Course Details

Course Information Package

Course Unit Title	SPECIALIZATION IN ART EDUCATION I
Course Unit Code	SPE304E
Course Unit Details
Number of ECTS credits allocated	4
Learning Outcomes of the course unit	By the end of the course, the students should be able to: Name contemporary Cypriot artists, collect data about contemporary Cypriot artists through personal interviews (practice qualitative research methods in data collection for educational purposes), study their work and produce presentations about them. Recognize art concepts, in theory (through artists’ artworks and children’s artworks) and experiment with them in practice. Relate these experiences with learning activities for children. Experiment with a variety of materials and apply different techniques in order to express visually ideas by producing mainly two-dimensional representations. Relate these experiences with learning activities for children. Discuss children’s artworks and relate them to learning preferences, ways of motivating learners, individual characteristics and general patterns of children’s representational awareness. Investigate current trends in visual arts education (including the role of new technologies), illustrate through artworks new technologies potential and design learning activities for children. Propose learning activities and organize art lessons/ art units that respond to children’s learning preferences and current trends in visual arts education.
Mode of Delivery	Face-to-face
Prerequisites	NONE	Co-requisites	NONE
Recommended optional program components	NONE
Course Contents	-  Cypriot artists: the work of a selection of well-known Cypriot artists, factors that influence the work of artists, study of contemporary artists (well known and younger ones). -  Research skills: the structure of interview schedules, how to contact interviews and transcribe them, how to analyze interviews and visual data. -  Children’s drawings: the role of children’s drawings in the art subject and in other subjects of the school curriculum (interdisciplinary approach), developmental stages, means for investigation, comprehension and interpretation, diagnostic tool, expression of emotions and experiences, means for therapy, etc.  -  New technologies: current issues related to the use of new technologies in art lessons/ units. On-line interactive activities, freeware software, such as Gimp, the use of video art (windows movie maker software), use of technology by the teacher and the children, developing teaching scenarios. -  Studio work and engagement with art concepts, means and materials for teaching purposes:         o Identity (multiple identities: personal, cultural, national, European): Produce video by using the window movie maker software to express issues related to their identities, produce drawings related to identity issues, realistic drawings (portrait, face proportions, shapes of faces, etc.), profile and en face,  surrealistic drawings, examples of children’s artworks, developmental stages, variety of graphic materials (e.g. pencils, charcoal, colours, markers, paints, etc.), and examples of artists’ works.          o Mosaics: Artists’ works, mosaics in the Greek culture, techniques, teaching scenarios/ learning activities with children, examples children’s mosaic artworks, on-line mosaics, production of mosaics with different mosaic.         o Still life: Enhancement of observational skills, representations of still life (realistic and not), artists’ works, examples of children’s works, teaching scenarios, on-line activities (“live” still lives), pencils, pastels, paints, canvases.
Recommended and/or required reading:
Textbooks	EKATE (2010). 50 Years of artistic creation [In Greek & English]. Nicosia: Cyprus Chamber of Fine Arts. Pavlou, V., Papamarkou, M. & Stylianou, E. (2008). Art – Primary Education – Internet. Educational supportive material for embedding ICT in the learning process. [In Greek] Nicosia: Pedagogical Institute Cyprus.
References	Pavlou, V. (2005). Art is…. understanding sixth grade pupils’ perceptions of art. Canadian Review of Art Education 32(2), 19-40. Pavlou, V. and Valanides, N. (2008). Digital online activities with cross-curriculum and interdisciplinary approaches in kindergarten: the role of visual arts. [In Greek] In Ch.Aggeli and N.Valanides (eds), Proceedings of the 6th Panhellenic Conference with International Participation: The Technologies of Information and Communication in Education (pp. 288-298). 25-28 of September, 2008, Limassol, Cyprus.
Planned learning activities and teaching methods	The choice of the methodology adopted for the delivery of this course is based on the PCKg model (Pedagogical Content Knowing) for student-teacher preparation, which emphasizes the need to provide future teachers simultaneously knowledge in four areas: a) pedagogical knowledge, b) subject matter (content) knowledge, c) knowledge of the learners, and d) knowledge of the learning environment.   The module operates at two levels:  -  The theoretical level that explores current trends in art education that relate  to  the theory of art (history of Cypriot art, culture in Cyprus) and to teaching of art (teaching approaches, learning preferences, developmental stages and individual differences, motivating learners, embedding new technologies in art lessons/units, etc.), and -  The studio level that deals with the in-depth familiarization through practice with different artistic/visual concepts and different techniques and ways to produce artworks.   During both levels students are shown examples of art lessons/units with children in the Cypriot primary schools with emphasis on learners’ outcomes and learning preferences. The examples, as well as other lecture notes, are available to the e-learning platform.
Assessment methods and criteria	Presentation in class 5% Assignment 1 20% Assignment 2 25% Portfolio 50%
Language of instruction	Greek
Work placement(s)	NO