art teachers are faced with virtually impossible tasks - inadequate materials, too many students, insufficient time, etc. What is being referred to are situations of neglect, indifference, and apathy.

What is being advocated? There are broad assertions about the need for a more rigorous approach to the teaching of art - the need to develop more systematic, se- quential, district-wide programs. What is being urged is an approach to education that would insure the learning of basic knowledge and information. Such an approach urges that the teaching of art be systematic, sequential, district-wide, and subject to formal evaluation. If only we can be clearer and more rigorous; if only we can develop an agreed-upon notion of "basic arts education". Of course, it is stated that "basic arts education does not exist in the United States today." (Toward Civilization: A Report on Arts Education, National Endowment for the Arts, 1988, p. 13)

Few would disagree that there is a need for dramatic improvement in the state of arts education. The same might be said for the teaching of science, mathematics, foreign language, etc. There is always room for improvement in educational practices as we seek to extend and expand human knowledge and understanding. To

4 Art Education/January 1990

Editorial

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be sure, there is a need for greater clarity and rigor in the articulation of purpose. Individually, each art teacher needs to be more "systematic". However, the question is "What is the system?" Of course, the other issues are of a different sort: How might we get more qualified art teachers in our schools? How might we get the teach- ing resources for an effective program? How might we manage class size and the scheduling of students so that there can be quality programs?

How might Fulghum react to efforts aimed at establishing district-wide, sequen- tial art curricula that include provision for evaluation and testing? I can only guess. He is no longer employed as an art teacher. It is reported that he did not conform to his school's elite conservative image. (See Patricia Leigh Brown, "Les- sons From The Sandbox", The New York Times Magazine, July 23, 1989, Section 6, p. 32) He sent students "to interview truckers, taught them how to balance spoons on their noses, and once traced the origins of all the materials to be found in a lead pencil" ... Among the questions on an official Fulghum art exam: 1) Suppose all human beings had tails; describe yours. 2) Did you ever think about doing something terrible? Pretend that you did it; describe the crime you committed, and make your own mug shot and fingerprints. 3) If you were paid a good salary to do whatever you do or like best regardless of its social value or status, what would you do with your life?

What shall we do with our lives as art teachers? First, let's not be accepting of the "guilt trip" being laid upon us. "Basic art education" does exist in many of our classrooms. Second, let's be assertive about the things that we are passionate about; things that we do know about and do - making and responding to art. Third, let's recognize that the world of art (like

other "worlds" in our experience - nature, environment, science, philosophy, etc.) is far reaching and diverse. There is no way that it can all be taught as a single, se- quential system of knowledge. We can teach students to encounter and experi- ence, and understand aspects of art. What can be taught are those wonderful mo- ments when you conceive and make something that is your very own, or when you experience the art forms done by others from near and afar; done in the past or present.

I am indebted to Marvin Minsky (Co- Founder of the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology) for his observation about the "magical trick" that makes us intelli- gent. "The trick is that there is no trick. The power of intelligence stems from our vast diversity, not from any single, perfect principle. Our species has evolved many effective although imperfect methods, and each of us, individually, develops more on our own.

Eventually very few of our actions and decisions come to depend on any single mechanism. Instead, they emerge from conflicts and negotiations among societies of processes that constantly challenge one another." (The Society of Mind, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985 p. 308)

The art teachers I have known have always given me a sense of where they stand on fundamental issues; they have allowed my sharing with them in a magical process of creating or responding to art; they have helped me grasp the concepts and techniques for the work I undertook, and above all, they empowered me to take risks and extend what was my existing knowledge and understanding to another level through the work I was doing. All of this sounds pretty "basic" to me.

Jerome J. Hausman

Art Education/January 1990 5

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