How Kids Benefit from Art Education
In the recent years, the arts in the UK schools suffered a major degradation on the expense of subjects such as math and science. As a result, many kids and young people were deprived of an important part of education experience. The supporters of a greater role of art education in the curriculum do not claim that the arts are superior over other subjects but they emphasise that without the arts, the future generations may lack very important skills and knowledge. And they are right because the arts do not only enable kids and young people to learn about art but they also enable them to develop a number of skills that play the key role in their future careers, even if these are not related to the arts.
Kids benefit from art education in a number of ways. But above all, the arts allow children and young people to:
- develop aesthetic awareness and skills
- improve their creativity and imagination
- develop critical thinking
- express themselves including their feelings, emotions and thinking through visual, audio, verbal and non-verbal means
- improve their communication skills
- develop a deeper understanding for cultural differences
In addition to the above mentioned benefits of art education, the research also shows that kids who have the opportunity to balance between the arts and “academic” subjects perform better in school in comparison to kids whose curricula barely include the arts. It is thought that art education boosts critical thinking and problem-solving skills which in turn enhance the academic performance as well as overall success later in life.
Despite the many benefits of the arts for kids and young people, many of the UK’s leading artists are worried about the future of the arts in British schools. They are especially upset over the English Baccalaureate (Ebacc) reform that excludes the arts as relevant for school performance indicator in the secondary education system. A number of artists fear that this will result in cutting down the amount of time that is dedicated to teaching the arts and a recent research that was conducted by Iposos Mori confirms these fears. In 2012, over 25% percent of schools increased the number of hours dedicated to the “academic” subjects, mainly on the expense of the arts, while the figure in 2011 was as high as 45%.
It appears that the arts in the UK schools are not in danger of disappearing completely. But without a proper balance between the arts and “academic” subjects, and a universal access to quality art education, our kids may lack the key skills for success later in life, not to mention that the UK+s cultural sector that is traditionally strong in the international scene may lose its pre-eminent position.