This study examines how children's drawings develop and how they are taught to draw. This paper is based on a continual six-year study at elementary schools of "sights at meal times." It describes the development of spatial expression in drawings as children repeat mixed perspective and other types of drawings from a variety of points of view, with their style growing more similar to that of adults. In this process of change, there is a tendency for the far edge of a table to be drawn longer than the closer edge. Through the workings of the child's visual imagination amidst their development and self-expression, this eventually leads to the predominance of the single fixed point of view seen in adults' drawings. While examining these changes in children's drawings, I will also discuss the state of drawing instruction.

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This paper aims to provide comprehensive guidance regarding formative activities to improve QOL (quality of life) in children with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities, particularly those with impulsive and involuntary movements. I formulated an action plan based on five types of frameworks, and carried out action research at a special needs school. In this mixed-methods study, both qualitative and quantitative data were collected. Results showed that for these activities to be effective, I had to understand the "physical functions" and "interests" of children and reflect these in the activities. Further, difficulties in teacher guidance can be reduced by utilizing subject matter practiced for children with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities in the past. In addition, as a new hypothesis, there are seven grades according to the actual condition of children with profound intellectual and multiple disabilities who have impulsive and unintentional movements, and three steps of guidance for the main teacher.

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In drawing, the visual spatial relationships and arrangements of the target are important elements. When those weak at drawing copy a target drawing, there is a tendency for spatial location relations to be incorrect or distorted. This research uses scientific knowledge to analyze the copy drawing method through which, using matrix lines, even a person poor at drawing can grasp the target spatial relationships correctly and draw a copy easily. This technique is utilized as a method of expanding / reducing the target being drawn. The analysis examines the issues and elements of improvement in basic capability of visual space expression in drawing. Results show that the copy drawing method using matrix lines is a simple iterative procedure compared to the strategy drawing method, which is learning the drawing method systematically. This is because the copy drawing method using a matrix has a smaller learning curve than the strategy drawing method.

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The purpose of this article is to explore the significance of self-education through art-based projects. The first half of the article clarifies the background of participatory art-based projects from the historical viewpoint of public art of the 20th Century. From the 1920s to the 1930s, Dadaist artists and students of the Bauhaus made participatory artworks; while during the 1960s, Fluxus artists tried to experiment with performances in which audiences can participate. The 1990s saw project-based art, which has often been called a new genre of public art become part of people's daily lives. The latter half is a case study on School After School Club headed by Japanese artist Jun Kitazawa. The methodology of his artistic project is to create an alternative school within local communities led not by adults, but by children. The children take on the role of teachers and establish their identities as creators through this project. This study elucidates innovative means on how art education can be expanded beyond traditional means of instruction and location.

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The purpose of this paper is a fundamental consideration of development of a teacher training program on Integrated and Cross-Domain Fine Arts Education. First, we investigated the teacher training programs of all Japanese prefectures and major (ordinance-designated) cities. Second, based on recent reports and survey findings, we derived the problems and viewpoints of development programs and presented the composition and method for development of a teacher training program on Integrated and Cross-Domain Fine Arts Education. Third, we carried out the teacher training program as devised. This resulted in a change of consciousness in the trainees. In conclusion, this study realized the needs of teacher training on Integrated and Cross-Domain Fine Arts Education, and was able to provide prospects for future practice.

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This paper is part of a series of research about expression guidance using the function of collaborative learning in art education; it contains an understanding of collaborative learning and the consideration of the author's educational activities as collaborative learning for elementary and junior high school students. The study shows that the root of the meaning of collaboration in collaborative learning is the chain and circulation of the occurrence of social meaning and its development to the senses in the zone of proximal development, and supports the conceptual change model in cognitive science, which permits transfer as a development of collaboration leading to the interchange of externalization and examination. It also shows that exchange of the different techniques of each student is utilized as expression of the techniques suitable for each student in technical guidance of 3DCG through collaborative learning, and remembrance of the expression contents in 2-frame animation production is promoted by examination of the meaning of the content before and after each frame and exchange of expression as its externalization.

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Although teaching skills have been studied mainly by focusing on language, recently studies focusing on nonverbal aspects of teacher performance have confirmed its effectiveness in classroom instruction and class management. This paper mainly focuses on what kind of teacher performance is effective for children's activities in the elementary school arts and crafts subject. From previous studies of teacher and child interaction, I derived eight components of teacher performance in elementary school arts and crafts classes. After analyzing these classes, teacher performance indicated by introduction was confirmed as effective in helping to sustain children's interest in learning.

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Reflecting on the six-stage program designed by rearranging Edmund Burke Feldman's innovative idea, the four-step structure of critical art appreciation, the author investigates the stages of interpretation as a principal part of reading-oriented appreciation. The six-stage program is composed of 1. observation including description, 2. visual analysis, 3. interpretation, 4. investigative learning, 5. reinterpretation and 6. evaluation (judgment). The most notable among these six stages is the third one, which is composed of three types of approaches: free interpretation, text-based research and iconographical reading. The new direction of this examination is a proposal for unification of these three different ways to interpret artworks and a clarification of each characteristic. At this time, the artwork selected for reading-oriented appreciation is Hugo van der Goes' "The Portinari Altarpiece" (1475-80). Through considering diverse aspects of interpretation of this altarpiece, the author recognizes that the six-stage program should be optimized. It is reorganized by effectively joining the three interpreting methods. In conclusion, the third step should be specialized by free interpretation (like VTS) as a warmup. Then text-based research and iconographical reading should be located at the next step in close cooperation. Finally the fifth step should be combined with the fourth one, reducing the program's steps from six to five. The next significant issue will be exploration of and improvement on this newly generating idea.

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This study considers the experiences of participants in parent-child moviemaking workshops through participant observation and case description. The clinical field is faced with a serious crisis in how it can explore alternative methodologies in the research of human experience, through evidence-based objectivism. To describe the actuality of daily life, this research approached the case study of a moviemaking workshop for children and parents through participant observation and case description, using M-GTA analysis comparatively. The results showed a bodily and emotional transformation driven by vitality affect and sensibility communication. Dynamic experiences of inter-subjective sensibility communication generate a transactional transformation and a fulfillment of vitality. The results of the comparison show the validity of the above qualitative research methods. This research revealed that a participant observation and case description based on subjectivity and inter-subjectivity become an alternative to new way of research on clinical human experience in arts education and arts and humanities.

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This paper aims at theoretical and empirical consideration of eye tracing on pictures as an art appreciation method. The following four conclusions have been obtained. 1. College students in the natural state are not interested in the aesthetic quality of artworks but the meaning of them. 2. Eye tracing route with verbalizing is effective to objectify the appreciation experience of the individual. As well, by specifying the nodule count and emotion word descriptions, the method can be further enhanced. 3. A description of the eye tracing route facilitates writing an appreciation statement. But the appreciation itself is not the same as its statement writing. One does not succeed the other automatically. For lessons on appreciation statement writing, the following points are essential: first, writing does not interfere with appreciation; second, high quality should not be required in student statements. 4. It is supposed that artists also set eye tracing routes on their works. So examination of the eye tracing route of the artist in each of their works by the grid of composition found by the author has a possibility as art teaching material.

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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the 2014 revision of the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme (IBMYP) focusing on the essential parts of the MYP and the aims and objectives of the arts subjects, in order to contribute to visual arts education in Japan. In this revision, Global Context replaced Area of Interaction (AOI) as the focus of the MYP. IBO indicates that this is the most ambitious programme redesign in the IB's 45-year history. The aims and objectives of the arts have changed. The study confirmed the following: that inquiry and concept learning are more important, and that the relationship of PYP and DP with MYP is further reinforced. The fact that MYP is flexible and can accommodate most national or local curricula is emphasized. Due to the revision, the importance of studying MYP visual arts is affirmed, with the possibility of positively affecting visual arts education in Japan.

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In this study, the author investigated the essence of upper grade elementary school children's attitudes towards art appreciation and proposed a new teaching method for art appreciation with sophisticated viewpoints. This study hypothesized that there are four steps in developing the ability of art appreciation. The first step is "primitive understanding of the contents of the art" and the second is "understanding of the formats of the art". The third step is "evaluating the art" and the final, sophisticated one is "criticizing the art". Based on the hypothesis, during the art appreciation classes of this study, the author suggested the importance of the four-step development of art appreciation to the children. In response to the author's suggestion, even sixth-graders were found to appreciate works of art from the sophisticated viewpoint of "criticizing the art".

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It is an important task of schools nowadays in Japan to "connect the community and the school/school education". Children try to realize artistic activities with traditional motifs in the local community. "Traditional motifs" create empathy across all generations. Various artistic activities of children were accepted and welcomed by people in the community. As a result, their linkage with the community was successfully formed. This paper discusses five examples: 1. Making "Tairyobata" (flag to celebrate a good fishing catch). 2. Making "Koinobori" (carp banner to celebrate a son's growth). 3. Making "Toro" (lanterns). 4. Making "Mikoshi" (portable shrine). 5. Making "Shimenawa" (straw rope woven from rice stalks). Pedagogically, the best way to create connection between a community and a school is to bring children into the community and allow their artistic abilities to blossom.

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The objective of this study was to provide answers to the following two questions, in order to establish a "MONOZUKURI (the art of making high-quality goods)" educational curriculum for the next generation. The first question is how MONOZUKURI education at individual schools in China deals with rapidly increasing mass production in Yiwu (Zhejiang Province, China), one of the largest commodity goods markets. The second question is what they must prepare as the basis of a MONOZUKURI educational curriculum for the next generation.To find answers to these questions, we visited Yiwu Tangli Elemantary School in September, 2013, For the first question, we concluded that they need to provide education according to Chinese traditional MONOZUKURI. Chinese traditional MONOZUKURI here refers to "Jianzhi", Chinese paper cutting (many styles and designs can be created using a single sheet of paper). The answer to the second question was "responsibility."

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This study aims to explore the education status and educational course characteristics of art teachers of the People's Republic of China in the 1980s. After the Great Cultural Revolution, at the beginning of the opening up and reform that gradually began to accommodate foreign educational thought and art culture, art teacher education inherited the art teacher training system of the 1950s normal school system. Meanwhile, art teachers also conducted preliminary reforms of the contents and cultivation methods of art education. By comparison between the education courses of middle and primary school art teachers in the 1980s and those in the 1950s, this study discovered that the focus throughout education overall on "Meiyu" art education as well as appreciation education, the active introduction of Western art, patriotic emotional education conducted via traditional Chinese art, and the development of design education exerted an influential role on the education courses of art teachers in the 1980s.

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This study discusses the role of teacher training for the subject of arts and crafts. We performed interviews with teachers in their 20s and 50s, who make up the majority of teachers in public elementary schools, and used SCAT (Steps for Coding and Theorization) to analyze the similarities and differences between generations in views of the Arts and Crafts subject. Results showed differences in the amount of training in other subjects. On the other hand, similarities included that teachers in their 20s reaffirmed and teachers in their 50s transformed their views of the Arts and Crafts subject through receiving training together when their school was designated as a lesson research school for Arts and Crafts. In order to enhance the future teaching of Arts and Crafts at elementary schools, we need to further detailed training at the stage of teacher training not only in teaching theory but also in how to use materials and tools. In addition, for in-service teachers, we need to provide an opportunity in the course of license renewal to overcome the current view of the Arts and Crafts subject, which focuses on the results of the classwork.

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The goal of this study is to investigate the assessments made by care providers of character depictions in young children's drawing activities. The drawing activities that occur in childcare facilities are guided by care providers' assessments of the children's works. Many care providers look for originality and creativity in the works of children, and some will negatively assess copying. There is also the possibility that they will negatively perceive characters that are copied from another person's work. Accordingly, a survey was administered to care providers working in kindergartens and other childcare facilities, asking them to compare their assessments of character drawings and of general drawings. As for the results, outcomes from care providers according to years of working experience were considered, and it was found that across all categories of experience, drawings of characters received lower scores, suggesting that different subjects of drawings affect care providers' assessment of children's work.

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Presently, it is understood that traditional crafts industries are in decline due to reduced demand and a lack of practicing artisans. Therefore, local governments are carrying out various activities to promote traditional crafts. Considering the declining industries, the transmission and promotion of these traditional crafts is a challenge within the education and culture sectors. Namely, in art education traditional crafts pose a problem for school teaching as they are part of official education guidelines. In addition, there is the issue within social education of the development of regional culture. This paper focuses on Ako dantsu (rugs) as a case study of existing activities that serve to promote traditional crafts. I compared Ako dantsu activities with traditional crafts of other regions. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the value of experiences in traditional crafts at local junior high schools, and to place this in the present context and issues surrounding traditional crafts. The results showed that Ako dantsu ateliers succeed in their transmission of skills and provide a place where people can learn about the regional culture. However, it became clear that it is necessary to further involve the local government in activities promoting Ako dantsu.

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Expressive activities by children, such as "drawing pictures while listening to sounds", are a perceptual phenomenon called cross-modal correspondence. The purpose of this study is to consider the theoretical basis of cross-modal correspondence in expressions of children and childcare. This study included expressive activities by children and artists. The results of the study showed the following three points: (1) Cross-modal correspondence was an important issue for child development, (2) there was a strong relationship between cross-modal correspondence and artistic activities, (3) expressions of children based on cross-modal correspondence would match the guidelines of kindergartens and nurseries in recent years in Japan.

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What degree of art appreciation ability should pupils possess when viewing Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window in order to be able to move beyond the work's literary qualities and savor its qualities as a painting? To get to the heart of this question, pupils were asked also to view The Milkmaid, a work in which literary factors do not come into play. Their experiences of viewing the two paintings were then contrasted. As the chosen research methodology, the aspect of receptiveness to aesthetic properties was posited as a measure of sensory ability. Different rankings in ability were found to lead pupils to grasp the theme of the pictures in painting or literary terms, and to determine the degree of connection between receptiveness to aesthetic properties and theme.

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Works of students on self-image referencing views from others as well as views of self produce better results than the latter only. This paper aims to analyze the reasons for this fact and the significance of views from others today. The authors came to two conclusions. The first is that expression themes referring to views from others as well as views of self are clearer and more multidimensional, as they are composed dialectically of the two. The second is that self-portraits in art education are not preferred by students, having a poor image as a closed cycle of self-reference. Naturalistic and surrealistic self-portrait styles in the past also came from the same closed cycle. Modern youth should have a new theme composed dialectically of negative self-image and positive views from others. It can be generalized that external reference is required in art education today.

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This study analyzes three writings on art education, which were published by Yamamoto Kanae et al. in Akita Prefecture, when visiting the prefecture for the "Exhibition of Works by Elementary School Children across the Prefecture" in April 1928. Our study confirmed the increasing awareness in Akita Prefecture that teachers themselves need to paint and practice sketches in order to improve art education.

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I surmised that the "encapsulation of learning" in art education is becoming a serious problem, because children cannot do artistic activities in the environment outside school due to reduced school hours and increased safety precautions. Therefore, in order to resolve this issue, I proposed a "theory of expansive learning" that expands children's learning and creates a "network of learning" for crossing the boundaries between different school systems. I also considered the connection between art education and the "theory of expansive learning" through the "Gachadama Art Project" at KOBE Bbiennale exhibition 2013". Through this process, I found that multiplex collaborative art projects have the capacity to create learning networks and widen the framework of learning activity to expand children's learning .

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This paper shows that moviemaking has a high degree of meaningfulness as a method of education through art. Here, I consider the effectiveness of moviemaking as a method of education through art, following the theory of Herbert Edward Read. On that basis, this article shows moviemaking's meaningfulness as a method of education through art in modern times in the context not only of art education but also of philosophy and sociology. The discussion shows that moviemaking as a method of education through the arts does not require the practice of media literacy. The conclusion is that various elements of moviemaking are suitable for the modern age as a means of education through art.

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In order to analyze and discuss the introduction of the theory and practice of handicrafts in drawing education in the late Meiji era, this study focuses on class content concerning reading and drawing shapes, through contemporary materials. The results make it clear that class content connecting drawing and handicraft education gradually developed from drawings of made objects and craft drawings of objects such as geometric pictures, three-aspect and two-aspect pictures for practice in design drafting and perspective drawing into the introduction of creation of three-dimensional objects.

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This research intends to clarify the hows and whys of art-viewers' appreciation skill development which is said to occur during Art Appreciation through Discussion (AAD henceforth) sessions. We rely on learning theories after Vygotsky, including the legitimate peripheral participation theory (Lave and Wenger) and the cognitive apprenticeship theory (Collins). To analyze the dialogic conversation, we transcribed recorded utterances by viewers who attended several AAD sessions. Borrowing established categories for analyses taken from dialogic learning classrooms, we analyzed conversations including the facilitator as well as the viewers. This analysis revealed two phases during the observed AAD sessions. One phenomenon was that the verbal learning support provided by the facilitator was gradually handed down to the viewers, by way of the viewers' mimicking. The other was the natural sharing of support activities among the viewers. These results, when combined, indicate that the learning which occurs at AAD sessions can be characterized as legitimate peripheral participation, as the participants were able to mimic (and then internalize) the facilitator's support. The results also indicate that the AAD sessions tended to grow so that the viewers could share the field, as Collins' cognitive apprenticeship theory indicates.

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The purpose of this study is to elucidate the logic of John Dewey's social reconstruction ideology, which expressed the importance of community cooperation, from a social science perspective based on his work during the interwar years. John Dewey's social reconstruction ideology called for school education to socially re-contextualize children and for local communities to be reconstructed as a means of remedying the hollowing out of local communities caused by the expansion of capitalism. The argument resembles Anthony Giddens' attempt to resist modern neoliberalism through the "Third Way." Having considered these ideas, the author envisages a process in which the arenas of students' lives, namely local communities and schools, interact mutually in junior high school art classes. The author then explores ways of implementing such a process, and the challenges it entails.

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While observing a group of a few students appreciating pictures together, we focused on how experience, narrative, and perception are formed and changed. First, we divided students into groups of three or four. Second, we focused on the "World Cafe" method of appreciation without writing and the conversation which it evokes. Through this method, we analyzed and described the mutual interaction and expansion of their experience, narrative, and perception among themselves. This study showed that not only appreciation of pictures but also conversations about appreciation had a great influence on how students saw and felt about the pictures and how they expressed their feelings.

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In a country or region with an Islamic culture, perceptions of art and its representation may differ compared to those in Japan. This study investigated the national curriculum of art education for primary schools in the Republic of the Maldives -an Islamic country- to clarify the qualities of art education in the Islamic world. This study found that the national curriculum, published in 2001 and referred to in this article, attaches great importance to learning and teaching the identities of the country. The curriculum content also appears to reflect the cultural characteristics of the Maldives, in that the entire population is Muslim.

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The exhibition facilities at the Yachiyo no Oka Museum of Art consist of 15 studio buildings. One is used for special exhibitions while the others are assigned to 14 individual artists who display their work there throughout the course of one year. The artists also conduct workshops and go to local elementary and junior high schools to teach painting. This essay discusses the concept of art museums as hubs for educational activities and lifelong learning focusing on this museum's system, which is unique in Japan. A look at the museum and its visitors is followed by a consideration of educational activities conducted in cooperation with artists, based on a questionnaire and interviews. Finally, the results of these educational activities and the challenges they present are summarized and prospects for the future are outlined.

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I discussed whether Nitta Jiro's novel Seishoku no Ishibumi was effective as teaching material for a class in history of art education. This novel uses as its subject an accident at a senior elementary school in Nagano in 1913, and describes the education circumstances at the time. Yamamoto Kanae gave a lecture at Kangawa Elementary School in Nagano Prefecture in 1918 that became the starting point of the "Jiyu-ga Kyoiku" (free drawing education) movement. Seishoku no Ishibumi depicts education in Nagano, so to speak, just before the dawning of "Jiyu-ga Kyoiku". I selected from Seishoku no Ishibumi various excerpts which effectively present the following two points. 1) The grounding for the "Jiyu-ga Kyoiku" movement 2) Factors hampering the "Jiyu-ga Kyoiku" movement

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In the past the discussion of children's painting competitions has lacked consideration from the point of view of a child. Therefore, we studied the evaluation methods of children and teachers regarding prizewinning works in children's painting competitions. In addition, we investigated the effect of awards on children and teachers. The results clarified the evaluation framework of children and teachers, and that the framework of children is affected by the evaluation of their teachers.

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In Japan, it is assumed that expression and appreciation are indistinguishable for young children and closely interconnected in their lives. In contrast, in the U.S, children are taught about art appreciation, for which abundant teaching materials exist. This study aims to discuss the importance of teaching art appreciation from early childhood. Tracing the trends in the U.S. art education history, one discovers that the teaching of art appreciation focuses on fine arts and that efforts have been made toward the wider acceptance of fine arts among the public. Specifically, this study analyzes Visual Thinking Strategies, Basic Manual: Grades K-2, materials targeting American children, and clarifies several features aiming at the development of various skills.

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