Virtuous Circle E-Book

John Sorrell

• Herausgeber: Elliott & Thompson
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 105

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

An excellent cultural education is the right of everyone, bringing personal, social and commercial advantages that can only benefit the lives of all individuals in our society.We live in the age of creativity. It is integral to everything we do. It inspires innovation, improving our environment, our products, our businesses and the quality of our lives. The UK has become a creative nation, renowned throughout the world.This book argues that cultural and creative activities should form a vital part of the everyday lives of young people - that they are academically, physically, socially and emotionally enriching.Encompassing archaeology, architecture and the built environment, archives, craft, dance, design, digital arts, drama and theatre, film and cinemas, galleries, heritage, libraries, literature, live performance, museums, music, poetry and the visual arts, John Sorrell, Paul Roberts and Darren Henley offer a blueprint for a renewed approach to cultural and creative education that will be required reading whether you are a parent, a practitioner, an educator or a policymaker.Far too important to be regarded as entertaining optional extras, creativity and cultural education matter.

Leseprobe

The Virtuous Circle

The Virtuous Circle

Why creativity and cultural education count

John Sorrell, Paul Roberts & Darren Henley

Contents

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1

The cultural education landscape

Chapter 2

The need for creativity

Chapter 3

The case for creative cultural education

Chapter 4

Creative learning as a core teaching aim

Chapter 5

The impact of raised expectations

Chapter 6

From ‘STEM’ to ‘STEAM’ and beyond

Chapter 7

What cultural education should a child receive?

Chapter 8

The future: national commitment and local leadership

Chapter 9

Summary of the argument

About the authors

Acknowledgements

Index

First . . .

A Cambridge University conference recently revealed new research suggesting that, 13,000 years ago, children living in the complex of caverns at Rouffignac in the Dordogne (known as the Cave of a Hundred Mammoths for its 158 depictions of mammoths) were helped to express themselves through finger fluting – running their fingers over soft red clay to produce criss-crossing lines, zigzags and swirls that decorate the cave. Their stunning paintings form part of the extraordinary work found within the five-mile cave system.

Some of the children’s finger paintings are high up on the walls or ceilings, so they must have been lifted up to make them or have been sitting on someone’s shoulders.

Just picture that, 13,000 years ago in a dark cave. A small child, sitting on an adult’s shoulders, reaching up to express his or her creativity.

Preface

This book is born out of three separate independent reviews into aspects of creative and cultural education carried out for two different governments across the space of more than six years.

The first, ‘Nurturing Creativity in Young People: A report to Government to inform future policy’, was written by Paul Roberts and published in July 2006. It was jointly commissioned by three members of the then government: Education Minister Andrew Adonis, Creative Industries and Tourism Minister James Purnell, and Culture Minister David Lammy.

Four years later, Darren Henley was commissioned to undertake two reviews by the next government’s Education Secretary, Michael Gove, and Minister for Culture, Creative Industries and Communications Ed Vaizey. The first, ‘Music Education in England’, was published in February 2011, with the second, ‘Cultural Education in England’, published in February 2012.

This book draws heavily on much of the research, thinking and writing that went into all three of these independent reports. However, this book has not been commissioned with a specific brief from a government department, so its content ranges beyond the remits of the original reviews undertaken by the authors. Much has happened in the world of creative and cultural education over the past few years and this book reflects on those changes, offering a vision for the future along the way.

Sir John Sorrell has worked with successive governments on education, particularly in the area of design. This book also draws on many of the speeches he has given on the subject, as a UK Business Ambassador for the Creative Industries, as Chair of the University of the Arts, London, and as Co-Chair of the Sorrell Foundation, which he founded with Lady Frances Sorrell in 1999. It also draws on his ‘provocation’ for the Warwick Commission, which is about the future of cultural value.

Although reference is made to institutions and activities across the UK in this book, our experience is in England’s education system. However, many of the arguments and examples that we put forward will be relevant to the education systems of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, although it should be noted that each of these nations has its own distinct education system, which differs from that of England.

Introduction

We live in the age of creativity. The UK has built a reputation for creativity that is perhaps better recognised outside than inside these shores. We have become a creative nation and we need to build on that position in the future.

Education is the means to achieve that aim. We share the unequivocal view that all children can and should experience a wide-ranging, adventurous and creative education, in which cultural education is central. We don’t mind admitting from the outset that we are completely partisan in this regard.

We realise that many people who read this book will already be converts to our cause. They share our view that cultural and creative activities and learning should form a vital part of the everyday lives of all young people – and that these activities are academically, physically, socially and emotionally enriching, whether they take place in school or out of school.

We hope that those who are less certain about the place of cultural and creative subjects and activities in our education system will read this book too. It is our job over the following pages to put forward a convincing argument as to why this area of a child’s development must not be forgotten.

We have not set out to write a highly academic tome. Rather, we hope that this book might appeal to three groups: the parents of children and young people; the practitioners from the education and cultural sectors who work every day in teaching young people; and those responsible for setting policies that affect the way in which cultural and creative education is delivered to young people.

At the very start, it is important for us to share our definition of the areas that we include as coming under the ‘cultural education’ umbrella. There is no universally acknowledged definition of what exactly should and should not be included under this term. For the purposes of this book, we consider cultural education to include: archaeology, architecture and the built environment, archives, craft, dance, design, digital arts, drama and theatre, film and cinemas, galleries, heritage, libraries, literature, live performance, museums, music, poetry and the visual arts.

However, it is important to note that we do not limit the use of creativity in education only to the subjects set out in the previous paragraph. We will put forward the case that creative learning is something that should be a facet of every part of a child’s overall education, no matter what the subject. Because, in terms of skills, it encompasses reading, writing, drawing, making and, fundamentally, thinking.

This is why creativity matters. It is not an entertaining optional extra. Creativity is needed as a thread to run throughout the curriculum, as important an educational objective as literacy and numeracy because it is a way to illuminate and understand every subject better. It is the start of a virtuous circle in which creativity drives performance across the curriculum, which in turn makes us an ever more creative nation.

Throughout the book, we will use terms such as ‘cultural education’, ‘cultural subjects’ and ‘cultural practitioners’. No inference should be made from our choice of descriptor at any given moment during the book. By using these umbrella terms, it is our intention to include all of the individual areas listed above. On occasion, we delve deeper into specific examples. Again, no inference should be made from our choice of examples, which are not intended to convey the relative importance of any one art form or discipline over any other. To read any such meaning into our words would be wholly incorrect.

Over the coming pages we will not only make the case for a creative education but also for ensuring that all children and young people, no matter what their background, circumstances or location, should experience the highest quality cultural education both in school and out of school, in formal and informal settings. This is currently not always the case. We will show why an excellent education in cultural subjects is in itself intrinsically valuable for children and young people.

There are many reasons for advocating the importance of cultural education, not least that it sharpens skills of creativity and connects to the growth of commercial value. This is not a new perception. As the UK was establishing itself as the world’s leading industrial power, and demonstrating this through the Great Exhibition in the mid-nineteenth century, it led to the development of art schools, music conservatoires and other cultural institutions. While the perception might not be new, it needs restating because it has sometimes been brushed aside or taken for granted in more recent times.

However, creative and cultural skills remain a strength for our nation. The UK has, over many years, built up two closely related industries. Our creative industries and our cultural industries are, in many sectors, world beaters. They also reinforce and support each other. In economic terms they matter enormously to our country’s future – benchmarked against the rest of the world, they give clear evidence that they can be the engine for growth.

In addition to cultural education having intrinsic value for young people, there are also wider benefits for the country as a whole in ensuring that we produce a generation of culturally literate and aware young people at the end of their schooling. The skills which young people learn from cultural education subjects help to ensure that the UK is a creative nation that can lead the world in these sectors. There is a clear message from the creative and cultural industries that the education which children and young people receive in school in creative and cultural subjects has a direct bearing on feeding into the talent pool for those who take up employment in this sector. In addition to the economic arguments, cultural subjects improve the individual and social well-being of the nation.

Sustained investment in providing young people with an excellent cultural education should form a key pillar of any government’s strategy for the long-term growth of our creative and cultural industries, both at a national and international level. It is unquestionable that there should be continued investment in giving the next generation of creative practitioners and thinkers the tools and training necessary for the UK to continue its position of preeminence.

To be clear from the outset, we do not believe that there is a need for anyone to be apologetic about children and young people learning about culture and taking part in cultural activities as a highly valuable part of their rounded education. While they are learning, many children and young people will also discover the sheer enjoyment of taking part in cultural activities, whether that is as an active participant or as an engaged consumer.

An excellent cultural education embraces the gaining of knowledge, the development of understanding and the acquisition of skills. Further, it helps to shape a young person’s identity and to give them a greater understanding of how they might interact with the world around them. As they engage with cultural activities, they will experience a huge range of emotions, all of which add together over time to help them become what UNESCO calls an ‘all-round complete person’.1

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1 Delors, Jacques, ‘Learning: The Treasure Within’, Report to UNESCO of the International Commission on Education for the Twenty-First Century, UNESCO (1996).

Chapter 1

THE CULTURAL EDUCATION LANDSCAPE

The argument in brief

There is a wide range of cultural education offered to children across the UK. It operates through the formal education system, but also relies on other partnerships with organisations and people who add enormous value to the education. Cultural education is vital to the reinforcement of the UK’s position as a world-leading creative nation, with all its social and commercial benefits. But there is a need for clearer pathways for children to gain the maximum benefit from cultural education. There remains a danger that talented individuals fail to achieve their potential for reasons of ethnicity, financial deprivation and geography.

A wealth of cultural education is being offered to children and young people across the UK. The world of cultural education is driven by partnership, with government departments, non-departmental government bodies, the National Lottery, local authorities, schools, cultural organisations, voluntary organisations, the creative and cultural industries, conservation practitioners, business sponsors, charities and philanthropists all contributing. This partnership-driven ecology greatly benefits children and young people.