DID YOU KNOW?

Young people who participate in the arts for at least three hours on three days each week through at least one full year are:

•  4 times more likely to be recognized for academic achievement3 times more likely to be elected to class office within their schools
• 4 times more likely to participate in a math and science fair
• 3 times more likely to win an award for school attendance
• 4 times more likely to win an award for writing an essay or poem

Young artists, as compared with their peers, are likely to:

• Attend music, art, and dance classes nearly three times as frequently

• Participate in youth groups nearly four times as frequently

• Read for pleasure nearly twice as often

• Perform community service more than four times as often

(Living the Arts through Language + Learning: A Report on Community-based Youth Organizations, Shirley Brice Heath, Stanford University and Carnegie Foundation For the Advancement of Teaching, Americans for the Arts School for Advanced Studies-Performing Arts

The facts are that arts education...

·                     makes a tremendous impact on the developmental growth of every child and has proven to help level the "learning field" across socio-economic boundaries.

(Involvement in the Arts and Success in Secondary School, James S. Catterall, The UCLA Imagination Project, Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, UCLA, Americans for the Arts Monograph, January 1998)
 

·                     has a measurable impact on youth at risk in deterring delinquent behavior and truancy problems while also increasing overall academic performance among those youth engaged in after school and summer arts programs targeted toward delinquency prevention.

(YouthARTS Development Project, 1996, U.S. Department of Justice, National Endowment for the Arts, and Americans for the Arts

• builds a school climate of high expectation, discipline, and academic rigor that attracts businesses relocating to your community.
• strengthens student problem-solving and critical thinking skills, adding to overall academic achievement and school success.
• helps students develop a sense of craftsmanship, quality task performance, and goal-setting—skills needed to succeed in the classroom and beyond.
• can help troubled youth, providing an alternative to destructive behavior and another way for students to approach learning.
• provides another opportunity for parental, community, and business involvement with schools, including arts and humanities organizations.
• helps all students develop more appreciation and understanding of the world around them.
  helps students develop a positive work ethic and pride in a job well done.

(Business Circle for Arts Education in Oklahoma, "Arts at the Core of Learning 1999 Initiative")

DIG DEEPER
Proof of the Power of Arts Education

Read highlights of key national research on the impact of arts education on children and learning. These brief findings offer links to publication summaries that link to full publications online (when available).

Read highlights of key national research on the impact of arts education on children and learning. These brief findings offer links to publication summaries that link to full publications online (when available).

HOW HIGH DO WE REACH?
What is it exactly that our kids should be able to do when they study the arts? We're glad you asked. Standards for arts education have been developed by arts and education experts at the national level, and most of our states have followed suit.

HOW HAVE WE DONE SO FAR?
National Assessment of Educational Progress: 1997 Arts Assessment Report Card
An ongoing project of the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) regularly tests students in different academic subjects.

• reach students who are not otherwise being reached
• reach students in ways that they are not otherwise being reached
• connect students to themselves and each other
• transform the environment for learning
• provide learning opportunities for the adults in the lives of young people
• provide new challenges for those students already considered successful
• connect learning experiences to the world of real work
• enable young people to have direct involvement with the arts and artists
• require significant staff development
• support extended engagement in the artistic process

To read the full report go to Champions of Change, a report produced by the national Arts Education Partnership, the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, the GE Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

INVOLVEMENT IN THE ARTS AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT: GENERAL INVOLVEMENT AND INTENSIVE INVOLVEMENT IN MUSIC AND THEATER ARTS

James S. Catterall, Richard Chapleau and John Iwanaga
The Imagination Project, Graduate School of Education & Information Studies
University of California at Los Angeles, September 1999

Researchers used U.S. Department of Education data from the National Educational Longitudinal Survey (NELS:88) which has followed 25,000 students nationwide from 8th grade through 12th grade.

The work examines involvement in the arts generally—across all disciplines and then it examines the potential importance of sustained involvement in a single discipline. Involvement in instrumental music and the theater arts are examined specifically.

The researchers summarized their findings generally as:

1.  "Involvement in the arts and academic success. Positive academic developments for children engaged in the arts are seen at each step in the research—between 8th and 10th grade as well as between 10th and 12th grade. The comparative gains for arts-involved youngsters generally become more pronounced over time. Moreover and more important, these patterns also hold for children from low socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds."

2.  "Music and mathematics achievement. Students who report consistent high levels of involvement in instrumental music over the middle and high school years show significantly higher levels of mathematics proficiency by grade 12. This observation holds both generally and for low SES students as a subgroup. In addition, absolute differences in measured mathematics proficiency between students consistently involved versus not involved in instrumental music grow significantly over time."

3.  "Theater arts and human development. Sustained student involvement in theater arts (acting in plays and musicals, participating in drama clubs, and taking acting lessons) associates with a variety of developments for youth: gains in reading proficiency, gains in self concept and motivation, and higher levels of empathy and tolerance for others. Our analyses of theater arts were undertaken for low SES youth only. Our presumption was that more advantaged youngsters would be more likely to be involved in theater and drama because of attendance at more affluent school and because of parental ability to afford theater opportunities in the community or private sectors."

Some of the specific findings from the report include:

A co-relationship between high involvement in the arts and better academic scores was found among all students and remained consistent when the students studied were selected only from the lowest socioeconomic quartile. Socioeconomic status (SES) takes into account parental income and education levels and has long been known to be the most significant predictor of academic performance. High SES students would be expected to have both greater involvement in the arts and better academic performance, making the relationship seen here between the two not startling. However, by comparing low SES students with other low SES students, the relationship between high arts involvement and better academic performance could be tested without SES affecting the results.

In the low SES group, significant differences were found between the academic achievement of high arts-involved students and low arts-involved students as measured by standardized tests and reading proficiency measures. For instance, 30.9 percent of 12th grade, low SES, high arts-involved students scored in the top half on the standardized tests which combined math and verbal achievement. Only 23.4 percent of their low arts-involved peers (12th grade, low SES) did so. For achievement in high levels of reading proficiency the percentages are 37.9 percent for the high arts-involved students (12th grade, low SES) and 30.4 percent for the low arts involved (12th grade, low SES).

The levels of academic achievement recorded by high arts-involved students in the lowest socioeconomic (SES) quartile narrows the gap that they have with higher SES students. 12th grade, low SES, high arts-involved students nearly close the achievement gap in reading proficiency with higher SES, low arts-involved 12th graders (37.9% reaching high levels of reading proficiency versus 42.9% respectively).

Drop-out rates are co-related to levels of arts-involvement among all students, even when controlled for socioeconomic status (SES) and high arts-involved, low SES students close the drop-out gap with higher SES but low arts-involved students. Low SES students in general have a higher drop-out rate than higher SES students but 3.5% of low SES, high arts-involved 8th graders studied dropped out by the 10th grade whereas 3.7% of higher SES but low arts-involved 8th graders dropped out by the 10th grade.

A high level of involvement in instrumental music co-related to high achievement in math proficiency.  This held true among all students and among those students in the lowest socio-economic (SES) quartile. More than twice as many 12th grade, high music-involved, low SES students performed at high levels of math proficiency as non music-involved, low SES 12th grade students.

Instrumental music involvement also related to high-music, low SES students closing the math achievement gap with higher SES students. In 8th grade, high-music, low SES students closed the expected achievement gap that low SES students would usually have with the average student. By 12th grade the high-music, low SES students had pulled significantly ahead of the average student in math proficiency (33.1 percent to 21.3 percent).

High level of involvement in theater co-related to high levels of achievement in reading proficiency. Low socio-economic status (SES) students highly involved in theater outscored the low SES students who were not involved in theater in reading proficiency. The 9 percent advantage of high-theater involved 8th graders grows to a 20 percent advantage by 12th grade.

High levels of arts involvement co-related to the number of hours students watched television. 10th grade students in the top quartile of arts involvement watched less television than those students in the bottom quartile of arts involvement. 28.2 percent of the high-arts students watched one hour or less of television on weekdays contrasted to 15.1 percent of the low-arts students. Only 20.6 percent of the high-arts students watched three hours or more of television on weekdays contrasted to 34.9 percent of low-arts students.

Involvement in the Arts and Human Development: General Involvement and Intensive Involvement in Music and Theater Arts is one of seven major studies compiled in Champions of Change produced by the national Arts Education Partnership, the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, the GE Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

IMAGINATIVE ACTUALITY: LEARNING IN THE ARTS DURING THE NONSCHOOL HOURS
Shirley Brice Heath with Adelma Roach
Stanford University and Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching

The report featured in Champions of Change explains that "this report of empirical data on imagination…explores how young people and professional artists in economically disadvantaged communities make learning work in community-based organizations devoted to production and performance in the arts." (p.20) "The scholars carrying out this study were not arts educators or advocates, but social scientists working to understand learning and language development and organization environments that enhance these for young people likely to be labeled ‘at-risk' in their schools." (p.20)

Linguistic anthropologists observed student learning in non-school environments that students chose for themselves and were surprised to find a compelling pattern emerge among those students who participated in arts organizations, as opposed to community service or sports-academic initiatives.(p.20) The arts pattern revealed that the environments of arts organizations were different as were attitudes and behaviors of the young people involved. (p.24)

Young people in non-school arts organizations participated in planning, practicing and critiquing individual and group projects and thus had opportunities far in excess of other students to engage in complex thinking and speaking around those activities with each other and with adults. "Young people in arts-based organizations gain practice in thinking and talking as adults. They play important roles in their organizations; they have control over centering themselves and working for group excellence in achievement. Their joint work with adults and peers rides on conversations that test and develop ideas, explicate processes, and build scenarios of the future." (p.26)

The researchers explain that, "The high risk embedded in the performances and exhibitions of these organizations creates an atmosphere in which students know how to solicit support, challenge themselves and others, and share work and resources whenever possible." (p.26) The use of individual and group critique throughout the production process develops strategy-building and strengthens the young person's ability to assess and learn on his or her own. One participant who went on to architecture school noted, "The place enabled me to put together a capable portfolio to get accepted at a good institution, to make sure I had the tools to look at something and crit it by myself and say 'is that good enough? What's good and what's bad about it?'" (p.27)

From these findings the researchers developed a new understanding of the "three r's" and named them: roles, risks, and rules. (p.22)

Some of the findings from the report include:

Students involved in afterschool activities at arts organizations showed greater use of complex language than their peers in activities through community-service or sports organizations. Linguistic anthropologists found that "the influences of participation in the arts on language show up in the dramatic increase in syntactic complexity, hypothetical reasoning, and questioning approaches taken up by young people within four-to-six weeks of their entry into the arts organization." "Generalized patterns emerged among youth participating in afterschool arts groups: a five-fold increase in use of if-then statements, scenario building followed by what-if questions, and how-about prompts, more than a two-fold increase in use of mental state verbs (consider, understand, etc.), a doubling in the number of modal verbs (could, might, etc.)" (p.27)

Students in afterschool arts groups "had nine times as many opportunities to write original text material (not dictated notes) as their classroom counterparts." (p.28)

Environments of afterschool activities at arts organizations "emerged as somewhat different from those of groups engaged primarily in community service or sports." Linguistic anthropologists found that in the arts organizations, "Students participated in planning and preparing as a group, their sentences peppered, "with 'could,' 'will,' 'can,'—asserting possibility." (p.24-25)
      
Troubled students involved in afterschool programs at arts organizations felt better about themselves than less troubled students in a national sample.  Though the students observed and studied in after school arts organizations were twice as likely as those in a national sample (U.S. Department of Education, NELS:88) to be undergoing uncertain and insecure family situations, they were 16 percentage points more likely to feel good about themselves (92.3 percent to 76.2 percent). (p.30)

The arts develop skills and habits of mind that are important for workers in the new "Economy of Ideas" (Alan Greenspan). The SCANS 2000 Report links arts education with economic realities, asserting that "young people who learn the rigors of planning and production in the arts will be valuable employees in the idea-driven workplace of the future." (* The Secretary's Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS) was established in 1990 by the Secretary of Labor with the goal of encouraging a high-performance economy characterized by high-skill, high-wage employment. It defined critical skills that employees need in order to succeed in the workforce and, indeed, in life. In addition to basic literacy and computation skills which workers must know how to apply, they need the ability to work on teams, solve complex problems in systems, understand and use technology.) (p.32)

Imaginative Actuality: Learning in the Arts During the NonSchool Hours is one of seven major studies compiled in Champions of Change produced by the national Arts Education Partnership, the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, the GE Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

LEARNING IN AND THROUGH THE ARTS: CURRICULUM IMPLICATIONS
Judith Burton, Robert Horowitz, Hal Abeles
Center for Arts Education Research, Teachers College, Columbia University, July 1999

"You are talking to someone who had very little to do with the arts before I came here. This has changed me enormously. I have an appreciation for the arts that I never had before. I have seen youngsters come through here who perhaps weren't as motivated, and I have seen them take off and fly because we pulled them into an art and opened up new avenues. I couldn't work anymore in a school that wasn't totally immersed in the arts."
(now former) Middle School Principal
Manhattan East (East Harlem)
Community School District 4
New York City

The study examined three questions: "What is arts learning? Does it extend to learning in other school subjects? What conditions in schools support this learning?" The researchers found "significant relationships between rich in-school arts programs and creative, cognitive, and personal competencies needed for academic success." (p.36)

Researchers studied 2046 children in grades four, five, seven, and eight in twelve public schools in New York, Connecticut, Virginia, and South Carolina. The students studied were determined by the researchers to have received either a "high" level of arts education or a "low" level by noting the number of years children had received in-school arts instruction and the range of different arts they had studied during this time. The students in the top quartile were called "high-arts" and those in the lowest quartile were called "low-arts."

Researchers studied students and school environments in schools that provided arts education in various ways: combining the arts disciplines with each other, integrating the non-arts curriculum with the arts, and teaching the arts in their separate disciplines. Various professionals taught the arts: specialist teachers, general classroom teachers, and external providers such as artists and performers from cultural institutions.

Researchers used various measures—some they developed specifically for this investigation (a Teacher Perception Scale, Classroom Teacher Arts Inventory, and the Student Arts Background questionnaire) and some previously developed by other researchers such as the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking, the Self-Description Questionnaire, and the School-Level Environment Questionnaire.

Some of the findings from the report include:

More students who had received high levels of arts instruction earned high scores on measures of creative thinking than students with the lowest levels of arts instruction. Creative thinking includes various aspects of problem solving: how many ideas a student has in response to a problem, how original those ideas are, how detailed the ideas are, and the student's ability to keep her mind open long enough for innovative ideas to surface. The results were, "more firmly tied to rich arts provision than to high economic status." 31 to 41 percent of the high-arts students earned high scores on the five different creativity measures whereas only 11 to 17 percent of the low-arts students earned high scores on creativity measures. (p.38, 39, Figure 1)

In schools with strong arts climates, teachers and students both benefit. Teachers found students who had received high levels of arts training to be more cooperative and more willing to share what they had learned than students with low levels of arts training. "High-arts" students were better able to express their ideas, use their imaginations, and take risks in learning, as reported by teachers. High-arts students had better rapport with teachers and teachers in arts-rich schools demonstrated more interest in their work and were more likely to become involved in professional development experiences (81 percent to 38 percent). They were also more likely to be innovative in their teaching (81 percent to 38 percent). (p. 38-41, Figures 2 and 5)

Teachers noticed many positive qualities in "high-arts" students. Pupils in arts-intensive settings scored higher in teachers' perceptions of their abilities to express thoughts and ideas, exercise their imaginations, and take risks in learning. Teachers also described those students as more cooperative and willing to display their learning publicly. (p. 38-39, Figure 2)

High-arts students demonstrated more self-confidence about their academic performance. Students with the highest quartile of arts involvement were far more likely than their low-arts counterparts to think of themselves as competent in academics (41 percent to 18 percent). They were also far more likely to believe that they did well in school in general (36 percent to 19 percent), particularly in reading (40 percent to 20 percent) and mathematics (30 percent to 15 percent)." (p.40, Figure 3, p.41, Figure 4)

Learning in and Through the Arts: Curriculum Implications is one of seven major studies compiled in Champions of Change produced by the national Arts Education Partnership, the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, the GE Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

ARTISTIC TALENT DEVELOPMENT FOR URBAN YOUTH: THE PROMISE AND THE CHALLENGE
Barry Oreck, Susan Baum, Heather McCartney
National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented
University of Connecticut, Storrs

Born of the notion that the way to discover artistic talent and giftedness in students was to treat all students as if they were gifted and talented by offering them instruction, the Young Talent program then offers extra instruction and opportunity to those disadvantaged students who have shown, as seen in their initial experiences with arts instruction, that they are potentially talented and motivated beyond the normal level.

Researchers followed 23 children and young adults, aged 10-26, in three different stages of talent development in music and dance: elementary; intermediate; and high school, college, or professional. Over half of those studied had been labeled "at-risk" for school failure at one point or another due to poor grades, absences, behavioral, or family issues. "The effect of sustained study in an art form on these talented young people provides powerful evidence for the crucial role of arts education in helping students achieve their educational and personal potential." (p.64)

Researchers used interviews, observations, and academic data and saw that "common elements emerged across ages and stages of development." (p.64) The report offers case studies from students in each of the three developmental stages studied and quotes from other students and parents. (p.66-76)

Some of the findings from the report include:

Various disciplined attitudes and behaviors were observed in under-privileged students who were given instruction in an art discipline.  The effects of students' involvement with the arts were tracked over time. These effects included artistic, academic, and personal achievement, and states of mind. Common characteristics across all age groups (elementary through adult) were: resilience, self-regulation, (constructive) identity, and the ability to experience flow (total focus and absorption in a task). (p.69)

Artistic Talent Development for Urban Youth: The Promise and the Challenge is one of seven major studies compiled in Champions of Change produced by the national Arts Education Partnership, the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities, the GE Fund, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

STAND AND UNFOLD YOURSELF: A MONOGRAPH OF THE SHAKESPEARE & COMPANY RESEARCH STUDY
Steve Seidel
Harvard Project Zero from a report produced by the staff of the Shakespeare & Company Research Study

One of the purposes of professional theater company, Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, Massachusetts, is to teach Shakespeare at elementary through college levels of education. The ways of teaching that the company uses are based on their approach to rehearsing, performing, and training their actors. This approach is quite unlike typical classroom education.

"

Some of the findings from the report include:

Acting out texts creates compelling learning experiences for students that also benefit parents and the broader community. Students in the Shakespeare & Company program learn Shakespeare's difficult texts through the process by which an actor analyzes and works with the text of a play and a company of actors in preparation for performance. In so doing the acting program meets the six criteria for rigorous and relevant project-based learning: authenticity, academic rigor, applied learning, active exploration, adult relationships, and assessment practices. "These performances are not simply school-room exercises: they are authentic acts of communication, culture, and community. When they are successful, they are demonstrations of deep understanding that make the complex and difficult world of Shakespeare's text lucid, vibrant, relevant, and moving to everyone in the auditorium." (p.84)

Many students in a theater acting program reported that the intense review of Shakespeare texts in preparation for performing helped them not only master that difficult material but also improve their reading of other complex material such as math and physics texts. (p.82)

The differences between poetic and scientific language underscore the value of arts education. "'What keeps it (the Shakespeare text), moment by moment, is that it is poetry.' Kevin Coleman, Director of Education insists. 'The individual words keep it complex. The complexity is inherent in the text moment by moment, word by word.' Coleman notes that language functions quite differently in our contemporary American culture. 'The language we are most familiar with tries to pin things down. This is why we feel it is so important to work with poetic language: poetic language versus scientific language, or even hopeless language or slang. Poetic language is expansive and opens up. Scientific language reduces. In our over-emphasis on science and math in schools, in our love affair with technology, we have left our imaginations impoverished.'" (p.83)