The general purpose of this investigation is to examine the values of print making as compared with drawing and painting in their respective relationships as a part of the junior-high-school art program. The specific purposes of the investigation are: 1. To determine the values which are common to both the print-making arts and the drawing-painting arts. 2. To discover the values which are unique in the print-making arts. 3. To determine which of the print-making processes belong in the junior high school. 4. To recommend the grade placement and limitations of print-making for the junior high school. A conservative general conclusion, based upon objective evidence, can safely be drawn to the effect that in all phases of the learning experiences print making was found to be as valuable as painting and drawing. Its values were compared with respect to specific art development, to general educational growth, to socialization, and to character training.

The purpose of this study was to demonstrate the feasibility of developing an art curriculum in Qatar, using the principles of the DBAE curriculum in conjunction with technology. Many of the challenges facing art educators and the art curriculum in Qatar can be approached through the multimedia applications of DBAE, which will provide instructors and students with an opportunity to more readily interact with visual art and to discover its educational relevance. Additionally, this study attempted to discover whether teachers are engaged in implementing technology in the art classroom and whether they are given the opportunity to engage in art to their satisfaction.

For three years the writer has worked with children from a section in Mineral Wells, Texas, in which home environments were unnecessarily bad. They offered none of the wholesome stimuli for growth and development that homes should give. The houses were drab and cheerless, and the grounds were neglected, often grown up in weeds or cluttered with trash. Through its members, made up of sixth and seventh grade children of Travis Elementary School and including children from the affected homes, plans and procedures were formulated for improving homes, and the interest and cooperation of the parents were secured in extending the improvements over the area. By this plan the writer hoped that life might be made more satisfying for these people as a result of improved surroundings.

This study is concerned with providing a strategy for teaching basic art concepts of line and shape at sixth grade level to the disadvantaged child through the use of kits as a supplement to classrooms instruction. Twelve kits were devised. The materials and information necessary to do the assignment were included in each kit. They were tested by disadvantaged sixth graders in a Dallas school for one month. The kits were evaluated using the children's work as compared to control assignments, as well as behavior checklists and frequency of uise counts. The game kits were particularly effective. Kits proved to be a viable strategy for enriching the art curriculum for disadvantaged children and improving classroom discipline.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether kindergarten children possess the ability to recognize, match, and discuss lines and line qualities. Using graphics and art reproductions, three matching tasks were constructed which examined young children's awareness of the line qualities of length, width, straightness, direction, movement, and uniformity. Graphics and art reproductions were also used to construct two tracing tasks employed to examine young children's awareness of actual and implied lines. The tasks were administered to 69 kindergarten students from four elementary schools in a public school district in the north central Texas area.

In this self-study inquiry, I studied my graphic design practice in a professional setting, focusing on my Arabic typographic skills and knowledge. My roles as researcher and design educator indivisibly intertwined throughout this research. I worked to understand the value of calligraphy in art and design education, highlighting its power as an art form while also emphasizing its pedagogical potentials. I utilized two theoretical approaches suited to investigating and understanding the Arabic letters as text and image, Ibn Arabi’s science of letters, or 'ilm al-hurûf, and semiotics. I applied my theoretical framework to three distinctive artworks to investigate their uses of the Arabic letters, contemplating their roles in modern and contemporary Arab art. Essential to my research was learning Arabic calligraphy through two approaches: 1) I attended a calligraphy workshop, and 2) I conducted three self-study experimentations. I analyzed my experience through visual representations, commentary, and narrative inquiry to assess Arabic calligraphy’s significance for graphic design education. As such, my experimentations confirmed Arabic calligraphy’s aesthetic and educational value. I employed my findings to create a contemporary Arabic typography curriculum suitable for university-level students. This curriculum is built on learning theories such as visual culture analysis, semiotics, constructivist theory, play principles, …

In this investigation, a content analysis was made with eleven lexicographical sources and three basal reading series to determine if art and art-related words were present. The analysis was made with the use of two charts, in which each was divided into eight categories of word context. The Composite Chart contained 6,576 words found in six lexicons, five word lists and forty-two readers, and the Reader Chart contained 407 words found only in the readers. The analysis revealed: dominant categories and percentages, word and cumulative word frequencies, high and low frequency words, and the percentage of words found in the basal readers as compared to the lexicographical sources.

Two curricular needs exist for the elementary art classroom: multi-cultural lessons which are customized to address North Texas ethnicities, and art history materials for early grades, whether taught by art teachers or regular classroom teachers. This thesis addresses both of these concerns by developing lesson plans to meet the needs, and executing an evaluative study with North Texas art and regular classroom teachers of kindergarten and first grade. The teachers represent four districts, including rural, suburban, and urban demographic populations. Findings address time limitations for public school teachers, cultural exchange differences between demographic groups, and differences between presentation of the units by regular classroom teachers versus art teachers.

This two-part study included a content analysis of an AP art history text and a survey together with interviews with AP art history teachers that embraced both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies. The first phase of the study examined one of the more popular art history survey texts in the AP art history program, Gardner’s Art through the Ages, in terms of how inclusive it is in addressing issues of sexual orientation and, particularly, same-sex perspectives. In addition, the text was examined for evidence of sexual orientation ignored – particularly same-sex perspectives ignored and for heteronormative hegemonies. The second phase investigated the understandings and opinions of AP art history teachers toward the inclusion of sexual orientation and same-sex perspectives in their curriculums and classrooms. Recent recognition of gay, lesbian, and same-sex perspectives in the study of art history has challenged art educators and art historians to begin to consider opening up their curriculums and writings to include these perspectives. These ignored perspectives produce important understandings that enrich and deepen the discourse of art history. The inclusion of gay and lesbian content and same-sex perspectives to the study of AP art history, not only effectively serves the needs of AP art …

This study developed new mapping techniques and methodologies for understanding creativity in terms of connectivity and interaction between human and non-human actors in a design classroom. The researcher applied qualitative methods of data collection combining both observation of classroom activities and focus group interviews in order to map a creativity network. The findings indicate that creativity is a complex weather-like system (or what I call "creative climate") composed of many sub-networks and diffused networks. Four interactions emerged from the study: (a) the creative climate is composed of the circulation of bodies and objects forming networks and sub-networks, (b) centers and corners/edges are a measure of connectivity and interaction in classroom space design, (c) roundness is a measure of classroom style and the space of connectivity usage, and (d) plugs-in creativity is a measure of technology consolidation. This study attempted to fill the gap in the literature on creativity and classroom design by explaining the role of non-human actors in shaping the creative climate in the classroom, especially the role of the classroom space itself as an actor. The implication of this study in art education opens a new opportunity for research in designing innovative classrooms. Also, it will allow future …

“In what ways does teaching with folk arts inspired visual arts-based instruction enhance community building among elementary students in a Title I school?” was the primary research question in this study. Agreeing with past and present day research that the construct of community is vital to social and cultural capital, this research attempts to determine how the notion of community benefits both students and teachers in the elementary art classroom. Folk art was utilized because this genre was accessible in terms of locality and familiarity among students and teachers. The purpose of this investigation was to produce teaching strategies and methods that show how community can be formed in the art classroom. The participants were elementary students, Grades 2 and 3, in a Title I school located in Denton, Texas. This investigation was conducted under an action research methodology. This approach to research is intended to be transformational, emergent, and accommodating. I recorded observations, field notes, and conversations from the participants. Emergent themes were discovered through content analysis and conceptual maps. Results from this investigation concluded transformation is only possible if the person wants change to happen. Data also showed that community and art education are symbiotic. Transformation, growth, and …

This research is a nomadic inquiry into the ethics and aesthetics of three makers’ social and material practices. Deleuze’s concept of the nomad operated in multiple ways throughout the process, which was embedded in performative engagements that produced narratives of becoming. Over four months, I built relationships with three people as I learned about the ethico-aesthetic significance of their daily practices. The process started by interviewing participants in their homes and expanded over time to formal and informal engagements in school, community, and agricultural settings. I used Guattari’s ecosophical approach to consider how subjectivity was produced through spatial assemblages by spending time with participants, discussing material structures and objects, listening to personal histories, and collaboratively developing ideas. Participants included a builder who repurposed a missile base into a private residence and community gathering space, an elementary art teacher who practiced urban homesteading, and a young artist who developed an educational farm. The research considers the affective force of normalized social values, the production of desire by designer capitalism, and the mutation of life from neoliberal policies. Our experiences illuminate the community-building potential of direct encounters and direct exchanges. The project generates ideas for becoming an inquirer in the everyday and …

This is an enterpretivist cultural study on how the lively idea of assessment is enacted by the art teachers, students and administrators in Denton school art education, North Texas, the United States. This ethnographic research aims to extend understanding on assessment as vivid cultural and social dynamics that both reflects and enlivens varied and interconnected values promoted and shared among the people involved. Through a perspective of the culture of assessment, this study is expected to facilitate insights on art education as lived, purposeful experience bearing suggestions on a certain social environment and historical implications. Such insights as sought further illuminate specific understandings on art education in different cultural societies, such as China. From a Chinese native viewpoint, the researcher broadens her horizons on connection and independence important for informative performance of art education in the discourses of modern nation and schooling, as well as globalization. It is hoped that this study will interest other art educators, teachers, and researchers to make multiple and continuous efforts in further exploring the culture of assessment with cultural and historical consciousness and knowledge.

This research examines the personal narratives of two contemporary non-native artists living and working on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. Issues related to narratives, power structures, artistic processes, insider/outsider dynamics, Hawaiian culture, island life, surfing, and the researcher's own experiences are woven together to formulate realizations surrounding alternative knowledge systems and the power of multiple or hidden narratives to the practice of art education.

This narrative study explores how two Taiwanese college art teachers’ lives and teaching experiences illustrate the ways they cultivate resilience and motivation to sustain professional commitments amidst challenges in their teaching careers. I use the life story interview as my methodology and a three-dimensional space approach to code and analyze my data to retell their stories about how resilience and motivation have guided them as they negotiated dilemmas in teaching. The participants’ stories demonstrate that in order to be motivated, teachers must satisfy their basic needs, which, in the language of Maslow’s need theory, include secure income, safety, love and belonging, respect, and personal accomplishment. To be resilient, art teachers need to facilitate self-efficacy as an essential belief to face challenges, and they also must gain support from family members, students, school administrators, and fellow members of professional organizations as external support resources. This study also illuminates the significance of international educational exchanges, the teaching knowledge constructed through layers of life and professional experience, and the importance of creating dialogue to address teachers’ challenges. Recommendations for future study include exploring further the relationship between motivation and resilience, specifying how gender difference affects the ways participants tell their stories, investigating how …

The world is becoming progressively interconnected through technology, politics, culture, economics, and education. As educators we strive to provide instruction that prepares students to become active members of both their local and global communities. This dissertation presents one possible avenue for engaging students with art and multifaceted ideas about culture, community, and politics as it explores the possibilities for creating a community-based, art education curriculum that seeks a merger of global and local, or "glocal" thinking. Through curriculum action research, I explored the process of writing site-specific curriculum that focuses on publicly available, local works of art and encourages a connection between global experiences and local application. I have completed this research for two communities, one in Ohio and one in Texas, and investigated the similarities and differences that exist in the process and resulting curriculum for each location. Through textual analysis, interviews, curriculum writing, and personal reflections, I identified five essential components of a community-based, glocal art education curriculum: flexibility, authenticity, connectedness, glocal understandings, and publicly available art. Additionally, I developed a template for writing glocally focused, community-based art education curriculum and produced completed curricular units for each of the communities. Finally, I have made suggestions for the future …

This study explored the state of art education in Turkey as revealed by pre-service art education university instructors, and the potential of incorporating visual culture studies in pre-service art education in Turkey. The instructors' ideas about visual culture, and popular culture, the impact it might have, the content (objects), and the practices within the context of Turkey were examined. Visual culture was examined from an art education perspective that focuses on a pedagogical approach that emphasizes the perception and critique of popular culture and everyday cultural experiences, and the analysis of media including television programs, computer games, Internet sites, and advertisements. A phenomenological human science approach was employed in order to develop a description of the perception of visual culture in pre-service art education in Turkey as lived by the participants. In-person interviews were used to collect the data from a purposive sample of 8 faculty members who offered undergraduate and graduate art education pedagogy, art history, and studio courses within four-year public universities. This empirical approach sought to obtain comprehensive descriptions of an experience through semi-structural interviews. These interviews employed open-ended questions to gather information about the following: their educational and professional background; their definitions of art education and …

This dissertation is about new materialism as it relates to art education. It is a speculative inquiry that seeks to illuminate the interconnectivity of things by considering the ways in which things participate in generative practices of perceiving and making. To do so, the dissertation pioneers an arts-based methodology that allows for broad considerations about who and what can be considered an agent in the process of art making. In this inquiry, the researcher is an artist-participant with other more-than-human and human participants to construct an (im)material autohistoria-teoría, a revisionist interdisciplinary artwork inspired by the work of Anzaldúa. The term w/e is developed and discussed as new language for expanding upon Braidotti's posthumanist subjectivity. New theories called thing(k)ing (including found poetry) and (im)materiality are discussed as movements towards better understanding the contributions of the more-than-human in artmaking practices.

One can argue that embracing technological models may produce students who are illiterate in the "proper" methods of communication. With rapid technological change, some fear traditions in their "original" form may be lost. Practices such as trying to recapture the artist's intent should be abandoned as a way of opening up literacy discourse to multiple narratives. Failing to critically explore the possibilities of emerging models of thinking, teaching, and learning in a technological culture can produce a loss equal to the loss of tradition. An a/r/tographer works toward a fluid practice between the domains of artist, researcher, and teacher in order to negotiate emerging forms of visual/tactile/auditory communication which include the body as a networked organism situated recursively within the larger structure of society. This study occurred during two separate semesters of an art education course for pre-service elementary teachers. Through interaction with hypermedia, social networking, installation art, and mash-ups, the teacher and students became artists, researchers, and teachers in a community of practice. A new form of teaching practice was envisioned that opens the possibility for both collective and individual understandings in the formation of curricula. A set of guiding principles was invented through practice as a way of …

This qualitative inquiry explored how art educators might broaden their views of place through critical encounters with art, local visual culture, and working with older artists. I combined place-based (PB) education and intergenerational (IG) learning as the focus of an art education curriculum writing initiative with in-service art educators within a museum setting to produce PBIG art education. This study engaged art educators in cooperative action research using a multi-modal approach, including identifying and interviewing local artists to construct new understandings about local place and art to share with students and community. I used critical reflection in our cooperative action research by troubling paradoxes in local visual culture, which formed views of place including Indigenous cultures. Using Deleuze's Logic of Sense (LOS) theories of sense and event, enabled concept development through embracing the paradoxes of this research as sense producing. LOS theory of duration complements IG learning by clarifying the contributions of place and time to memory and experience. Duration suggests that place locates the virtual past, which is actualized through memories--one of the shared experiences of IG learning. Rethinking IG relationships as a sharing of experience and memory while positioning place as a commonality, dismantles ageist notions by offering …

This qualitative inquiry explores a community-based art partnership called the semester programs that took place between Artpace San Antonio and Louis W. Fox Academic and Technical High School from 2004 until 2006. This narrative inquiry used interviews with artists and former Fox Tech art students involved in our program, along with my teacher/ researcher reflections, to make meaning from the data. The artists involved in the semester programs were Gary Sweeney, Daniel Guerrero, David Jurist, and Ethel Shipton. Former students interviewed include Eloy McGarity, Rosa Leija, John Contreras, and Jennelle Gomez, while I, Maria Leake represent the voice of the art teacher. Our stories of experience were analyzed and connections between situated learning theory, creativity theories, community-based art education, and memory research were all recognized as being exhibited during our community partnership programs. There were seven patterns and themes that were noted as occurring within each semester program, as well as notable distinctions. The patterns and themes from the data analysis suggest that our community partnership reflected the following: learning and creative expression went beyond the individual; networks of support and communication were available to all participants; challenges were acknowledged; empathy between participants was an unintentional outcome; working together as …