As I continue along my pre-service teaching education, I have developed, created, molded and adopted different aspects of educational practices into my own pedagogical philosophy.  However, by no means do I consider this a final edition of my pedagogy.  As with any goal or theory, testing and practicing to accomplish the task and fine tune the craft towards perfection is required.  While I personally don’t believe in perfection, I do believe in striving to be the best you can be within one’s own personal realm of ability and perseverance.  My pedagogical philosophy will always be incomplete, a work in progress; an ideal that must be continuously stretched and adapted to not only my needs as an educator but, more importantly, to the needs of my future students.  The following are a few theories and practices that inform my personal pedagogical philosophy.

 

     We have the power to use the visual arts to give the world a voice.  Eisner states the “limits of language are not the limits of cognition” (2009, p. 8).  Often children can struggle with voicing their knowledge through written and verbal language formats.  The visual arts can be a second language to a child, givinghim or her the ability to express not only their knowledge, but their personal identity as well.  Literacy in the visual gives people the empowerment to make meaning in imagery (Yenawine, 1997).  The visual arts has the ability to empower people of all ages, races, ethnicities, and socio economic class giving them equal voice to the world.

 

     We have the power to use the visual arts to create a fun and open atmosphere for learning.  An arts education allows for a creative, imaginative, personalized, playful and free environment (Gude, 2007).  Encouraging students to actively experiment and pursue their own direction in art-making helps to create a personal connection to the work, leading to the development of deeper understanding and strengthening knowledge.  As Olivia Gude advises, “experimenting with media is not enough to truly stimulate students’ creative abilities” (p. 7).  Therefore, as an art educator I must become a guiding force, aiding and directing students to stay focused on the task but with an empathetic touch in order to maintain the freedom and openness the arts invite.

 

     We have the power to integrate the sciences, mathematics, history and much more into the arts, while ensuring the arts are equally as important.  Through the freedom of the arts, any subject matter can be tackled.  Art is one of our most basic human proclivities (Dissanayake, 1992) and therefore it is only natural for art to be taught to students on equal ground with the core subjects.

 

     We have the power to build, shape, and mold upon my own knowledge, culture, and understandings as well as those of my future students.  Using a constructivist approach, the arts can be used to help children develop their own body of self-organization; posing questions, realizing ‘failure’ is as viable an answer as success, and creating a communicative collaborative energy that enhances thinking (Fosnot & Perry, 2005). 

 

     Finally, we have the power to use and teach art in a way that breaks away from the simple instruction of the form and structure of art.  Using postmodern principles to broaden the creative powers of students (Gude, 2004), we can build new personal principles for teaching and learning reflecting the ongoing growth of not only ourselves but my own personal pedagogy as well.  

 

     As mentioned before my pedagogy will be constantly in flux.  It will be constantly built upon, de-constructed, and re-shaped.  Elliot Eisner states, “We ought to be helping our students discover new seas upon which to sail rather than old ports at which to dock” (2009, p. 9).  A truly good pedagogical philosophy is never complete; a philosophy which allows us to keep exploring the known and unknown world.

 

REFERENCES

Dissanayake, E. (1992). Homo aestheticus: Where Art Comes From and Why. New York: Free Press.

Eisner, E. (2009, March). What Education Can Do For the Arts. Art Education, 6-9.

Fosnot, C. T., & Perry, R. S. (2005). Chapter 2. Constructivism: A Psychological Theory of Learning. In C. T. Fosnot, Constructivism: Theory, Perspectives, and Practice. New York: Teachers College Press.

Gude, O. (2004). Postmodern Principles: In Search of a 21st Century Art Education. Art Education, 6-14.

Gude, O. (2007, January). Principles of Possibility: Considerations for a 21st-Century Art & Culture Curriculum. Art Education, 6-17.

Ros, H., & Farinella, M. (2014). Neurocomic. Nobrow Press.

Yenawine, P. (1997). Thoughts on Visual Literacy. In J. Flood, S. B. Heath, & D. Lapp, Handbook of Research on Teaching Literacy through the Communicative and Visual Arts (pp. 1-3). Macmillan Library Reference.