ART IS
SMART The value of creativity
in the classroom
BY PJ FEINSTEIN AND ADRANISHA STEPHENS
A t a time when school districts across the country are eliminating
art programs due to budget cuts and the prioritization of standard-
ized testing, Arlington Public Schools (APS) in Virginia stands out
as an exception.

“We are so fortunate in Arlington. I’ve been in central office for 19 years,
and we have never had a cut to the arts,” says arts education supervisor Pam
Farrell. “We are so strongly supported by our superintendent, our school
board and our community so much so that three years ago when we were
facing a big budget deficit, the number one thing the community voted to
not cut was the arts.”
The APS community understands the value of arts education, including
visual art. When elementary school students are building with clay or mid-
dle schoolers are learning how to do portraiture, they’re aren’t just having
fun. They’re also learning skills that translate into all aspects of their lives,
including literacy, planning and awareness, creativity and critical thinking,
explains Farrell.

“In visual art classes, the kids are basically solving problems as they’re mak-
ing art. And so the amount of decisions they have to make – which way to go,
which colors to select – really, really impact their critical thinking,” she says.

TEACHING “HABITS OF MIND”
Michelle Silberberg, a photography teacher at Northwood High School
in Rockville, Maryland, says that visual art can teach learners about lay-
out, perspective and balance, all techniques that are necessary for visual
presentations of academic work.

Right now, her students are creating a photography project surrounding
mental illness. “It’s a tough topic and I am here to help them and support
The arts can provide gains in literacy, planning and
16 Washington FAMILY MARCH 2020



them,” says Silberberg. “We are discussing how they can make that into a
visual project and the importance behind it.”
They have also tackled issues such as domestic violence. “There’s a lot
of random violence in lyrics and shows, but we don’t freak out about it
because we see it all the time,” she says. “We’re exposed to it so much that it
becomes this normal thing. But it’s not normal how we normalize domestic
violence in the U.S. And that’s what I investigated with my class.”
Silberberg adds that arts education also teaches resilience.

“A lot of time, especially in art, if somebody messes up, they are like, ‘Oh
well, I need to start over.’ But that’s not necessarily the case,” she says.

Instead, she challenges her students to figure out how to make it work,
such as scratching up or melting negatives to come to an end result that
makes them feel proud.

“And that can go to any subject or any life experiences,” says Silberberg.

“If something doesn’t work out the way that you wanted it to, how can you
move past the initial negative emotions and move forward to something
that you’re happy with?”
This idea of resiliency or bouncing back actually relates to a concept
called “Habits of Mind” that Farrell mentions when discussing the benefits
of arts education.

“It’s really that critical thinking and application to the task and carrying
through, because you have to keep working through your visual problems
when you’re creating a piece of art,” she says, adding that knowing when to
stop can be just as important, too.

“Because if you go too far then it’s going to be unrecognizable, right?”
INTEGRATING ART IN THE CLASSROOM
Allison, 11,
Maryland When designing the APS curriculum, Farrell first looks at the Virginia
Standards of Learning and the National Visual Arts Standards by grade
level, incorporating a diverse group of artists that “relate to all of our stu-
dent population and interests,” she says. Because every school has access
to the other general educators’ plans for the year, visual art teachers will
often co-plan with classroom teachers to do arts-integrated projects, such
as Virginia history or tessellation for math.

At Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, Sandra
Jacobs-Ivey has been integrating art into her curriculum for more than 30
years. “I don’t know how you cannot use art in the classroom. It’s been
a part of my pedagogy for a while,” says the AP Literature and Bridge
English teacher.

For Jacobs-Ivey, it started the first year she became a teacher. She dec-
orated her classroom with art prints and motivational quotes, often
referencing the prints in student assignments and requiring the kids to
respond to them. Later, she had students create stories around a creative
aspect of a piece of art.

“It was a really good way for them to tap into critical thinking,” she says.

Jacobs-Ivey also incorporates art into her lessons to make complicated
concepts easier to understand. Take “Hamlet,” for example.

“Act Three is imbued with soliloquies where the imagery is just overflow-
ing, so I had the students create visual representations of the speeches,” she
says. “And they later mentioned to me, ‘I’ve really loved doing this because
it made me understand the speech more,’ and ‘It helped me to have another
avenue to express my understanding of the written text.’” ■
awareness, creativity and critical thinking.

ART: COURTESY OF ALLISON; BOY: GETTY IMAGES/E+/ALINA555; DOTS: ISTOCK/GETTY IMAGES PLUS/YURI PARMENOV