Achievement vs. learning

More from Alfie Kohn...
"The more kids are led to focus on how well they are doing, the less engaged they tend to be with what they are doing."

Here I Stand - Erica Goldson

“We could encourage the best qualities of youthfulness – curiosity, adventure, resilience, the capacity for surprising insight simply by being more flexible about time, texts, and tests, by introducing kids into truly competent adults, and by giving each student what autonomy he or she needs in order to take a risk every now and then. But we don't do that.”-- John Taylor Gatto

In 2010, valedictorian Erica Goldson gave a graduation speech to her class at Coxsackie-Athens High School in New York. After the speech was uploaded to the web, it quickly went viral and Erica became known as the “valedictorian who spoke out against schooling.”
-- read transcript HERE
-- Erica's blog

STANDARDIZED

A little more about standardized testing...
Coming this fall, STANDARDIZED Lies, Money & Civil Rights: How Testing Is Ruining Public Education. This documentary focuses on the proliferation, business, and inadequacies of state-mandated testing in our public schools.
-- read about it HERE

Alfie Kohn on Feel-Bad Education

"Education really isn't about helping kids to feel like proficient thinkers who love learning, instead they have to memorize facts, practice skills in order to do well on tests, and that ends up being quite unengaging, and it has a number of destructive consequences. The more traditional, back to bascs and test oriented schooling is the more kids lose interest in learning, the more superficial they are thinking.."

Mind-opening writing on what kids need from school, from one of education's most outspoken voices. Arguing that our schools are currently in the grip of a "cult of rigour"- a confusion of harder with better that threatens to banish both joy and meaningful intellectual inquiry from our classrooms - Alfie Kohn issues a stirring call to rethink our priorities and reconsider our practices.
-- read more about the book HERE

What 60 Schools Can Tell Us About Teaching 21st Century Skills

"One of the real frustrations we all have is we keep trying to put that square peg of the industrial age engineered designed model into the round circle of the eco system that we know represents great learning. These 2 systems are fundamentally incompatible and this means that we have to change at a foundational level, not just at the margins."

"In a time of rapid change... we need to teach into the unknown and that's difficult, uncomfortable, messy and unfamiliar to us and we need to learn a new set of skills for that... we need to teach students to be self evolving learners..and in order to do that we need to become self evolving organizations..we need to embrace constant change.."

The rate of change in the world demands that we re-imagine and restructure the foundational learning relationship among students, teachers, and knowledge. In September 2012, pursuing a decades-long passion for transformational education, Grant Lichtman packed up his Prius and set off on a solo, nationwide research tour to discover what schools are doing to prepare students for an evolving future. Find out what he learned from three months on the road visiting 21 states, 64 schools, and the great ideas of 500 educators.

"If we teach today as we taught yesterday, we rob our children of tomorrow" -- John Dewey

3 rules to spark learning

"Students' questions are the seeds of real learning" 

Creativity applies to every aspect of life and learning...
It took a life-threatening condition to jolt chemistry teacher Ramsey Musallam out of ten years of "pseudo-teaching" to understand the true role of the educator: to cultivate curiosity. In a fun and personal talk, Musallam gives 3 rules to spark imagination and learning, and get students excited about how the world works -- go to Ramsey's website

Rule number 1: Curiosity comes first.
Rule number 2: Embrace the mess.
Rule number 3: Practice reflection

Leaving to Learn - interesting presentations

We hear often of the "high expectations" schools must have of and for their students, yet we seldom hear of the expectations students have of their schools. Students' expectations constitute the new "rules of engagement" in the relationship that young people want with their schools.
Isn't it time to offer adolescents a pathway to success in school that's proven to inspire and motivate kids to keep on learning? Isn't it time to try more innovative ways to address the challenges of our nation's dropout rate? We can keep kids in school and prepare them for life after graduation by delivering authentic learning experiences that matter to them. The first step is taking down the barriers between school and the outside world. The first step is letting them leave, to learn.
-- go to Leaving to Learn website

What about Emotional Intelligence

"If your emotional abilities aren't in hand, if you don't have self-awareness, if you are not able to manage your distressing emotions, if you can't have empathy and have effective relationships, then no matter how smart you are, you are not going to get very far".
"We should be teaching kids regularly over time in a systematic way self-awareness, self-management, empathy and social skills.."
Daniel Goleman is an internationally known psychologist, author, and science journalist. Goleman wrote the New York Times bestseller Emotional Intelligence. In the first video he briefly explains what is emotional intelligence. In the second video he speaks to the one thing he would change about education.
-- read about him on Edutopia
-- go to Goleman's website

The Multiple Intelligence Theory - Howard Gardner

"Kids go to school and college and get through, but they don't seem to really care about using their minds. School doesn't have the kind of long term positive impact that it should". 

This is a 1997 interview with Harvard University Professor Howard Gardner about multiple intelligences and new forms of assessment. Please watch and absorb.
-- read about it on Edutopia

Howard Gardner Teach Things in More Ways

This is truly worth watching, please do so.

“I think we should take a step back … and say, ‘What kind of human beings do we want to have?’ ‘What kind of world do we want to live in?’ ” 

How can we improve our country and make our society happier? Improve our education system, says Howard Gardner, psychologist and professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. When it comes to kids learning, it’s important to focus on individuation – ensuring each kid learns at his or her own pace and in the most effective way – and pluralization, teaching important lessons in many different ways. “We still are falling prey to a one-size-fits-all way of teaching,” he says. “You teach in one way, if the kid doesn’t learn, it’s his or her fault. You test them one way and the kid doesn’t get the right answer, that’s the end of his life. Unless we learn how to individuate and pluralize, we’re lost.” Gardner suggests a more balanced curriculum - a focus on humanities, arts, philosophy and history and not so heavy on science and technology.
-- from gen|connect

Education is broken

"Teach kids to be citizens instead of workers..the purpose of school is to help kids realize themselves in a community"

Chris Lehmann introduces a revolutionary idea in education: Encourage learning by allowing students to do things they are good at instead of restricting them. While that may sound elementary, Lehmann's speech carves out an innovative way to teach students success so they will strive for success in the post-graduate world. Hailing from Manhattan, Chris Lehmann is breathing fresh air into the Philadelphia School District by providing immediate feedback to teachers using an iPad, asking teachers to practice kindness in the classroom, and promoting a student-centered school.
-- Chris' blog
-- prezi presentation on Chris talk

N.C. schools promise arts education, but access not equal

North Carolina mandates that all elementary school students have equal access to art instruction, but enforcement of the law appears inconsistent across the state. Special correspondent for education John Merrow reports on two elementary schools' different approaches to arts education and the effects on student performance.

Back to Finland...GERM that kills schools

"The worst enemy of creativity is standardization"

Activist & Education Director Pasi Sahlberg brings what he has learned from the education system in his native Finland to United States' parents, teachers and policy makers.
-- more videos/interviews HERE

Let's talk about some unusual inspiring teachers..

Ok...maybe a bit extreme but interesting..
Kim Bearden is an award-winning educator of over twenty years. Her unique combination of innovation, discipline and creativity transform average classrooms to remarkable learning centers! She delivers inspiring keynote messages to thousands of educators each year.  Bearden has received numerous awards for her creative and dynamic teaching styles, among which she was chosen from over 70,000 nominations to be honored as the Disney American Teacher Awards Outstanding Middle School Humanities Teacher. -- read more about her HERE
Ron L. Clark, Jr. is an American educator, currently teaching in Atlanta, Georgia, who has worked with disadvantaged students in rural North Carolina and Harlem, New York City. He is known for his books on teaching children in middle schools. -- read more about him HERE
Together they founded the Ron Clark Academy, a nonprofit middle school in Southeast Atlanta that promotes innovation and engages its students through energetic and creative ways of teaching balanced by a strict code of discipline. Their 5th-8th graders represent various socio-economic and academic backgrounds and communities from across the metro region. The school is inclusive, benefiting students regardless of gender, race, socio-economic status or religion. Families are asked to pay tuition on a sliding scale that is designed to make the Academy affordable for all children.
-- learn more HERE

Learning Matters: The Arts: every day in every way

"If a child can't learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn"

-- Ignacio Estrada

The Bugg A+ Magnet School in Raleigh, NC specializes in something called arts integration. All subjects are connected. Literacy is taught with music. Students learn social studies in dance class. (In the US magnet schools are public schools with specialized courses or curricula). More specifically, the Creative Arts and Science Magnet Program is an approach to teaching and learning grounded in the belief that the arts can play a central role in how children learn. A+ schools combine interdisciplinary teaching and daily arts instruction, giving teachers multiple opportunities each day to recognize the special skills and learning styles of students. The arts teachers and science teachers are specialists who work with classroom teachers to help bring the arts into math, science social studies and language arts. This type of teaching results in classrooms where students are excited about school, challenged in areas where they have a need and are able to clearly see the connections between subjects. Students learn that there are many ways to be "smart" in accordance with the renowned learning research of Howard Gardner and the Multiple Intelligences pedagogy.

Integrating the Arts into School Curricula

"The challenge for all of us, I believe, is to find innovative ways to link our educational curriculum to the real-world experiences of our students. We must foster creativity, develop imagination, and enable students to envision alternative possibilities in problem solving. Our children learn best by doing, not by listening to someone tell them how to do something. The arts provide a natural language for children to bring meaning to the world and to provide a means to express their own uniqueness".

Champions of Change is a weekly initiative to highlight Americans who are making an impact in their communities and helping our country rise to meet the many challenges of the 21st century. Dr. Kevin Maxwell has been Superintendent of Anne Arundel County Public Schools in Maryland since June 2006. He has worked with the Board of Education to create a rigorous and relevant arts-oriented curriculum.

Do We Need to Burn Our Violins and Close Our Swimming Pools?

"The latest infection sweeping schools, according to Finnish education reformer Pasi Sahlberg [and from which Finland has remained uninfected], is the GERM virus, the Global Education Reform Movement. The symptoms—universal testing, like the national literacy and numeracy tests; increasing school choice; and competition—are affecting schools throughout much of the English-speaking world, from England and the U.S. to Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa."

-- The Australian

So, do we want our children to be taught in schools that's main aim is to be, as Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard recently said, "back in the top five schooling systems in the world" in reading, science, and mathematics? Or, do we want our children in schools that integrate the arts and offer a well-rounded curriculum with a focus on the development of the whole child? Are we prepared to "burn our violins and close our swimming pools" to achieve PISA status, or is there another way? Sahlberg obviously believes that there is another way. He believes you can have both—academic achievement as well as a well-rounded education—and he has Finnish data to support his point of view. (Pasi Sahlberg is director-general of the ministry of education in Helsinki, but he's spending more and more of his time outside Finland teaching governments and schools the Finnish way). -- read full article HERE

Sir Ken Robinson on Standardized Tests

"What schools are often encouraged to do is to stop the world so it can be taught. And it can't be stopped. We have to engage with the flow of knowledge and with the evolution of understanding. We therefore need forms of curricula which are open and dynamic"... "The emphasis on standardized testing has tended to encourage passivity and not activity"... "We need forms of assessment which are descriptive and not judgemental" -- Sir Ken Robinson

The Life and Death of the Great American School System

"I used to think that our society and schools could use tests to improve. But what’s happened with the test – and I don’t think I understood this until No Child Left Behind really went into full implementation -- is that tests have now become the linchpin of education." 

As the Assistant Secretary of Education in the first Bush administration, Educational historian Diane Ravitch became known for her push to establish national standards for K-12 education. From 1997-2004, she served as a member of the National Assessment Governing Board, overseeing the federal testing program. Now, as the author of The Life and Death of the Great American School System, she’s taking it all back. Well, sort of.
-- read full article by Megan Erickson HERE

"Listen: The Movie"

"Why do people tell me to think outside the box when they barely ever let me out of it?"

Ankur Singh is an 18 year old college freshman at The University of Missouri – Columbia who took off his second semester of school to create a documentary film about standardized testing in America. The film is titled "Listen", and focuses on what students themselves have to say about testing culture in the United States. He says: "They never ask us students what we want from our own education. And since we are the primary stakeholders, that is not OK". Dozens of children, teachers and parents across the country are featured in Listen. They tell the same exasperated story of students enduring ridiculous amounts of test-prep.
-- read about it on Edutopia


Listen - Official Trailer from Ankur Singh on Vimeo.

What if we Obliterated Standardised Testing...

"We need to adapt to the ever impending future which undoubtely awaits us while we can before it is too late"

Let's hear what a student has to say...Can we see beyond a student's test grades? Why do we have to conform to cookie-cutter uniformity? Behshid (a student in grade 10) wonders what the educational world would be like if one size does not fit all. The theme for TEDxWinchesterTeachers is "The Beginning of Infinity: Education and the Future".  New advances and cutting-edge discoveries in the fields of artificial intelligence, neuroscience, genetics, quantum computing, nanotechnology, and cosmology are dramatically changing how we perceive the world. If we wish to prepare students for a radically different future, the traditional methods of education cannot continue.

None of the Above - Why Standardized Testing Fails

"The skills you need to survive today are just much broader than the skills you needed to survive in the early 1900s. It is a different world, a world that is changing very quickly. In today's world you don't only need the memory and analytical skills that are some way important on those tests, but you also need to be creative, you need to be able to adapt to a rapidly changing environment in a creative and flexible way.."

Former Oklahoma State University Provost Bob Sternberg developed his first intelligence test in seventh grade and since then has become one of the top 100 psychologists of the 20th century. His talk discusses the faults in standardized testing and the new needs of today's generation.

Let's talk about standardized testing

Today we will focus on standardized testing. It is not our intention to claim that all testing is wrong tout court, but we believe that  there are strong limits to the meaning we can derive from test scores and that the primary role of teachers should remain to facilitate learning and foster students' creativity. So let's start from these guys...SourceFed is a recent news website created by Philip DeFranco in 2012

The Human Jukebox

Donations as votes. A fun and democratic way for street musicians to to raise money for the arts...Money was sent to Wingspan Arts, a non-profit that aims to expose diverse and young groups of people to the arts.
-- video uploaded by collectivecadenza

Be inspired by art

Supporting the arts also means to appreciate the art that surrounds us.

Make sure you visit THE DOUBLE FANTASY SCULPTURE in the Bermuda Botanical Gardens... Bermuda Sculptor Graham Foster created the sculpture, commissioned by the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art. This iconic masterpiece symbolizes John Lennon with his iconic Rickenbacker Guitar, a double image of his profile with his “Lennon Glasses”, the Double Fantasy freesia flower and peace doves.

Be inspired by beauty

Supporting the arts also means to appreciate the beauty that sorround us. 

In June and July of 1980, John Lennon wrote his last songs in Bermuda. He named the album from a freesia flower he saw in the Botanical Gardens - The Double Fantasy. As Yoko says "I am pleased that John is being honored in the Bermuda Botanical Gardens. It is where he discovered the Double Fantasy freesia flower which became the title of his last album. Know that he loved and was immensely inspired by Bermuda. His spirit is now a part of the beautiful botanical gardens where I hope peace and love will grow. I love you".

"I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow"

-- Abraham Lincoln



The national Bermuda Botanical Gardens are located in Paget Parish. They cover an area of 36 acres and include formal gardens, rolling lawns, a rose garden, sensory garden, and much more. The gardens are also home to Camden, the official residence of the Premier of Bermuda, and the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art.

What is Your Hope for the Future of Creativity?

"The best applications in the world won't produce startling results. They need creative minds, adventurous spirits and developed imaginations to do that."

-- Sir Ken Robinson

After exploring the meaning of creativity and the role it plays in education, this video series produced by Adobe comes to the final and perhaps most important question: What's next? The future depends on cultivating the creativity of students. How do we shape and develop their thinking so they can go into the world and capitalize on the opportunities available to them?

Why is Creativity Important in Education?

"Creativity is not an option, it's an absolute necessity." 

-- Sir Ken Robinson

According to a recent Adobe creativity study, 88% of U.S. professionals believe that creativity should be built into standard curricula. Companies are looking for more than graduates who can do specific tasks, they want employees who can also think differently and innovate. To be successful, students need an education that emphasizes creative thinking, communication and teamwork.

How Do You Define Creativity?

According to Adobe creativity needs to be championed so educators can feel increasingly empowered to teach it as a critical competency across all disciplines. They firmly believe creativity is an imperative for students' success in a global marketplace and they have partnered with Sir Ken Robinson, an internationally recognized author and creativity expert, to develop an exclusive video series outlining his thoughts on the importance and power of creativity in education. In this first video he explores the meaning and natural path of our creative process.

BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD - Gandhi

"If you make the difference in one life, you have made a difference in the whole entire world"

Need some inspiring stories? All over the world people take action to positively transform the lives of others. People work hard to help our planet be the best it can be. Our constant exposure to ‘bad’ news leads many of us to lose hope in each other and ourselves, to feel powerless to improve anything. In truth people all over the world spend time, energy and personal resources cultivating tolerance, joy, and peace. In every crisis lives a seed of beauty and the possibility for something better. Know your power. Make a Difference!
-- visit Conscious Action Network Youtube Channel
-- visit Conscious Action Network website

Peace and Humanity

"Greed has poisoned men’s souls; has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost". 

"You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy, let us use that power".

Please watch or watch again the final speech of the Great Dictator, delivered by the character, the Jewish Barber (played by Sir Charles Chaplin), in Chaplin’s 1940 film, The Great Dictator.

Love is all we need

"Let us realize that a change can only come when we stand together as one"

"We Are the World" is the world famous song and charity single originally recorded by the supergroup USA for Africa in 1985. It was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, and produced by Quincy Jones and Michael Omartian for the album We Are the World. With sales in excess of 20 million copies, it is one of the fewer than 30 all-time singles to have sold at least 10 million copies worldwide.

MAYBE THE TIME HAS COME TO STAND TOGETHER AS ONE?

O love, love as long as you may!

O lieb, so lang du lieben kannst! O lieb, so lang du lieben magst!
O love, love as long as you can! O love, love as long as you may!

Liebesträume (German for Dreams of Love) is a set of three solo piano works by Franz Liszt, published in 1850. Originally the three Liebesträume were conceived as lieder after poems by Ludwig Uhland and Ferdinand Freiligrath. In 1850, two versions appeared simultaneously as a set of songs for high voice and piano, and as transcriptions for piano two-hands. The two poems by Uhland and the one by Freiligrath depict three different forms of love. Freiligrath's poem for the famous third Notturno is about unconditional mature love ("Love as long as you can!", "O lieb, so lang du lieben kannst"). Ferdinand Freiligrath was a tireless champion of freedom and civil liberties and a poet who sang the song of democracy in the face of repression. He was repeatedly forced into exile due to his active political engagement for democracy.

MAYBE TIME HAS COME TO LET LOVE PREVAIL?

Making a world of difference

Today we are tuning into CHANGE...
The posted video talks about Vodafone Foundation's World of Difference Programme: funding people to take time out to work for their dream charity. But what would you do to change the world?
-- go to Vodafone Foundation

Just show you care

More about Life Vest Inside (see older post)... Life Vest Inside is dedicated to spreading kindness and goodwill and is based upon the philosophy that kindness keeps the world afloat. Join us in our efforts to effect real and positive change by promoting kindness and empowering people to see how special they truly are.

'INSIDE OUT' art project

And this is a fascinating documentary which tracks the evolution of the biggest participatory art project in the world, the wildly popular 'INSIDE OUT'. Travel the globe with French artist JR as he motivates entire communities to define their most important causes with incredibly passionate displays of giant black and white portraits pasted in the street. We witness young and old taking ownership of walls that were previously restricted and in doing so testing the limits of what they thought was possible. In capturing the process, Alastair Siddons creates a glowing testament to the power of image and the role that art can play in transforming communities.
INSIDE OUT, The People's Art Project has been created, developed and produced by a team of friends sharing the same passion for art and action, freedom, identity and limit. They all have been involved in JR's work for years on different levels.
-- go to insideoutproject.net
-- go to JR website


INSIDE OUT: The People's Art Project TRAILER from SOCIAL ANIMALS on Vimeo.

Use art to turn the world inside out

"Can art change the world? Maybe … we should change the question: Can art change people's lives?" 

JR, a French street artist, uses his camera to show the world its true face. He makes his audacious TED Prize wish: to use art to turn the world inside out. A funny, moving talk about art and who we are. Very inspiring...nice accent :)
-- go to JR website
-- learn more at insideoutproject.net

Kindness Boomerang - "One Day"

Watch as the camera tracks an act of kindness as its passed from one individual to the next and manages to boomerang back to the person who set it into motion. Become Part of the Change we ALL Wish to See in the world!!! Life Vest Inside is a non-profit dedicated to empowering the masses to engage in acts of love and kindness.It is based on the philosophy that increasing kindness in society will lead to more connectedness and a better, happier world. In the stormy seas of life, we all could use a little support, perhaps a "life vest," to keep us afloat. That life vest is kindness.
-- visit Life Vest Inside website
PLEASE WATCH

Play Me, I'm Yours

‘Play Me, I’m Yours’ was first commissioned by Fierce Earth in Birmingham, UK in 2008. With 15 pianos located across the city for three weeks it is estimated that over 140,000 people played or listened to music from the pianos. Since then ‘Play Me, I’m Yours’ has reached an estimated five million people worldwide. Each new city that commissions the artwork becomes part of this growing international legacy.
The Bermuda piano was created by Joan Butterfield.
-- Learn about the project HERE
-- Read on the Royal Gazette

No Wars Will Stop Us Singing

Music composed by Debbie Wiseman and lyrics written by Don Black.
This moving anthem offers hope against the back-drop of continual war throughout the world where children needlessly suffer and die. This contemporary song has been translated into several different languages and has become a national 'anthem' sung by thousands of young people on World Peace Day -- September 21st.
-- go to Peace One Day website

Step for Peace

On June 18th 2009 a group of nineteen young Israelis and Palestinians, who have been working together for 3 years, came together in Tel Aviv to show that music can overcome conflict by creating a unique track and video. The project is a collaboration between peace organisation Windows- Channels for Communication (Windows for Peace) and pioneering London-based music college Point Blank. This video 'Step for Peace' is the final result of all their hard work.

IMAGINE

"You may say I'm a dreamer 
But I'm not the only one 
I hope someday you'll join us 
And the world will be as one"

-- John Lennon

PS22

"Don't fake it, you should feel it"

-- Mr. B

We already mentioned the PS22 Chorus...here a little bit more about them, very inspiring story.
Please listen to it.

What is relevant education?

"The very nature of our society is changing. We need to be ready for this change. We need our education to reflect this. And we need to provide our children with the skills and confidence to be able to realize their potentials in this ever changing world".

Emanuel Souvairan is the director of DevEd, an organisation working towards changing attitudes and approaches to education in the developing world through a focus on the delivery of relevant education. Emanuel has worked for non-profits and the United Nations in Afghanistan, India, Switzerland, Uganda and the UK on a series of different humanitarian and development projects such as disaster relief, working with farming cooperatives, drilling boreholes, developing small business initiatives, building schools, flood shelters and roads, setting up microfinance initiatives, research for health and innovation, monitoring and evaluation and developing humanitarian and leadership training courses.

Beautiful distractions in 21st century learning

Very interesting point of view...

"Learning is experience and  that experience opens up a pathway to possibilities"

Dionne Custer Edwards is a writer and arts educator serving K-12 students through arts partnership with artists, teachers, and the community at The Wexner Center for the Arts, where she created PAGES, a multi-visit writing-based arts program for high school students and WorldView, an exploratory, global-minded, cross-cultural arts program.
When we think of potential distractions in a typical K-12 classroom, we might envision: students passing notes, staring out the window, doodling, whispering side conversations, or, heaven forbid, texting. What if we could design learning environments as experiences with built-in intentional distractions, allowing a complex and dynamic learning process? In this kind of learning environment, we would embrace, even engage distraction: a choir of inquiry, a beautiful collision of difference (in opinion, perspective, experience), or a flexible lab for hands-on, interactive problem solving. What if engaging distraction is learning?

Music keeps us sane

"How does music and veterinarian medicine interact in my life? They don't...different areas of my life, different interests that allow me to bounce from one place to another, and I think this is just part of being healthy"

Moving Between Music and Medicine....video uploaded by Ontario VetCollege

Robert Gupta: Between music and medicine

"The beauty of music has the ability to speak where words fail"

When Robert Gupta was caught between a career as a doctor and as a violinist, he realized his place was in the middle, with a bow in his hand and a sense of social justice in his heart. He tells a moving story of society’s marginalized and the power of music therapy, which can succeed where conventional medicine fails. Violinist Robert Gupta joined the LA Philharmonic at the age of 19 -- and maintains a passionate parallel interest in neurobiology and mental health issues.

Let's Take the Sting Out of Education Cuts

California Voters Tell State Leaders: Every Cut You Make is Destroying the Futures of Six Million Children!
-- video uploaded by educateourstate

Wow - thanks youtube

Hip Hop Violin - Paul Dateh and inks one
-- go to Paul's youtube channel

ArtSPARK - Music teaches life skills

Castillero Middle School orchestra teacher Scott explains how music inspired him as a kid--and still does as he teaches it to others. He also notes how music and the arts teach life skills way beyond musical notes.
-- video uploaded by Symphony Silicon Valley

ArtSPARK: Because exposure to the arts matters!

Children's Musical Theatre actor and 3rd Grader Everett tells how one night seeing "Oliver" changed his world. Flute player law student Kyle shares how exposure to music as a child has impacted his life in every way. Christina is a chemist majoring in drug research and therapy at Stanford. And she's also a flute player with the Stanford Flute Ensemble. See what inspired this scientist to be involved in music.
 -- videos uploaded by Symphony Silicon Valley

Arts and Education - A (short) Documentary

"..I can honestly say that being able to be involved in those arts activities is what taught me how to work hard and how to be driven to do something... and I think that this thing in particular really affected the rest of my education as a whole"

-- produced by B-Man Productions

A story about Peace and Music

There are no words for this.

"Sometimes you gotta lose to win, never give up, never give in" 

For five years, young Emmanuel Jal fought as a child soldier in the Sudan. Rescued by an aid worker, he's become an international hip-hop star and an activist for kids in war zones. In words and lyrics, he tells the story of his amazing life.
-- go to We Want Peace website
-- Warchild music video
-- Warchild documentary trailer
-- Warchild movie website

Hamilton's Culture For Kids in the Arts

"Participation and access to the arts is a right, not a privilege"

Culture for Kids in the Arts is a registered charitable organization dedicated to providing high quality arts experiences to children and youth, regardless of their financial circumstances. Designed to promote arts in education, Culture for Kids in the Arts programming encourages students to expand their learning potential through their natural enjoyment of the performing and visual arts.

Vitek Wincza, Artistic Director of the Hamilton Conservatory for the Arts, recognized through his own experience that arts programs can motivate and inspire learning. His passion to remove barriers for full access to the arts ignited this dream. From this dream, he designed arts programs that would be inclusive regardless of talent, financial status or heritage. As a result, the Hamilton Conservatory for the Arts became the founding partner of CFKA, providing facilities, expertise and resources. To date,the CFKA has provided arts experiences to over 40,000 children and youth!

I Am Education: Kids Tell All - Zion

Zion is an engaged, creative 12-year-old who has never done well on high-stakes exams—a fact that impacts his morale and his performance. And the pressure has only grown: He knows that his test scores can impact his teachers' jobs, whether he passes a grade, and his school's entire reputation. Never before have kids taken so many standardized tests, and never before have they played such an important role in our schools.
-- video Produced and Directed by Keith Fulton and Lou Pepe, uploaded by Take Part

I Am Education: Kids Tell All - Primo

This a beautiful campaign making the kids speak about education. We will post a few clips... Let's hear what the kids have to say!!!

Nine-year-old Primo can turn just about anything into something beautiful, but he's limited to expressing his remarkable creativity at home due to his school's lack of art classes. In most districts, art and music are the first courses to go when budgets are cut. Today, nearly four million elementary school students receive no visual arts education.
-- video Produced and Directed by Keith Fulton and Lou Pepe, uploaded by Take Part

Ken Robinson - Creativity and making Mistakes

Sir Ken Robinson on Charlie Rose

"Creativity is fundamental..We create our own life, and we can recreate it.."

"Being wrong is not the same thing as being creative. But if you are not prepared to be wrong you will not come up with something original. We stigmitize mistakes. The result is we are educating people out of their creative capacities. All children are born artists. The problem is to remain artists as we grow up".

Teachers Are Like Gardeners

"The plant grows itself, what you do is provide
the conditions for growth"

From Sir Ken Robinson talk at Full Sail University: “There are seasons of personal growth and there are seasons that are fallow…the very old, like the very young, still have enormous amounts to find out about themselves if the conditions are right…you can’t make a plant grow…what you do is provide the conditions for growth”

Changing Education, a 15-year-old kid point of view

The education system in America is outdated. It's time for change. Arooj Ahmad is a high-achieving 15-year-old high school sophomore at Libertyville High School in suburban Chicago who has taken a focused interest in reforming the U.S. education system, which he calls outdated.
-- read on Washington Post

Why Music?

"I think that arts programs really challenge kids at a very critical time in their life immediately before adolescence and through adolescence to be reflective and to be cooperative...when someone has got a flute solo and everyone in the room wants them to do well because if that person does well we all do well..that sort of value cannot be underestimated in the life and the development of a kid"

-- Stuart Sims (Coordinator of Instrumental Studies at California State University, Stanislaus)

Stuart Sims, Allen Vizzutti, Robert W. Smith, and Michael Skinner discuss the greater meaning of music on our culture and our schools.
-- video uploaded by Music for All

A New Design for Education

Educators all over the world are taking steps to meet the challenges of a new education system that meets the needs of the 21st century.

Farmington Area Public Schools and Spring Lake Park Schools are engaged in innovative collaboration with transformative ends in mind. As an approved Innovation Zones Pilot Project, this collaboration will prove a disruptive innovation with ripple effects into other districts in Minnesota. As the only metro area districts in Minnesota with a full one-to-one iPad integration for all K-12 students, these two districts are well poised to brave a new path into the potentialities of a 21st century education.
-- video uploaded by Farmington Area Public Schools (Independent School District 192 Farmington, Minnesota)

The Four C's: Making 21st Century Education Happen

This video by EdLeader21 and Pearson Foundation focuses on how the 4C's (Critical thinking, Creativity, Collaboration and Communication) are being implemented in three parts of the country.

Do you realize?

Do you realize how dramatically the world has changed? When was the last time that you used correcting fluid? When was the last time that you sent a film out to be developed?

What about Education?

Education is about adapting to a changing world. How and what we teach has to change as well.
-- video is property of The Center of the Net

High Line Arts Education Project

In October 2013, the Aspen Institute Arts Program kicked off the High Line Arts Education Project, conceived by 2012 Harman-Eisner Artist in Residence and High Line architect Elizabeth Diller, and Arts Program Director Damian Woetzel. Thirty students from some of the nation’s lowest-performing and highest-poverty schools traveled to New York City, to photograph the High Line under Diller’s guidance — coming from as far as Lame Deer, Montana to Roxbury, Massachusetts and nearby Bridgeport, Connecticut. The day was convened in partnership with the Turnaround Arts Initiative, a program of the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities, launched to narrow the achievement gap and increase student engagement through the arts.

Did you know about Turnaround: ARTS ?

"The arts are who I am. And who you are"

-- Savannah, Grade 8

Obama’s Committee’s (PCAH) Turnaround Arts initiative, created in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Education and the White House Domestic Policy Council, is a public-private partnership designed to help transform some of the nation’s lowest performing schools through comprehensive and integrated arts education. Developed from the recommendations in PCAH’s recent report Reinvesting in Arts Education: Winning America’s Future Through Creative Schools, the Committee’s landmark research publication of May 2011, Turnaround Arts will test the hypothesis that high-quality and integrated arts education can be an effective tool to strengthen school reform efforts-boosting academic achievement and increasing student motivation in schools facing some of the toughest educational challenges in the country.
-- go to Turnaround Arts website

Education in 2012: working together to create a better system

John Abbott, the man behind Born to Learn and the 21st Century Learning Initiative, shares his thoughts on education in 2012. Worth listening.
-- get Abbott's book (Over schooled but Under educated)
-- read on Huffington Post

Born to Learn

Born to Learn is the first animation in a fascinating series aimed to provide easy-access to the exciting new discoveries constantly being made about how humans learn! Narrated by Damian Lewis.

Your brain is the planet's most powerful learning machine. But our current systems of education aren't doing enough to unlock our true potential. This is what Born to Learn is all about. These videos sum up over 20 years' of rigorous and complex research in a way that's accessible and easy to understand in a fun, thought-provoking series of animations that illustrate ground-breaking new discoveries about how humans learn
-- visit Born to Learn website
-- Born to Learn youtube channel

How Children Succeed - Interesting point of view

“Tough makes the convincing case that it’s not test scores or even raw intelligence that predict who will triumph: It’s grit, curiosity and persistence, all life skills that can be taught. An eye-opener.” 

-- People Magazine

Paul Tough is a journalist and former editor at the New York Times Magazine. His 2012 book "How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character" tries to answer this important question: Why do some children succeed while others fail?
The story we usually tell about childhood and success is the one about intelligence: success comes to those who score highest on tests, from preschool admissions to SATs. But in How Children Succeed, he argues that the qualities that matter most have more to do with character: skills like perseverance, curiosity, conscientiousness, optimism, and self-control.
-- from Paul Tough's website
-- read more on the Economist



Paul Tough discusses character strengths in education with Geoffrey Canada, founder and CEO of the Harlem Children’s Zone, June 2013

More from "Talk Science to Me"

Cooling atoms with lasers? John Bohannon does an excellent job of demystifying the physics behind it ... with dance. In his words, "The fewer words you use, the better" when explaining complex subjects. Bohannon is a biologist, science journalist, and dancer based at Harvard University. He writes for Science Magazine, Discover Magazine, and Wired Magazine and frequently reports on the intersections of science and war.
Check this TED talk out...this is crazy in a genius kind of way... Use dancers instead of powerpoint. That's his "modest proposal." In this spellbinding choreographed talk he makes his case by example, aided by dancers from Black Label Movement. With his encouragement, numerous doctoral students deliver their theses as dance performances each year.



Also check Dance your PHD and watch funny video below
-- read more here

Words are not enough?

Interesting insight on the pairing of art and science!
When people hear the words "science communication", many still think of jargon-filled, unintelligible papers in dusty, peer-reviewed journals that no one except the boffins in white coats ever read. Although news clips on the evening news about a key drug discovery, science blogging, museum signage or even TED talks are all good examples of science communication, for most people it’s all about the the written word. But what about sand art? Or opera? Or dance? Sometimes words are not enough. -- read all on Talk science to Me
Shelly Xie, a medical researcher, is a scientist communicating through art. She uses sand art to tell audiences about schistosomiasis and its impact on daily life in Ghana.



Using a non-traditional medium like art communicates science in a more engaging way for general audiences. And even if you’re using more traditional formats, presenting complex theories and concepts without jargon and unencumbered by the dry, passive voice–laden text of formal science communication, art overcomes the language barrier and stirs an immediate emotional response. Or, more simply put, it engages the reader.

Sir Ken Robinson - Arts and Creativity in Schools

"What advice would you give to senior leaders and governors in schools to maintain a creative and cultural offer for their students in a period of radical transformation and change?"
Sir Ken Robinson and A New Direction 'Bridge Building'
Connecting the Arts and Schools in London
This video is part of a series of questions A New Direction asked Sir Ken Robinson to reflect on the current challenges around creativity in education.

"My advice is to recognize that education is the school that you are running for the children in it, and that you have freedom to innovate within that culture to benefit your students, your parents, and the community and you should take it"

-- go to A New Direction (for arts, culture, and young London) website

Teach arts and sciences together

"The difference between science and the arts is not that they are different sides of the same coin even, or even different parts of the same continuum, but rather, they are manifestations of the same thing. The arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity".

-- Mae Jemison

Mae Jemison is an astronaut, a doctor, an art collector, a dancer… In 1992, she was the first African-American woman to go into space. She's become a crusader for science education -- and for a new vision of learning that combines arts and sciences, intuition and logic. Telling stories from her own education and from her time in space, she calls on educators to teach both as one -- to create bold thinkers.
"Science provides an understanding of a universal experience. Arts provide a universal understanding of a personal experience."

Watch this old but interesting TED talk she gave in 2002.

What is ART? - maARTe ako

This video campaign aims to take a closer look on how the arts can be applicable to our lives. Expressed by those who live, breathe and LOVE it - the Filipino Artists. In a society that sees art as frivolous, and being ma-drama and maarte, they challenge to change the paradigm and change the meaning of art -- NICE

The Arts & Children: A Success Story

The Arts—music, dance, theatre and the visual arts—are intellectual disciplines of substance. Arts skills and processes, knowledge and history, can be taught to and learned by all students, not just the talented. They also enhance learning for everyone across the academic spectrum and therefore are of great value for todays students. Students who participate in arts programs are more likely to succeed and become leaders in whatever field of endeavor they choose.

-- video uploaded by theaemsalliance

Our Education System is is Totally Outdated!

As we explained in the previous post, STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math - subjects that no one will deny are necessary for success in the global economy. For that reason, these subjects also don't have to stand up to the kind of scrutiny arts and humanities do. However, art education advocates have pointed out that STEM education alone won't solve our economic problems going forward. That includes business executive Harvey White, co-founder of Qualcomm, the largest fabless chip supplier in the world. So it's great news that White has come out as a strong advocate for adding an A to STEM, working with Americans for the Arts, the Conference Board, and others to push this message. White pointed out that countries such as China, recognize the important role of creativity and critical thinking in the innovation process more than we do here in the US of A. This combination of technological know-how and critical thinking skills will help students with a STEAM education succeed in business in the future - locally and globally.
-- from Art Advocado by Alison Wade
-- visit STEAM website

Mr White wrote an extremely interesting article:
Our Education System is not so much "Broken" – as it is Totally Outdated! 

SOME EXTRACTS:
"As Ken Robinson illustrates, schools were, and still are structured like the factories they were developed to serve. They treat education like an assembly line – you move from one task (class) to the next – day in and day out. There is little collaboration or interchange between the work done in one department (course) versus the next. The product (students) are processed, as in a factory, in batches (by year of birth). The resultant product (graduates) are therefore all from the same mold. Due to this structure, which has not changed much in the last 100+ years – change is hard to come by." 
"Arts use the right side of the brain but have recently been stripped out of the public education system by multiple budget cuts leaving the US with mainly a "half a brain" system. Arts need to be returned to the national curricula where it was for the years leading up to our more prosperous years"
"The new economy requires that we continue to improve and encourage STEM education because mastering existing and new technologies is vital. It also requires that Arts be included in the curricula to capture the full potential of the whole-brain – i.e., a STEAM based one. It is using the combination of all these capabilities that drives creativity and innovation. The future economic cost of not having a whole brain education system that fosters creativity and innovation is immense."

>> READ FULL ARTICLE HERE

STEM to STEAM: Art in K-12 is Key to Building a Strong Economy

"The game is changing. It isn't just about math and science anymore. It's about creativity imagination and, above all, innovation." 

- Business Week

STEM education is an acronym for the fields of study in the categories of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.The term refers to curriculum choices in schools from kindergarten through college to improve competitiveness in technology development - from Wikipedia
Recently, a coalition of educators, artists and scientists are proposing a different approach to science, technology, engineering and math education, commonly known as STEM: add the arts and make it STEAM. STEAM is a movement championed by Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) and widely adopted by institutions, corporations and individuals.
The objectives of the STEAM movement are to:
- transform research policy to place Art + Design at the center of STEM
- encourage integration of Art + Design in K–20 education
- influence employers to hire artists and designers to drive innovation
The push to incorporate arts into STEM comes as some districts see cuts to arts education. An analysis by The Center for Arts Education, a nonprofit and advocacy organization that promotes arts programs in New York City public schools, found that city schools lost 69 art teachers from 2006 through 2012—even though the system grew by 304 schools during that time.
A real national movement starting to take shape... in 2012 even Sesame Street is being brought to viewers by the letters S - T - E - A - M . Only a year ago, Elmo was interviewed on CNN about the importance of S -T - E -M.

SOURCES:
- go to STEM to STEAM initiative, Rhode Island School of Design
- STEM to STEAM: Art Is Key to Building a Strong Economy (Huffpost Arts & Culture, J. Kamen and J. Maeda
- STEAM Blends Science and the Arts in Public Education (Wall Street Journal, Sophia Hollander)
- Art and Design Matter - RISD Leads Public Forum Art (Dexigner, Levent Ozler)
- STEM to STEAM: Art in K-12 is Key to Building a Strong Economy (Edutopia blog)

Arts Integration in high school

A Chicago high school has adopted arts integration as their school-wide methodology; this is an interesting video clip that looks at why and its success. Arts Integration is the primary instructional model at Innovations High School. By integrating the arts, they seek to: 1) increase student motivation and attitudes toward learning, 2) support learning and increase student success in core academic subjects, and 3) organize integrated instruction around “big ideas” that enable students to make meaningful connections between concepts learned in different subject areas.
-- got to Innovations high school website

Yes we can

Geoffrey Canada on Waiting for "Superman"

Geoffrey Canada is an American social activist and educator. Since 1990, Canada has been president and CEO of the Harlem Children's Zone in Harlem, New York, an organization which states its goal is to increase high school and college graduation rates among students in Harlem -- from Wikipedia
 In this short clip he expresses his thoughts on director Davis Guggenheim's documentary film Waiting for "Superman."
-- watch Geoffrey Canada's popular TED talk
-- go to Harlem Children's Zone website

Waiting for Superman

"The fate of our country won't be decided on a battlefield,
it will be determined in a classroom"

Waiting for "Superman" is a 2010 documentary film by director Davis Guggenheim. The film analyzes the failures of the American public education system by following several students as they strive to be accepted into a charter school -- from Wikipedia
As he follows a handful of promising kids through a system that inhibits, rather than encourages, academic growth, Guggenheim undertakes an exhaustive review of public education, surveying “drop-out factories” and “academic sinkholes,” methodically dissecting the system and its seemingly intractable problems. However, embracing the belief that good teachers make good schools, Guggenheim offers hope by exploring innovative approaches taken by education reformers and charter schools that have—in reshaping the culture—refused to leave their students behind.
-- go to Take Part website
-- Read about the book Waiting for "Superman"
-- Waiting for "Superman" Facebook page

MS 223: A Work in Progress

Ramon Gonzalez is principal of Middle School 223, located in New York's poorest Congressional District—the South Bronx. MS 223, formerly identified as the most dangerous intermediate school in New York City, is undergoing a transformation. With the help of the School Arts Support Initiative, funded by the Center for Arts Education and the New York Times Company Foundation, the arts are taking their place as a basic subject along with English, Math, Science, Social Studies and Technology. Through interviews and classroom footage, Mr. Gonzalez, teachers, Teaching Artists and students discuss the transformative elements of the School Arts Support Initiative and lay out the nuts and bolts needed for a successful arts-rich school environment.
-- uploaded from CAENYC

Music to save lives - Restoring hope to Ugandan orphans

In 2005 Fabian Jowers and his French wife, Elizabeth, left Madrid to set about forming the Music to Save Lives Orphanage in Kampala, Uganda. There are currently 30 children in the orphanage, ranging in age from 2 to 21 years, and most come from backgrounds where poverty, neglect and abuse are common. Through the therapeutic nature of music and dance, here they are able to rebuild their confidence and learn gradually to interact and work with others in a positive and constructive way. The orphanage’s principal choir, Uganda Natumayini, is now made up of 25 children. It performs all the traditional cultural dances of Uganda as well as incorporating dance and song from countries such as South Africa, Rwanda, Mali, Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea. The concrete results of Music to Save Lives’ work is also evident in the international success of their first musical group, Aba Taano. They have played to critical acclaim in top concert halls in Spain, Holland, Estonia and Hungary, and represented Africa at the World Expo in Zaragoza, Spain in 2008.
-- visit Music to Save Lives website
-- visit Aba Taano website

Hungry for Music

"When they did give me the piano I was so excited because I can finally fulfill my dreams and finally do something great with my life"

-- a student

Hungry for Music is a charity organization that supports music education and cultural enrichment, both in the United States and abroad, by acquiring and distributing quality musical instruments to under served children with willing instructors and a hunger to play. At Hungry for Music, the most important service is putting musical instruments into hungry hands. They serve children who demonstrate a desire to learn music as well as teachers who have students willing to learn. Music has the ability to heal, it soothes tension and has the ability to transform sadness and aggression to hope and creativity. Music is the prayer through which the world heals itself. They believe that by sharing instruments and musical experiences, children who would not normally have the opportunity can experience a kind of freedom and self-discovery that is often stifled in an atmosphere of economic hardship.

-- visit Hungry for Music

Artist Transforms Guns To Make Music - Literally

Mexican artist Pedro Reyes wants people to think about the availability of guns in the United States, and the impact that has in Mexico. Reyes believes art should address social issues like gun violence, even when they're difficult and controversial. His first project began in 2007. As part of a campaign to curb shootings, the city collected 1,527 guns. He used them to create art. "Those 1,527 guns were melted and made into the same number of shovels," he says. "So for every gun now, there's a shovel. And with every shovel, we planted a tree." Then Reyes worked on a new project. It is one that transforms guns into something more musical. A few years ago, a government agency in Mexico gave Reyes 6,700 guns that had been confiscated from criminal gangs and rendered inoperable. Since then, he's been turning them into electric guitars, violins, flutes and percussion instruments. "To me at least," jazz grad student Zach Pedigo says, "the concept is about taking weapons that are destructive in nature and chaotic and trying to make them for something else. So, instead of objects of destruction, they become objects of creation." That's exactly Reyes' point. Art, he says, is about transformation. "It's the same metal," he says, "but it is no longer a gun. It's now a flute or a guitar." Asked whether that's an improvement, whether musical instruments are better than guns, Reyes responds, "Yes, I do believe guns are bad. Because, you know it's an industry that to thrive, it needs conflict." (extracts from "Artist Transforms Guns To Make Music - Literally" by Greg Allen)
-- read full article by Greg Allen on NPR here
-- go to Pedro Reyes website

Sad and Beautiful

Here's what happens when a piano is abandoned on the streets of Manhattan...The sight of a lone piano on the sidewalk can be both sad and beautiful. So when Anthony Sherin of the New York Times noticed that someone had left a piano in front of his apartment, he decided to document what happened to it. Have an instrument lying around that you never play? Don't throw it out, donate it to a child to support music education.
-- found on GOOD
-- uploaded by the New York Times

Turning drawings into a music game - WOW

Gilda Negrini and Riccardo Vendramin, two young product designers from Italy, worked on this project during a course at Politecnico of Milano. It’s called MusicInk, it runs on an Arduino Duemilanove board, and gives an alternative method to teach music to children. That’s how they describe it: "MusicInk makes drawings turning into real music, this magical process is due to a mashup of various eterogenous technologies...". MusicInk spawned from the idea of looking into the world of music teaching, creating a new way to understand music and interact with musical instruments. MusicInk is a toy that leads you to an innovative approach to music, allowing children not only to draw musical properties, but also to turn them into a real symphony. This project main characteristic is the use of a unique electrically conductive paint that allows children to play their own drawings.
-- from the Arduino blog
-- go to Musicink website

Another great program supporting music in schools

"I think everyone in the world should have an instrument to play with and this will greatly change the the world"

-- a student

Harmony Project is Los Angeles’ largest nonprofit organization solely dedicated to music education for youth in low-income communities. They accomplish this by bringing quality music instruction and ensemble playing to children who otherwise would not have access to it; complementing music education with supporting resources and opportunities; and, fostering a community of families that actively support their children’s growth and development.

-- go to Harmony Project website
-- go to Harmony Project youtube channel

Adopt the Arts

"Music gives you the power to create things" 

-- a kid

PSA for Adopt the Arts, featuring Matt Sorum (Guns N' Roses) and Jane Lynch.
It is the mission of Adopt the Arts Foundation to bring together well-known artists, public figures, and the general public to save the arts in America's public schools. They believe that it is morally and ethically incumbent upon us to foster the creativity, dreams, hopes, and imaginations of our children. Adopt the Arts Foundation is dedicated to improving the academic performance of every child through the gift of making art and music to our public school students. In their short existence as a non-profit, we have already donated 1,000 instruments – providing modern band curriculums and vocal and instrumental classes – to 30 LAUSD elementary schools.
-- learn more about Adopt the Arts Foundation

John Lennon, the Artist

Not everybody knows that some famous musicians are also talented visual artists. John Lennon was one of them. Art was actually Lennon’s first love. He began drawing long before he had a guitar, then attended the prestigious Liverpool Art Institute for three years (1957-60) before the Beatles became a full-time occupation. He continued to draw throughout his life.
-- from The Art of John Lennon website.
A close friend of John Lennon's from Liverpool art college, Bill Harry who has written several books about the Beatles, said that he loved John's art because it reminded him of Steinberg, the American artist."He had a great fluidity of line with his cartoons and things...But he was such a rebel… instead of drawing the life model, he'd draw her watch.."
-- Read article by Imogen Carter, the Observer here
And do you know what is the red stamp on the prints? Artists in the Orient sign their works with an individual, patented stamp known as a chop. John Lennon’s (to the left), which is hand-stamped in red on each edition, was designed by him to read "Like a Cloud, Beautiful Sound."
-- from The Art of John Lennon website.

-- View John art here
-- We love this one...
-- Click on zimbio or on pastemagazine for other musicians that are also impressive visual artists

Transforming New York City Public Schools

Founded in 1996, The Center for Arts Education (CAE) is dedicated to ensuring that New York City public student have quality arts learning as an essential part of their K-12 education. CAE also provides information and resources that demonstrates the benefits of and needs for scholastic arts. The following videos are about New York schools but again demonstrate how integration of arts into the core curriculum benefits the student, teacher, and the school culture.
-- go to CAE website
-- go to CAE youtube channel