Framing Education as Art: The Octopus Has a Good Day / Edition 1

by Jessica Hoffmann Davis

Overview

This book champions the arts as essential to the K–12 educative process. Exploring apparently oppositional approaches to the arts and their role in education, it provides both an overview of arts learning in and out of school as well as a set of “artful” lenses through which to regard non-arts teaching and learning. With strong implications for practice, the work celebrates inquiry and multiple perspectives as it explores a range of reflections on art, artistry, artists, art education, and the methods and results of arts-related educational research.

Featuring discussions and illustrations of selected works of art by children and professional artists, the text:

• Offers practical, arts-related strategies for improving teaching and learning in schools.
• Reaches beyond arts educators and advocates to include those who have no experience in the arts.
• Addresses a broad vista of settings for arts teaching and learning, including non-arts classrooms, schools that focus on the arts, community art centers, and art museums.
• Includes lessons learned from urban community art centers with a history of working successfully with, and providing safe havens for, disenfranchised students.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780807745779
Publisher:	Teachers College Press
Publication date:	04/03/2005
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	244
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Jessica Hoffmann Davis is a cognitive developmental psychologist and founder of the Arts in Education Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Table of Contents

	Acknowledgments	ix
	Introduction	1
1	The Artistic Process	8
	Octavia One	8
	Introduction to the Generative Tension: The Artistic Process-Feeling/Thinking	10
	The Artistic Process-Feeling	11
	Reviewing the Emotive Approach to the Artistic Process	26
	The Artistic Process-Thinking	27
	Reviewing the Cognitive Approach to the Artistic Process	43
2	The Child as Artist	46
	Octavia Two	46
	Introduction to the Generative Tension: The Child as Artist-Romance/Reason	49
	The Child as Artist-Romance	53
	Reviewing the Romantic View of the Child as Artist	60
	The Child as Artist-Reason	62
	Reviewing the Rational View of the Child as Artist	76
3	The Arts in Education in School	80
	Octavia Three	80
	Introduction to the Generative Tension: The Arts in Education in School-Justification/Celebration	82
	The Arts in Education in School-Justification	85
	Reviewing Justifications for the Arts in Education in School	99
	The Arts in Education in School-Celebration	101
	Reviewing Celebrations of the Arts in Education in School	122
4	Arts in Education in the Community	124
	Octavia Four	124
	Introduction to the Generative Tension: Arts in Education in the Community-Mighty Muse/Safe Haven	127
	Arts in Education in the Community-Mighty Muse	130
	Reviewing Arts in Education in the Community-Mighty Muse	148
	Arts in Education in the Community-Safe Haven	152
	Reviewing Arts in Education in the Community-Safe Haven	171
5	Framing Education as Art	173
	Octavia Five	173
	Introduction	176
	The Artistic Process-Feeling/Thinking	181
	The Child as Artist-Romance/Reason	191
	The Arts in Education in School-Justification/Celebration	198
	Arts in Education in the Community-Mighty Muse/Safe Haven	206
	A Final Word and Image	211
	References	213
	Index	223
	About the Author	230

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“In this pathbreaking and graceful book, Davis resists the dualisms that distort and the ideology that politicizes conversations in the field. Instead, she challenges us to consider a paradigmatic shift—a bold reframing of our view—that urges educators and policymakers to look to the arts for inspiration, innovation, provocation, and direction.”
Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Professor, Harvard University and author of The Essential Conversation and Respect

“Jessica Davis takes her readers on an adventurous journey through the arts and art education in their interconnectedness: in museums, community centers, schools, and in partnerships with professional artists. She ends with a suggestive epiphany having to do with a ‘wheel of culture’ with the arts at the center.”
Maxine Greene, Professor Emerita, Teachers College, Columbia University

“ Framing Education as Art not only lets us see education as art, but art as education as well. It’s a beautifully crafted work.”
— Elliot W. Eisner, Lee Jacks Professor of Education and Professor of Art, Stanford University