Towards an Enriched Understanding of Arts Integration

How we prepare young people to successfully navigate this complex world is an underlying question for me personally and, since around 2013, professionally. Over the last decade or so, I have approached my work through several lenses: as a teaching artist who works with young people; as a member of networks and organizations of like-minded, mission-oriented folks; and as a player in various systems attempting to drive change. Through this approach, I have both observed and participated in processes which center integrated strategies of personal development, educational experiences, and systems change; these are not divorced, but rather, one and the same.

In 2019, when I first embarked on the journey to explore the concept of the “creative generation,” (you can read more about this early work in several articles here, here, here, here, and here, and more elsewhere), I quickly realized three primary paradigm shifts were needed in order to animate the articulated potential of young creatives in society:

From 2019-2022, the Collective of Creative Generation has been engaged in a four-phased research project to explore key questions related to the cultivation of creativity and support of young creatives as social changemakers.

  1. We, the adults - artists, educators, community organization leaders, etc - needed a new vernacular to describe the type of integrated work that we did at the intersection of arts/culture, education/youth development, and social change (I spent about a year looking at this, see links above);

  2. Teaching and learning, as a whole, needs to be more integrated and our systems must recognize the power of arts, cultural, and creative education, especially when integrated with liberatory and justice-oriented practices; and 

  3. Our institutions - be they schools, cultural organizations, community-based nonprofits, or otherwise - must recognize their role as civic institutions and embody organizational practices to that effect (we saw a lot of this during the pandemic, as documented in this special edition of Arts Education Policy Review.)

Exploring Integrated Pedagogies

As a piece of this work - primarily in point #2 in our foundational research, identified above - we have spent a portion of our time, energy, and resources understanding the shift in pedagogies to be more integrated: specifically the integration of arts, cultural, and creative education, especially when integrated with liberatory and justice-oriented practices.

In preliminary analysis of a global set of case studies, originally shared at the 2019 World Summit of the World Alliance for Arts Education in Frankfurt, Germany which produced the Frankfurt Declaration, I shared what I called the “Policy-Pedagogy-Practice paradigm”:

 
 

The purpose of this model was to translate the lived experiences, reflections, and futures-oriented visions of participating practitioners around the world into a model to guide future inquiry. In this model, I propose that the field of arts and cultural education recognizes connections in several realms: a.) there are public policies in place which provide the resources to enable arts-based learning experiences for youth in compulsory, higher, and informal education settings; b.) educators and teaching artists have autonomy to implement those policies and create meaningful learning experiences for youth through the arts and justice-oriented education; and c.) when integrated, those learning experiences can provide new insights and opportunities for leadership and civic engagement by young people to critique (or even influence, change, or dismantle) the policies and systems within which they are living.

We recognize through this model that many educators have the tacit knowledge to naturally interweave arts education (or the “pedagogy” in the model above) with the youth-centered, justice-oriented, and civically engaged practices (or the “practice” in the model above). In fact, this process has had a name for several decades in the arts education field, when considering other curricular subjects: arts integration. 

When arts integration (especially through this expanded view) is implemented by educators, artists, and institutions, extensive evidence shows - particularly in the scholarly fields of social justice youth development, pioneered by Drs. Shawn Ginwright and Julio Cammorata - that youth have a deeper understanding of self, their community, and the world within which they live.

Integrated Approaches: Social Justice Arts Education (SJAE)

In 2020-2021, the Collective at Creative Generation, engaged in numerous projects exploring the integration of arts education with social justice education. In original research commissioned by Arts Every Day in Baltimore, MD, we conducted a literature review, crosswalk of the National Core Arts Standards and the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Teaching Tolerance Program (now Teaching for Justice)’s Social Justice Standards, and analysis of teacher experiences utilizing integrated lesson plans employing SJAE integration.

What we discovered was neither groundbreaking nor novel, but important nonetheless: Through this integration of the arts and social justice education, arguments from educators can be made that youth more deeply understand themselves, their communities, and the world, affirming the scholarly theoretical research. However, when examining the teaching and learning processes involved, educators must shift their tacit knowledge of the arts and social justice to become more explicit of the fields, thus inculcating deeper knowledge exchange among their peers and driving innovation (by avoiding stagnation) of once-revolutionary pedagogies within the broader educational systems.

From this initial work, we piloted the same professional development, integrated lesson plan creation, and reflection process with three other cohorts of educators in K-12 and community-based theatre (with the American Alliance for Theatre & Education), community-based partnerships (with three partners in Boston, MA), and middle/high school visual art (with the Tennessee Art Education Association). This provided a sample of multiple artistic disciplines, educational settings, policy contexts, and educational roles. From our analysis of reflections offered by members of these cohorts, we visualized the inputs, actions, and observed outcomes of SJAE integration.

 
 

Across these reflections one thing became more apparent: young people were no longer only deepening their understanding of self, community, and world, but also applying their creativity in social contexts through acts of creative action.

Toward an Enriched Understanding of Arts Integration

As this project drew to a close, Creative Generation was engaged in back-to-back, large-scale investigations of “educational pedagogy to organizational practice to impact”: one one behalf of ArtPlace America and the other with Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Both projects sought to understand how youth-led, arts integrated, community-based experiences were implemented and the impact they had on young people and their communities. In both projects, first in 2020 and again in 2021, youth-facing practitioners and program managers identified the modality of arts integration as being key to their work.

In the first circumstance, young creatives and their adult allies, illustrated the elements which go into “creative youth in community development” projects by articulating three levers, which educational experience designers can employ to meet the needs of the youth and their community: arts and cultural practices, youth leadership and agency, and engagement with community.  Similarly, almost a year later, a group of arts program leaders in Boys & Girls Clubs across the country articulated three knobs by which they create their programs: arts, youth development, and social justice (publication forthcoming).

Interestingly, these out-of-school time and community-based programs were articulating a new, enriched description of what the formal education system (K-12 and higher education) has called “arts integration” for years. In all circumstances (SJAE and creative youth development), artists and educators affirmed the general basis of arts integration, which has often been articulated by leading institutions like the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. They especially all aligned in the progressive triad of (my modified terms):

  • Arts Learning;

  • Arts-Enhanced Learning; and 

  • Arts-Integrated Learning.

However, they differ in the content being integrated. Traditionally speaking, arts integration involves a set of curricular subjects (mainly as defined by law), such as English Language Arts, science, social studies, math, etc. However in our findings across both formal and informal education settings, the content being integrated with the arts should expand.

So, as we looked through all of the data aggregated across these numerous projects - case studies, interviews, lesson plans, teacher reflections, and more - we found some consistencies and have created the below working model. (Also, a big thanks to our friend and colleague Dennie Palmer Wolf of WolfBrown for deep thinking, debate, and articulation of these succinct ideas).

 
 

Here, you see a spectrum - with no positive or negative connotation assigned to any side or element - that articulates the seven prominent types of arts integration:

  • Teaching & Learning: Building cross-disciplinary connections

  • Literacy: Expanding the modalities for learning

  • Collaboration: Engaging across disciplines and cultural forms

  • Ways of Knowing: Deploying strategies for meaning making & inquiry

  • Creativity: Applying creative capabilities to clove complex challenges

  • Civic & Social Engagement: Increasing belonging & participation

  • Community Resilience: Engaging in culturally sustaining practices

I will note, however, that this model is a starting point and the beginning of a dialogue. We do not purport to be drawing any conclusions, but rather noting observations and asking big questions, as we typically do at Creative Generation. That said, I do feel incredibly affirmed that, throughout the pandemics of 2020-present, our original findings from 2019 hold up and that artists, educators, and community organizations (like schools, cultural institutions, and more) continue to think deeply and meet the needs of young people and their communities.

Continuing the Exploration 

We, at Creative Generation will continue this exploration in the coming months of 2022. During the Summer and Fall we will conduct numerous explorations, elevating knowledge from the field of practice, which will focus on practitioner-led and locally-focused definitions and strategies in a number of settings involving institutions of higher education, small and large cultural institutions, schools and their arts and non-arts educators, and community-based youth development programs.

We will specifically be exploring the questions in relation to “arts-integrated” work:

  • What does the work look like in myriad educational settings?

  • How are practitioners describing this work?

  • Which systems are enhancing or inhibiting this work?

  • What are the observed outcomes of this work?

And, we invite you to be part of this exploration! Should you wish to contribute, please drop us a line at info@creative-generation.org!