Roxann Sorenson Moonfire Porcelain Dr. Pauline Stonehouse University of North Dakota ASCD Brain Compatible Learning Network.

The Brain, Learning, and the Arts

Roxann Sorenson

Moonfire Porcelain

Dr. Pauline Stonehouse

University of North Dakota

ASCD Brain Compatible Learning Network

Introductions:

PAULINE STONEHOUSE ROXANN SORENSON

This Session:

THE ARTS & BRAIN

COMPATIBLE LEARNING

Recent Research on the arts, learning and the brain

STEPPIN’ OUT WITH SHAKESPEARE

A Clay Workshop in five acts

Prologue: The Globe Theatre

Defining Arts:

Jensen, E. (2001). Arts with the brain in mind:

Musical Arts

Visual Arts

Kinesthetic Arts

Art?

Neuroeducation: Recent Research

The Dana Consortium Report on Arts and Cognition - 2008

Does early arts training cause changes in the brain that enhance other important aspects of cognition? (2004)

Johns Hopkins University Summit - 2009

What new research is relevant?How does the process of learning with and through the arts improve academic performance? (2009)

In Search of Brain-Based Education: Bruer (1999)

“We have almost survived the Decade of the Brain.” p. 649

“The brain-based literature represents a genre of writing . . . that provides a popular mix of fact, misinterpretation, and speculation.” p. 657

Learning Style Research Under Fire

“The contrast between the enormous popularity of the learning-styles approach and the lack of credible evidence for its utility is, in our opinion, striking and disturbing.”

Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer, & Bjork (2010)

Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence

Neuroeducation NEUROSCIENCE EDUCATION

NEUROEDUCATIONThe Johns Hopkins School of Education

Neuro-Education Initiative (NEI)Interdisciplinary group of researchers

brought together to bridge the gap between brain sciences and education

THE SCIENCE OFLEARNING

PRACTITIONERS OFEDUCATION

PSYCHOLOGYHow children learn andwhat practices promote and sustain the learning

process

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT ONE: Characters

“Shakespeare, Meet You Tube”

Edutopia

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2010Shakin’ Up Shakespeare

1. Romeo and Juliet

2. Hamlet

3. Macbeth

4. A Midsummer Night’s Dream

5. The Taming of the Shrew

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT TWO: Footwear

Chopines

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT THREE: Drawing on the Imagination

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT THREE: Drawing on the Imagination

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT FOUR: Getting Your Feet Wet (“Jump”)

. . . art is not, like science, a logic of references but a release from reference and rendition of immediate experience. . . not primarily a thought, or even a feeling, but an impact.

Joseph Campbell (1959)

Steppin’ Out With Shakespeare ACT FIVE: Reflection

“In every adult there lurks a child – an eternal child, something that is always becoming, is never completed, and calls for unceasing care, attention, and education. That is the part of the human personality which wants to develop and become whole.”

Jung in Cameron (1996)

Epilogue:Arts Training and Cognition

…..each individual art form involves separate brain networks. Our theory of how interest and training in the arts to improved general cognition generally, involves five elements.

(Posner, M., Rothbart, M. K., Sheese, B. E., & Kieras, J. K., 2008, p.4)

Rap Up: Musical Arts

Macbeth Rap Memory skills are enhanced by training in music and acting

Specific links are suggested between the practice of music and geometry

Correlations exist between music training and reading

Kinesthetic Arts

Training in acting appears to lead to memory improvement

Learning to dance by effective close observation is closely related to learning by physical practice. Skills of observational learning may transfer to other cognitive skills

Visual Arts

The visual arts enhance cognition, emotional expression, perception, cultural awareness and play a significant part to play in the learning process.

Simple as A-B-C

Reading and Language Skills

Mathematics Skills Thinking Skills Social Skills Motivation to Learn Positive School

Environment

Ruppert (2006): National Assembly of State Arts

Agencies

Critical Evidence: How The Arts Benefit Student Achievement

“One convenient way to sum up how study of the arts benefits student achievement is the recognition that learning in the arts is academic, basicand comprehensive. It is as simple asA-B-C.”

Session Evaluation, Questions, Comments:

If we shadows have offended,

Think but this, and all is mended:

That you have but slumbered here,

While these visions did appear . . .

Gentles, do not reprehend.

If you pardon, we will mend.

William ShakespeareA Midsummer Night’s Dream

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Insight: The Artist

PABLO PICASSO

For me, creation first starts by contemplation, and I need long idle hours of meditation. . . I let my mind drift at ease, just like a boat in the current. Sooner or later it is caught by something. It gets precise. It takes shape . . . My next painting motif is decided.

Insight: The Philosopher

MAXINE GREENE

“Participatory involvement with the many forms of art does enable us, at the very least, to see more in our experience, to hear more on normally unheard frequencies, to become conscious of what daily routines, habits, and conventions have obscured.”

Maxine Greene (2007). Art and imagination: Overcoming a desperate stasis.