Foundations of Education and Instructional Assessment/Performance Assessment and Rubrics/Elementary Art

'Assessing Art' By A. Jones

Learning Targets

1. The reader will be able to define why art is taught.

2. The reader will be able to define some specific art assessments.

3. The reader will know the ways to evaluate and assess art.

Content

A.Why We Teach Art

B.Art Evaluations

C.Defined Objectives and Assessments

D.Types Of Assessments

E.Conclusion

'"The art room is...the teachers canvas on which ideas are showcased, the curiours are challenged, and responses are invited. George Szekely"''

Why We Teach Art ?

In order to assess art you must first understand why we teach and make art. Art is a means to engage all students senses for learning and expression. Creating art helps children express their imaginative and emotional personal development. Art lessons contribute to the cognitive development and their critical thinking skills. Art is crucial in helping students to understand and explore their world and develop their own abilities to function in it. Art exposes students to world cultures, individual expressions, visual symbols, and it helps them to develop their own preferences, and it makes them aware of influences in society. Art has the ability to integrates all major subjects : Math, Science, Social Studies, History, Language Art, and Technology. Students enjoy art classes because it allows them to touch on experiences not addressed in any other classes. In art, students can express opinions and ideas that are uniquely different then their peers.In art there is always more than one way to achieve excellence. According to Elliot Eisner "the arts teaches children: to make good judgement, that problems can have more than one answer, the arts celebrate multiple perspectives,the art teaches that in complex forms of problem solving are seldom fixed, the arts makes vivid facts that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we know, the art teaches students that small differences can have large effects, the art teaches students to think through and within a material, the art enables us to have experiences no other source has the capability of."(Eisner,2006)

" Learning to draw will put you in touch with a long respected tradition that begins in Prehistoric times. Drawing remains a natural way for creative people to visually express their attitudes about the world around them. Wayne Enstice and Melody Peters"'

Art Evaluations

Creating art objectives and evaluations usually consist of two parts examining artwork during the process and after artwork is completed. There are several ways a teacher can monitor the students progress, which might include : examining the students projects in art portfolios, engaging students in written and verbal critiques about their artworks and their peers artwork, and assessing learning in student and in art journals. Art Portfolios are a collection of student artwork representing a selection of different performances. Art portfolios showcase students accomplishments and progress through various stages of art production. Art Journals are like mini art diary's they contain sketches, art thought process, and students own views and interpretation of certain lessons and art vocabulary.Portfolios are a great way to assess and demonstrate improvement over time.

The website below has examples of art Evaluations www.mmwindowtoart.com/evaluations.html

"Defined Objectives"'''

Defined objectives are important to meet standards and provide assessments of performance. All students need to be clearly informed of objectives and grading rubrics on every lesson. A Rubric is a grading chart it has specific details on what is be evaluated. For example most art rubrics give you: O is for Outstanding artwork done with no help 100-95%, V is for Very Good Work with little help from Teacher 90-86% ,S is for Satisfactory basic artwork 85-76% no real thrills , N is for Needs Improvement 75-69% did just enough to get by , U is for Unsatisfactory 68% and lower did not master much of the lesson. A art rubric usually states specific goals of the project. For example student will learn to mix paint from dark to light within a grid. You can look at the grid and tell if the students have the same five to six colors you gave them, or if they experimented and made some shades and tints of those colors by mixing the paints with white or black.Stating specific objectives allow students the ability to achieve these goals.The Following website list art rubrics http://www.goshen.edu/art/ed/rubric3.html .Many state and local systems set broad goals. These goals are set by the National Art Education Association that are recommended for standard based art instructions.The following website has the National Standards for Dance, Music, Theater, and Visual Arts http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/teach/standards.cfm.

Art Objectives and Assessments

There are many different ways to evaluate art lessons. Many teachers objectives reflect their personal values about art education,their teaching styles and their students age and ability. All art teachers teach a specific skills that you build upon and expand into more quality artwork.Too many directions at once may confuse younger students and students with ADHD or special education requirements. Wise art teachers expand lessons to cover more than one class meeting. By expanding class lessons you gives students the opportunity and time to build up and reflect in order to master the skills. Mastery of skills builds confidence giving them a great piece as a end result in which they are proud of.No teacher teaches with the hopes of students to become failures. Many art teachers use performance-based assessments.Performance based assessments require students to perform or demonstrate a task. Most art grades are based on artwork, art learning and can be based on some extent on test results. ''There are five main art objectives 1.Production 2. Perception 3. Critcism 4. Aesthetics and 5. Art History.'' Art Production is the process of making or producing art. Art Perception is how students see and digest what they are doing, looking at, or learning. Art Criticism is the students ability to point out evidence and make connections to the artwork that supports their perception. Art Aesthetics in the students questioning " Why". For example if you show students a pieces of artwork that they find to be ugly or weird ? Why do you think this is ugly ? Why do you think this is weird ? This is a example Aesthetics. Art History is the study of past art masters, ancient civilizations, valuable objects from various cultures,and artifacts.

Types Of Formal and Informal Assessments

"Through educators often think the primary purpose of assessments is grading, a thorough assessment plan ,consist of a variety of eveidence on student acquisition of learning" (Rohrer,2009) Informal assessments is the teacher assessing who is grasping a lesson and who is not. As a class progress a teacher can tell who is engaged in art production and who not by looking at students. Teachers can quietly talk to students and give them some encouraging words, demonstrate a technique they can try, and also make mention of the overall rubrics and goals and objective timewise. For example by the end of this class we should all have our background sky painting in, when we meet again we will be filling in details of the landscape and will not have any sky colored paint available. Formal assessments are vital to gain information for educational decision making to revise programs and increase grades."In recent years, policymakers have been reassessing their conception of teacher quality by beginning to focus attention on examining the relationship between the assessment of the teacher competence and student achievement."(Randall,2005) Verification of student learning is the main reason for formal assessment. Assessments help teachers evaluate their programs, diagnose learning,revise,compare,and anticipate educational needs and determine if needs have been achieved.These assessments also help determine how to adjust lessons to increase student learning. Assessment informs teachers if they need to shift instruction strategies to reach more students." Instead of using traditional assessment,such as standardized test, many teachers are choosing to use performace based, authentic assessment to measure the quality of an eduaction program by comprehensively examining the individuals performance"(Yauying,2004).

Conclusion

We teach art to help students explore the world around them and find their place in society. Art assessments have been performance based and are starting to influence other subjects to include more performance based activities instead of just quizzes and test.By reflection on different types of art assessments, and how teachers can use art portfolios and art journals to see what students have digested the lesson or not. Assessments are not just used for grades but also needed to inform students and teachers of progress and what may need to be retaught or reworked strategy wise to close the gap between successful students and unsuccessful students.In conclusion good assessments evaluates and summarize both student learning and teachers effectiveness.Art mimics much of society it is constantly changing and evolving.

Please circle the best answer.

1. Why do we teach art?

a.because it is a state requirement.

b.to engage in students sense of learning and expression.

c.to enable children to draw and paint very well.

d.to give teacher's a planning break.

2. What are the two parts to art evaluations?

a. examining the artwork during the process and once artwork is completed.

b. examining for the best quality of artwork at the completion only.

c. examining the work to see who could include the most in their artwork.

d. examining the artwork for evidence of art principles.

3. What is the purpose of assessments ?

a.to give grades only.

b.to inform students and teachers on learning targets.

c.to evaluate teachers only.

d.to evaluate teachers and students.

4. What are the art objectives?

a.art assessment only to  give a grade.

b.art assessing, the artmaking, and art history aspect.

c.production, history, perception, aesthetics, and criticism.

d.the art of making artworks

'''Answers 1.b 2.a 3.d. 4.c'''

References

Eisner,E.(2006). The Arts and The Creation Of Mind ,pp. 70–92).Yale University Press.NAEA Publication

Randall,J.(2005)Performance Assessments and Electronic Portfolios.Retrieved March 20, 2009,from elibrary Website Http://elibrary.bigchalk.com/libweb/elib/do/documents

Rohrer,K.(2009)Art Teacher Assessment. Retrieved March 20, 2009, from elibrarywebsite Http://www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/links/toolbox/assessment.html

Yaoying,X.(2004)Teacher Portfolios: An Effective Way To Asesses Teacher Performance and Enhance Learning. Retrieved March 20, 2009, from elibrary Website Http://elibrary.bigchalk.com/libweb/elib/do/document