Unlocked

Via Unlocking the Classroom, a good and useful book.

Studio Thinking: The Real Benefits of Arts Education.

Created by Harvard's Project Zero, The Studio Thinking Framework includes 8 Habits of Mind:

1. Develop Craft
2. Engage & Persist
3. Envision
4. Express
5. Observe
6. Reflect
7. Stretch & Explore
8. Understand the Art World

Different

Over at the Community Arts Network, professor Carol Ng-He interviews professional Teaching Artist Malik Gillani about "Myths to Drama" an arts-integrated education program that brings a global perspective into Chicago Public Schools classrooms. The program, developed and implemented by Mr. Gillani's Silk Road Theatre Project, is aligned with the State of Illinois’ Board of Education standards and helps students explore social studies themes through the arts. Activities include drama, music, reading and writing and the vision behind the project is expansive.

In answer to a question about why the company decided to use the study of myths as a vehicle, Mr. Gillani explains:

"Myths to Drama” isn’t another class; this is not just to repeat what has been offered in other classes. It is to provide a different model of learning. So, the basic theory of how we deliver “Myths to Drama” is the philosophy of multiple intelligences.

People learn differently, so you need to give people different avenues of learning. So for us, myth is a way of learning a culture in an alternative model, in a way that social studies are not taught in school.

This program appears to be pretty cool, the curriculum outline is online and I dig it.

I think the idea that we learn differently seems kind of commonsensical and true. But since I've started reading up I can't find an end to it and the books on the subject just seem to keep coming.

The categories keep coming.

We are of different minds.

It's an endlessly fascinating and lucrative idea.

The Greatest of these is Love

I've been meaning to tell you that Anne Rhodes over at the Empire State Partnerships blog outpost ESPrit de Corps has posted the executive summary of Project Zero's recent report Qualities of Quality: Excellence in arts education and how to achieve it.

I'm not an executive, but I've downloaded it anyway and I think it's terrific.

Americans for the Arts offers an "on-demand webinar" where Steve Seidel outlines all of the research findings in detail. I can demand the webinar for $85, or I could demand a week's worth of groceries.

Music: Here Comes the Sun (Here Comes the Sun @ youtube.)

Project Zero

Wow.

Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education

Project Zero Classroom 2009

July 27–August 1, 2009

The institute"addresses fundamental education questions, such as:

• What are the components of an effective education for the world that students live in now and will live in 10, 20, or 50 years from now?

• What is understanding, and how does it develop?

• What are the roles of reflection and assessment in student and teacher learning?

• How can participants continue to share and pursue their understanding of Project Zero’s ideas with others after the institute?"

It looks really amazing. Howard Gardner, David Perkins and Steve Seidel are the faculty.

Tuition is $2100, which could maybe be enough for a one-bedroom in Manhattan.

Wow.

Plus: Project Zero Update on Current Work, July 2007 (pdf)