Diagram 3: Four Lenses of Quality in Arts Education Experiences
Pedagogy Environment Community Dynamics Student Learning 79
Quality as Seen Through the Lens of Student Learning
Engagement
Purposeful experiences creating or engaging with works of art
Emotional openness and honesty
Experimentation, exploration, and inquiry Ownership
Quality as Seen Through the Lens of Pedagogy
Authenticity
Modeling artistic processes, inquiry, and habits Participation in the learning experience
Making learning relevant and connected to prior knowledge
Intentionality, fl exibility, and transparency
Quality as Seen Through the Lens of Community Dynamics
Respect and trust among all participants, along with a belief in student capacities
Openness of communication Collaboration
Quality as Seen Through the Lens of Environment
Functional and aesthetic space and materials The arts occupy a central place in the physical environment
Examining the Base: A Tool for Identifying and Refl ecting on Program-Defi ning Decisions
The purpose of this tool is to help practitioners, administrators, and other members of the community connected to a particular arts education program to de- termine or reconsider their answers to the set of foun- dational questions identifi ed in Chapter 4. We consider these questions as ‘foundational’ because they are ques- tions all programs must answer and because they establish a ‘base’ upon which virtually all other programmatic de- cisions are made. A program’s answers to these questions are not set in stone. As a program is being created, as it is considering expansion, or as other changes unfold, these decisions are explicitly and implicitly revisted and even challenged, The four foundational questions are:
WHO: Who teaches the arts? And who are the students? What background, contexts, roles, and perspectives will teachers bring to this program?
Who will be served by this program – and why focus on that population?
WHERE: Where arethe arts taught?
Where does this learning and teaching take place?
WHAT & HOW: What is taught and how?
What will be the content of instruction and how will it be taught?
ASSESSMENT: How is arts learning assessed?
How, for whom, and for what purposes, is evidence of learning gathered?
The questions in this tool lead participants through a process of considering pragmatics fi rst, purposes and ideals second, and quality third. Of course, in practice, pragmatics and ideals are intertwined, and in considering quality from the perspective of a program’s foundation, many questions are likely to arise, including the following kinds of concerns:
• Can we provide for as many – and as diverse – a
student body as we have chosen to serve and maintain high quality for all involved?
• Do we have enough highly qualifi ed teachers
to provide the learning opportunities that we
intend?
• Our student body has changed in signifi cant ways
in recent years. Are our decisions about what to teach and how to teach still as appropriate and relevant as they were when we began? Ultimately, a foundation can only hold so much weight. If a program is struggling or growing, the base must be revisited, reconsidered, and, if appropriate, redesigned. The purpose of this tool is to help in that process.
Steps in the Use of the Examining the Base Tool:
Facilitator’s introduction: Welcome participants and frame the session.
• Welcome the participants and ask everyone to
introduce themselves.
• Introduce the purposes of the session and the
rationale for using it at this time.
• Introduce the basic steps of the protocol for
using the tool. Explain the time frame for the session.
• Ask for any questions or concerns before begin-
ning.
Step 1. Examine your program’s current answers to the foun- dational questions.
• Divide the group into four groups, assuming
there are enough people present to have at least a pair work on each question.
• Each group considers three questions about the
question they’ve been assigned:
What does the program currently do that embodies the answer to the question?
What pragmatic considerations does this answer refl ect?
How does the answer align with your program’s basic purposes? (If you have already used the “Purposes” tool, use the list you created to help you think about this question.)
Step 2. Collect ideas from all groups.
• Reconvene into the whole group and ask each
group to report on their answers.
tion and then for topics or issues that anyone would like to raise about any of those answers. Compile a list of these topics on chart paper, so you can return to them.
Step 3: Dig into the issues.
• As a whole group: Revisit the chart paper and
identify which topics are of greatest shared con- cern. (One way to do this is to read through the list and ask everyone to vote only three times for
the issues s/he would most want to discuss.)
• Depending on the size of the group and the number of issues selected for discussion, there could be subdivisions into smaller groups to dis- cuss particular issues from the chart. The goal here is to explore as many concerns as have been raised about the “foundational decisions” upon which the program is operating.
• Review what has been learned so far in consider-
ing these foundational decisions. Identify topics or issues that must receive more consideration.
Step 4: Consider the foundational decisions from the stand- point of quality.
In small groups comprised of different people from the earlier groups:
• Each small group considers one of the founda- tional decisions through the lens of the question:
From the standpoint of creating high quality arts learning experiences for students, how do you feel about these decisions?
NOTE: These discussions can be quite sensitive. In a sense, this tool is intended to surface con- cerns and discontent. Given that, participants should be encouraged to frame their comments as concerns and questions rather than provocations. The small group should be given adequate time (and fair warning) to prepare a report with key points from their conversation. The report should note where consensus was achieved and where there were disagreements in answers to the framing question. The major points should be noted on chart paper.
As a whole group:
• The whole group listens to the reports of the four
groups. The facilitator leaves time for clarifying questions following each report.
• The group must consider which of the founda- tional decisions should be given further consider- ation, especially in light of the questions raised from the standpoint of perceptions of the quality of the arts learning experiences students are hav- ing in the class or program.
Step 5: Think ahead.
• As a group, decide what action plans or follow-
up conversations should be pursued, if any, as a result of this experience.