Nicole Curtis

2.13 An Investigation into Visual Learning in the Contemporary Primary Classroom. Reconnecting Students back to Their Humanness. (Paper)

Nicole Curtis – University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Abstract:

Visual learning is central to the holistic education of all young students in our image-saturated, ocular-centric, culture. Visual learning is the thread that ties students back to their humanness as making, creating and communicating are primal human traits.  This qualitative inquiry uncovered what really happens in classrooms in the visual learning space. For the first time, in depth conversational, one on one interviews, involving 15 experienced practising teachers revealed the nature of current visual praxis.  Against the backdrop of a neoliberal economy driven education system, this inquiry took a constructivist approach and applied two theoretical lenses, Vygotsky’s theory of sociocultural constructivism and Habermas’ communicative way of knowing. The focus was one of reflexive inquiry of both the interview data gathered in the school environment-classrooms and the insights of the researcher/teacher practitioner. Teacher inadequacies in the visual art space was evident, as well as the importance placed on curriculum areas that are assessed through rigorous standardised testing procedures. Teachers demonstrated frustration as their creativity is bound and limited by a policy driven one-size-fits-all pedagogy currently promoted as the signature pedagogy by policy makers.  The implications of this inquiry are significant as the state of visual art and visual learning remains dire in primary school classrooms. This inquiry recommends empowering teachers through quality Professional Learning and that governing bodies support and promote visual art and visual pedagogies through a quality syllabus that includes the rigorous and future focused artful cognition promoted through visual art.  Key words Visual learning, visual art, cognition, curriculum, artful, pedagogy, qualitative, iterative, reflexive, constructivism.

Art is reconnecting students to their humanness through making