Vlădescu Maria Mădălina - Art as a mean of teaching

Proiectul Internațional “Omul drag de la catedră”

Ediția a III-a 2018-2019

Concurs elevi. Simpozion Internațional dascăli

Inclus în CAERI, anexa 9 din OMEN nr. 3016/09.01.2019, poziția 1518

ISBN 978-606-725-262-0

Art as a mean of teaching

Vlădescu Maria Mădălina

Liceul Tehnologic de Transporturi Auto, Târgoviște

            Art has always been one of the most important components of the human spirit. From the Greek kalokagathia (harmonious developement of spirit, body and mind), passing through centuries of history and culture, we come to visual art, art therapy, self-knowledge through art, green arts, art expression, urban art. Everything that surrounds us seems to be somehow tied up to art: the way we feel, the way we express ourselves, the way we see and appreciate the world, the relationships we establish with other people, the self-improvement, the emotional enriching, the actions we make, even the way we live. It is obvious that creating artistic abilities to children becomes a necessity for a complete education because in today’s world it is more and more difficult to distinguish between authenticity and fake. Art can offer a sensitive dimension for the human conscience because any ability or competence we may possess through education, it’s rigid without the artistic vibration. Education based on art contributes to growing the human spirit and interpersonal relationships.

            If education means to create and maintain the moral and spiritual health of a society, than it is compulsory not to neglect the artistic competence. One of the oldest educational systems, of the Ancient Greek, cherished art as a main principle organizing human spirit and they combined intellectual formation with physical and spiritual education for a harmonious personality. Greeks, Platon especially, considered music as an art that ennobles the individual because it touches his heart, but it can also cultivate the rhythm and a certain intonation of the voice. When teaching Romanian Litterature, music can create a pleasant environment, but it can also be a mean to exteriorize one’s feelings.  For example, it can be useful in the approach of poetry. I used music when studying poets like Mihai Eminescu, George Bacovia, Nichita Stănescu. When we had to study Sara pe deal de Mihai Eminescu, I offered the students, beside the litterary text, a musical version (orchestrated by Vasile Popovici) and I asked them to appreciate the harmony between the text and the music. I also asked them to specify the emotions communicated through music and the impressions it induces to themselves. The literary text had a greater impact on them when I associated it with the music, the students were able to identify emotions, to appreciate the atmosphere, the relation between outer space and inner feelings.

For the study of George Bacovia I used another method: I presented the students several musical pieces (Gheorghe Iovu – “Nostalgie”, Yanni – “Rainmaker:, Demis Russos – “We pretend”, Vangelis – “Metallic rain”, Atticus Ross – “Panoramic”, Beethoven – “Silence”,  Mozart – “Requiem”, Samuel Barber – “Adagio for Strings”) and I asked them to choose one that they consider appropriated to express the  message of bacovian poetry, Décor or Lacustra. They could also propose themselves songs suitable for Bacovia’s texts. Through this exercise, students were able to establish connections between feelings, music and litterature, to identify and name emotions induced b a text, to develop interdisciplinary abilities. They were able to connect more intimately with the text itself, to enter the text world and they also acquired knowledge about composers or songs they didn’t know before. This kind of exercise stimulated their motivation for learning, they regarded poetry with more interest and it can help developing an  aesthetic sense.

But art does not reduce itself only to music. Painting it is a domain that can be largely explored in didactic activities. I used pictures by Bernard Fradin (“Cité lacustre”), Alfred Thorne (“Paysage lacustrine”), Joseph Hurard (“Paysage cotier”) and asked the students to associate one of them with “Lacustră” by George Bacovia and to explain and argument their choice. This way, they had to understand the message of the text, to connect with the emotions expressed by the poet so they can make a wittingly choice. For the poetry “Décor” by the same George Bacovia I used a didactic method, called “verbal painting”: children have to express verbally which elements would they choose to draw or paint, if they had to reproduce the text “Décor” at a visual level. They can be guided through questions like: “What kind of elements would you place in the foreground?”, “What would you put in the background?”, “What colours would you choose?”, “Would you use contrasts, shades?”. Through this method chidren enrich their vocabulary by using terms  from painting and develop their creativity as they are stimulated to imagine themselves a picture. The result is that they come to transpose themselves in the poet’s state of mind, in the poetry universe.

Such use of art not only openes the door for trans and interdisciplinarity, but it encourages empathy and the student can spiritually identify himself with the emotions expressed by the text. We also see here a more personal interaction with the text, which is important to create a personal opinion and encrease the self-esteem of the child who realizes that he can understand and connect with the text and his creator. The atmosphere in the class is nicer, students are more relaxed and human interactions are brighter and less conflictive.

For the epic and dramatic texts I used dramatizing method. For dramatic pieces it is obvious that mobilizing the students to play themselves in class some important scenes and characters can be interesting and helpful to understand the essence of the text and characters. For epic texts I made adaptations, made by myself with the participation of the students. For example, at the theme Moromeții by Marin Preda I chose the dinner scene, in the beginning, and asked some students, with some acting skills, to play the characters: Ilie, Catrina and the six children. They dressed in traditional clothes, made a traditional table to resemble the one from the novel and brought traditional dishes, wooden spoons to decorate the scene. For their collegues it was like the family itself had come to life, for the acting students the implication was total and they did everything very enthusiastic. They ended up by loving the novel. When I had to teach them the particulars of the characters in the same novel, Moromeții by Marin Preda, I used dramatizing method: I selected important quotes and replies from the novel and involved a couple of students to speak as if they were Ilie Moromete, Niculae, Catrina, the three older brothers, Tita and Ilinca. For the acting children it was an  interesting exercise because they had the opportunity to identify with the characters and know them intimately; for the rest of the class it was easier to identify the characters features because they seemed alive and the students felt like interacting with them. The same method was used when we discussed the novel Enigma Otiliei by George Călinescu. It was easier for the children to establish a relationship with the character, to understand  Otilia’s choice and establish her dominant features. Dramatization creates an atmosphere, a relaxing scenery, stimulates interaction between the students and it introduces them in the intimacy of the text.

At the same time, when discussing the novels, I used scenes from the movies made after literary works. It was the case of Moromeții by Marin Preda, where the movie catches very precisely the novel action and message. It would have been difficult to recreate in the classroom the scene  where the acacia is cut or when Ilie Moromete beats his older sons, so I presented the children those scenes in cinematographic versions. The cinematography can be very helpful in for books where the action takes place back in time ( the early XX-th century in Enigma Otiliei by George Calinescu) or in the village, during the interwar period (Moromeții by Marin Preda), because the space and the period are distant and strange for the students of the XXI-st century. They cannot know it by direct experience, so the movie is a good way to show them the space, the costumes, the aspect of the houses, the village or the city in that time. Instead of struggleing to picture a time or a space they have never seen, the students have the possibility to access them through movies.

The conclusion is that didactic activities are more dynamic, more pleasant and more attractive to children if art domains are implicated. The understanding and the motivation are stimulated and a child who is curious to see a new learning scenario will not flunk school repeatedly. If the student is involved in the process of learning using artistic activities he will also develop skills like creativity, specalized vocabulary, human interaction, cooperation, critical thinking, esthetic sense. Art not only charmes our senses, but it can also represent a complementary alternative to our children education because it teaches how to be human and to have all senses alive.      

Bibliografie:

Melnic, Tatiana, Dezvoltarea inteligențelor multiple la orele de literatură în Limba română, Revistă de gândire și cultură, nr. 3(225) 2014, Chișinău, anul XXIV.

Rusu, Marinela, (coordonator) THE ROLE OF EDUCATION THROUGH ART papers from conference Art and Personality, 2014.

Șchiopu, Consantin, Metodologia educației literar-artistice a elevilor, Universitatea Pedagogică de Stat ”Ion Creangă”, Chișinău, 2016.

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