DeMoss,+Karen

Terry Morris, Consultant.
 * //How Arts Integration Supports Student Learning: Students Shed Light on the Connections.// Karen DeMoss, University of New Mexico, 2002 **

** Abstract: ** Learning in and with the arts has been linked with increased student achievement, but the means by which the arts may support cognitive growth in students is relatively undocumented. Thirty students across ten classes in veteran teacher artist partnerships were selected to help explore the processes and outcomes associated with arts-integrated learning units versus learning processes and outcomes in comparable non-arts units. The student sample evenly represented comparatively high, medium, and low achievers. Even thought we observed differences in levels of arts integration across classrooms, students from all achievement levels displayed significant increases in their ability to analytically assess their own learning following arts-integrated units. No such gains associated with traditional instructional experiences. Students also described their arts-integrated versus non-arts learning differently. Arts-integrated instruction: 1) created more independent and intrinsically motivated investments in learning, 2) fostered learning for understanding as opposed to recall of facts for tests, 3) transformed students’ characterizations of “learning barriers” into “challenges” to be solved, and 4) inspired students to pursue further learning opportunities outside of class.

· **If learning with and through the arts is correlated with higher achievement and other evidence of learning, what special qualities or processes of arts education might be supporting students’ growth? · ** **Would students adept at meeting schools’ standardized achievement demands differ in their arts learning experiences from those who find traditional achievement measures a challenge? · ** **Would individual students value (and gain from) their arts-integrated learning differently from how they value (and gain from) their non-arts-integrated learning? · ** **How would students describe the differences that arts integrated education made in their learning?**
 * Questions: **

(The article included examples of student reflections on their learning in non-arts and arts integration units of instruction)