Edited by Donata Altini in collaboration with : Ana Isabel Sรกnchez Pelรกez, Barbara Majchrzak, Ozge Doฤ an, Olugbenga Abraham
Methodology in art and music education of young students (preprimary).
Introduction We are living in times of unprecedented change. The globalization, the powerful dynamics of commercial pressure directed particularly at young people, and the increasing interaction between traditional, ethnic, religious and national communities are all creating a cultural climate of immense complexity. In Paris on 3 November 1999 the UNESCO Director General made an appeal for 'the promotion of arts education and creativity at school as part of the construction of a culture of peace'. Arts Education is a universal human right, for all learners, including those who are often excluded from education, such as immigrants, cultural minority groups, and children with disabilities. Art is the universal language that has the ability to unite all peoples, all children. The methodology developed in our Comenius project, a multilateral school partnership, during two years, endowed the schools with a vast repertoire of skills, experiences and needs (geographic location, immigrant pupils with a migratory background, with disability...). ARTS EDUCATION CAN produced positive learning outcomes, such as creating positive attitudes to learning, developing a greater sense of personal and cultural identity, and fostering more creative and imaginative ways of thinking in young European children. It promoted equality and contributed to combating all forms of discrimination. Arts-based processes allowed all children the opportunity to express their knowledge, ideas and feelings in ways that do not necessarily involve words. Images and music are the language of the psyche: young children enjoyed “drawing” a melody in a paper or in the air, they “saw” colours in the music they hear. They were capable of understanding simple rhythms in music and saw how rhythms can be expressed in art work. Music certainly inspired young children to express their ideas in a work of art.
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Art Influences Learning Arts are basic to education: art encourages cognition, critical thinking, and learning. Our current education system places great emphasis on academic development. As a result, arts programs are being reduced or even eliminated from classrooms to accommodate more didactic teaching methods. Studies have shown that arts teaching and learning can increase student's cognitive and social development. The arts can be a critical link for students in developing the crucial thinking skills and motivations they need to achieve at higher levels. Art Impacts Learning Outcomes Child development is a sequential process: children progress from simple to complex abilities. Art activities provide children with sensory learning experiences they can master at their own rate. Art materials and techniques range from the simplest to the most complex. Young preschoolers can explore dozens of nontoxic art materials directly with their hands or with a myriad of painting and clay tools. Older children can select art materials that offer greater complexity and challenge. Art manufacturers provide an exciting range of tools with which children can work. Tree branches, shells, sponges, found objects, or simple kitchen tools can easily become art accessories as well. Each art material and accessory provides different skill development and has the potential for new discoveries and a creative classroom offers a wide range of art materials and tools for exploration and learning. Integrating Art into the Classroom Art is an outstanding tool for teaching not only developmental skills, but also academic subjects such as math, science, and literacy. The most effective learning takes place when children do something related to the topic they are learning. When children study any given concept, they learn it better and retain it longer if they do an art activity that reinforces that learning. This information has been recognized by teachers since the time of Confucius, when he said: "I hear and I forget. I see and I remember; I do and I understand."
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OBJECTIVES: 1. Little Chameleon Mascot and the famous painters Little Chameleon Mascot, the characteristic figure, helps the pupils to reflect on the importance of differences, on different ways of doing art discovering Miro's Language of signs and symbols, the Picasso's cubism style, drawing with texture observing the art of Vincent van Gogh or with the style of pointillism of French artist Georges Seurat, or with the vibrant use of colour of Monet's impressionistic style. They will create Mondrian-type balanced compositions and will use colour and shape as Henri Matisse or oil pastels to create enchanted villages in the Chagall style.
2. The music and galleries as inspiration of paintings
The activities supporting entrepreneurship and reinforce creativity: -reinforce the European dimension of education in our schools; -improve the quality of education developing and exchanging methods and good pedagogical tools; -build a creative and culturally aware society; -encourage collaborative reflection and action, and a better pedagogic vision and the work of the school; -integration of Arts Education into education systems of schools; -promote the learning of foreign languages between the pupils and the teachers; -make accessible important parts of the country’s cultural heritage and expressions from the multicultural society stimulating and documenting artistic and cultural education and training (involving parents too).
The music serves as inspiration for many of their abstractions. The student "artists" both hear and see the connection as they enjoy his fanciful imagination. They paint the Celtic or classical music - relates to impressionism; "Cool" Jazz relates to abstract art; disco music - relates to the cubism style. The children create narratives about artworks and drama. It’s very important to invite artists, musicians, poets, and dancers in our workshops, stimulating creativity and creative work at schools and in our communities. The local museums and the virtual European galleries are the sites of developing children’s imaginative and encouraging children to paint colours, lines, and subjects in order to portray the mood of music they will listen.
“Our children love diversity: diversity is colours, shapes, music, diversity is art.......” 5
3. First step: 5 basic elements of shapes: dot, circle, straight line, curved and angle line families The method is simple and it really helps children improve their drawing skills tremendously. By learning the 5 basic elements of shape: dot, circle, straight line, curved and angle line families, the children learn to recognize and use these elements when they draw. Activities: Children discover paintings of famous painters and listening to different styles of music create their artworks and the story they're telling, using :
A point is the simple colored part of Pointillism painting by Serrault:
A line as “ a dot that went for a walk” Kandinsky
Dancing lines, opened and closed, creating strange shapes as coloured dreams of Mirò
and Klee or geometrical shapes as Mondrian or Capogrossi style, or multicultural mandala and tangram.
Painting music: "Colour is the keyboard, the eyes are the hammers, the soul is the piano with many strings. The artist is the hand which plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul". Wassily Kandinsky The children discovered the famous paintings by Serrault, Kandinsky, Mirò, Klee and Mondrian, by other abstract modern artists and listening of emphasized rhythm, classical music, or pop and jazz, they are inspired in their art creation. We propose the pointillism music of Webern for Serault style, classical music for Kandinsky style jazz music for Mirò, Klee and Mondrian style. Children will paint music: rhythm and movement in art.
Note: Kandinsky attempted to put order to tonal colors. He explained how he associated certain colors with particular instruments. For example: yellow was linked with the sound of the trumpet, red with the tuba or kettle drum and blue with the cello, contrabass or organ.
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4. Second step: COLOURED EMOTIONS Music a universal language, expresses feelings words. The teachers help the children to learn to identify their emotions and after expressing and reading emotion related to emotional music associated to famous different paintings. They enjoy exploring the relationship between colours of music and paintings, and emotion:
WARM EMOTIONS: HOPE AND JOY The paintings of Vincent Van Gogh show an instinctive understanding of the emotive properties of color. In this version of 'Sunflowers' he uses warm yellows to create an energetic image that radiates feelings of hope and joy. RED:
COLD EMOTIONS: SADNESS AND DESPAIR Another effective use of emotive color is found in the paintings of Pablo Picasso. Picasso painted in monochrome tones of green and blue which reflected sadness.
The teacher helps children to: Reflect on, explore, and share their feelings Learn about the connection between words, actions and feelings Create visual representations to depict a variety of feelings, Develop empathy for other children through sharing personal experiences and exploring commonly-shared emotions and feelings. Identify and describe basic elements in “emotional” music (e.g., high/low, fast/slow, loud/soft, beat) Use icons or invented symbols to represent beat. Use the singing voice to echo short melodic patterns. Sing age-appropriate songs from memory. Play simple instruments and move or verbalize to demonstrate awareness of beat, tempo, dynamics, and melodic direction. Compose, Arrange, and Improvise. Create accompaniments, using the voice or a variety of classroom instruments. Create movements that correspond to specific music (dancing).
DARK EMOTIONS The Scream, by Edvard Munch, evokes the jolting Emotion of the encounter and exhibits a general anxiety.
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5. Third step: MUSIC OF COLOURED WORLD: One of the most important object in education is encouraging and supporting tolerance and acceptance of diversity, the key to overcoming discrimination, including racism. We want teach the tolerance for a world of peace. In this second step of plane, teacher invite children to paint the BEAUTY of WORLD IN: 
THE PORTRAITS: Children examine portraits by a variety of artists (Picasso, Modigliani, Arcimboldo, Baj), explore diversity and paint similar portraits.
The LANDSCAPES: landscape in Modern Art (Van Gogh, Cezanne, Monet, Munch).
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STILL LIFE: Matisse, Picasso, Cezanne and Morandi.
6. THE DREAM: SURREALIST EMOTIONS The world of dreams and fantasy mixed with the real world. The dreams reflect our memories, thoughts and emotions. They can be extraordinarily vivid or very vague; filled with happiness or frightening and scary; very realistic or totally confusing. The teachers make a collection of the work of Marc Chagall, Matisse, Dalì…. a display of images and books, inviting the children to talk about their work by asking questions like these.
"Although the dream is a very strange phenomenon and an inexplicable mystery, far more inexplicable is the mystery and aspect our minds confer on certain objects and aspects of life."
"What style of painting is this? What is it made of? Do you like it? Would other people like it? Does it work? Why? Why not? How does it make you feel? What does it remind you of? What does it make you think about? What do you think it is about? ..” Teachers ask the children about their dreams, their daydreams and their nightmares. Children paint “enigmatic master of the impossible dream” of Magritte listening pop music (ex. by Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams)
and play beginning a part of dream.
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Next children look at a few Chagall dream paintings and talk about the clues they could see that made the painting look like a dream, etc. Teacher tells about Chagall's love for Bella, his wife and his emotions in paintings and children create his love in a series of paintings. Domenico Modugno
Children paint listening to Music by KristallBalalayka Folk Band.
was inspired by two paintings by Marc Chagall for famous song "Nel blu dipinto di blu" (Volare) (in short name). This song was sung over 50 years, but it is still recognized by many people in Italy and the rest of the world.
Painting Music: Rhythm and Movement in Art is about the many ways artists have emulated music using techniques such as color, form, repetition, layering and lyricism. It also exemplifies how music has influenced and inspired art and art making. As many ways as there are to explore the music and art connection, what is actually being seen and what is heard is up to the individual. What do you hear: a symphony, a ballad, the blues or jazz? Perhaps you hear only noise or silence between the notes. However you experience it, we hope you will enjoy the performance.
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7. The Famous Artist Crafts for Kids Learning about famous artists can be lots of fun and a great opportunity for children to explore different techniques and mediums. When they produce their paintings, they can use watercolor, tempera acrylic colour, collage of different materials or pictures, crayons‌.. Many ideas are on blog www.musicofartcomenius.blogspot.com
8. Dramatic Arts/Movement/Music Movement is explored through large and small group activities, dance and yoga. Dramatic expression is explored through play and pretending during open exploration periods and in mini-plays and puppet shows with Little Chameleon. Music is explored through listening and singing-a-longs at Circle Times and in painting activities. Rhythm and melodic instruments are also explored. Shared dramatization of stories and dramatization in play help children build confidence in self-expression. Shared musical experiences with folk tunes or early songs increase an experience of community. Song games and rhythm instrument circles help the children develop confidence in expressing themselves and help children gain a greater sense of the need for cooperation within the group. Working together,
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students will listen to, sing and create songs, and experience movement and dramatic play that reinforce and enhance their classroom themes.
Two ideas: the child expresses feelings through movement activities:
Activity: What’s the Feeling? Let's Get Started:
1. Gather the children together. 2. Discuss different types of feelings. If possible, show picture feeling cards and famous paintings that express the emotion. 3. Play different types of music and ask the children what type of feeling they have when each song is played. 4. The children may choose to look at a feeling picture to match the music.
Other activities:
Activity: Chameleon feelings in music. Let's Get Started: 1. Sometimes children recognize feelings in other children or creatures easier than they recognize their own feelings. 2. After a discussion about the chameleon or during an animal unit, have the children explore what type of movement they make. 3. When the children have explored movements of chameleon or others animals, put on music with different tempos. Before play each selection, tell the children to determine how the music would make the chameleon feel and move according to that feeling. This activity is a great warm-up for allowing children to discuss their own feelings.
-involving artists (parents, musician or local painters) in any activities with children, -learning national painters, -exhibition of paintings. 12
9. Some activities in the schools of the partnership 9.a The pointillism (English partner)
One of the most famous examples of pointillism is Un dimanche après-midi à l'Île de la Grande Jatte (‘A SundayAfternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte’) by Georges Seurat. Music associated….. In music, pointillism is a composition technique used in 20th century music. This technique, also known as Klangfarbenmelodie (‘sound-colour-melody’), was mainly used by Anton Webern (1883 – 1945) and by Arnold Schoenberg (1874 – 1951), and was further developed for electronic music by Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928 – 2007) in the 1950s Five Pieces for Orchestra by Arnold Schoenberg. No3, which is called ‘Farben’ . ‘Farben’ means colours in German. He combined Texture, Composition, Brightness and Darkness, Rhythm, Line and Form (RSNO Education and Community, 2011) He used piccolos, flutes, oboes, English horn, trumpets, trombones, tuba, cymbals, triangle, tam-tam, bass drum, xylophone, harp, celesta, and strings for his master piece.
Pointillism and young artists Materials used: Different colours, cards, papers, buttons, ribbons, shapes, glue, paint brush, water, glitters Procedures : Combination of shapes, colours, dots.
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9.b The abstract art of lines (Spanish partner)
The Abstract Art movement is called Abstract Expressionism because, although the art has no subject, it is still trying to convey some kind of emotion. Visual abstract art developed some characteristics of music: an art form which used the abstract elements of sound and divisions of time Name of painter: KANSDISKY The first real Abstract Art was painted earlier by some Expressionists, especially Kandinsky in the early 1900s. Wassily Kandinsky, himself a musician, was inspired by the possibility of marks and associative color resounding in the soul.
PAINTING BY CHILDREN
Music associated: Jazz Violin – Autumn Leaves – slow swing Materials: a piece of card Cards, play dough , glue, paintbrushes Procedure:
Making lines with play dough
Putting the lines in the draw in a card
Finally spreading glue over the lines
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9.c The impressionism (Turkish partner) Impressionism emerged in France. The Impressionists, however, developed new techniques specific to the style. Encompassing what its adherents argued was a different way of seeing, it is an art of immediacy and movement, of candid poses and compositions, of the play of light expressed in a bright and varied use of colour. The Impressionists found that they could capture the momentary and transient effects of sunlight by painting ‘in the open air’. They portrayed overall visual The painting : effects instead of details, and used short "broken" brush strokes of mixed and pure unmixed colour—not 1904 – House of Parliament Sun blended smoothly or shaded, as was customary—to Monet achieve an effect of intense colour vibration. Impressionism is a precursor of various painting styles, including Neo-Impressionism, Post Impressionism, Fauvism, and Cubism. The representatives of impressionism paintings were : Monet, Renoir and Pissarro. Name of painter: Claude Monet Monet has been described as "the driving force behind Impressionism". Crucial to the art of the Impressionist painters was the understanding of the effects of light on the local colour of objects, and the effects of the juxtaposition of colours with each other. Monet's long career as a painter was spent in the pursuit of this aim. Music associated: “ Claude Debussy – Beau Soir” Debussy is the best famous delegate at Impressionist Musics. And the song mentions the sun. Materials: plastic forks, sponge, finger paints. Procedure: “print tecnique”. Using plastic fork for print.
Printing with finger paint and sponge.
Impressionist final painting.
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9.d The surrealism (Polish partner) Surrealism was founded in France in 1924. The period in which it was born, is called "the era of dreams". The founder of this Movement in the art is André The painting: Breton. The idea of Surrealism in painting is "visual expression of inner perception." Artists created images that were in contrary to the logical order of reality. Denied the assumptions of realism, classicism, empiricism, rationalism and utilitarianism. Surrealism discovered hyper, externalized dreams, subconscious and associated states all the elements at random. There are three types of surrealist painting: • abstract, "Moon City" Thomas SętowskiIf you are looking • figurative, for the magic gates to other world, please stop in front of once of Tomasz Sętowski Painting. Just a few seconds is • collages. to feel the magic of each paint. This magic is more The representatives of surrealist paintings were: enough magic than magic you are know from the legends and Salvador Dali, Marcel Duchamp, René Magritte, fables. Undiscovered, incomprehensible, crazy and creative! Architectural magic, construction magic, a marine Joan Miro, magic, custom magic, magic of the shapes and ideas.
Name of painter: Tomasz Sętowski (1961 Czestochowa, Poland) - Polish contemporary surrealist. Through his paintings he engages his audience, promoters and art curators in a fairy-tale story where reality blends with fiction, owing to which the artist was fast pronounced to be one of the most original and gifted painters who managed to create his own, unique and recognizable style. Thomas Sętowski presented his work at around 60 individual exhibitions.
Music associated: "Evening Song" - music Stanislaw Moniuszko. Lyrical song about the inner power of expression sparking the imagination.
Materials: paper paintings of different building, crayons, scissors, glue, white paper cards, pastel. Procedure: collage technic. Forming the paper compositions – various buildings from the colored paper and from cut paper. Buldings can be cut from newspaper. Sticking elements on a white cardboard with drawed moon.
Painting, using a pastel in various shades of blue background.
Final surrealist painting.
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Index: Introduction…………………………………………………………………………2 1. Little Chameleon Mascot and the famous painters…………..5 2. The music and galleries as inspiration of paintings…………5 3. First step: 5 basic elements of shapes: dot, circle, straight line, curved and angle line families…………….6 4. Second step: COLOURED EMOTIONS…………………………………7 5.Third step: MUSIC OF COLOURED WORLD…………………….......8 6. THE DREAM: SURREALIST EMOTIONS……………………………….9 7. The Famous Artist Crafts for Kids……………………………………11 8. Dramatic Arts/Movement/Music…………………………………….11 9. Some activities in the schools of the partnership…………...13
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Teaching Arts… “This book is the result of two year of European project in Comenius multilateral school partnership, it aims teachers and other professional educators, supporting arts education in their schools, as a part of a more balanced and creative curriculum that every child receives as part of a quality education. Arts are elements of the so-called expressive activities. These are meant to express ideas, emotions and experiences through pictures, music and gestures. Expressive activities take part of the pupil’s social, cognitive and cultural development. Unity…Harmony…Perspective…Value, the language of art has much in common with the language of peace, communication and understanding. Arts encompass values based on the respect for differences and for the surrounding environment and they take great role in the development of children’s personality for building a culture of Respect and Peace, promoting intercultural understanding and celebrating diversity.”
Donata Altini Italian coordinator of project
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