Visual Thinking Strategies - Research Paper Example

?Saab, Elise Graduate Muse E-120 Final Paper Visual Thinking Strategies Approaching the staff entrance to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (where I amcurrently interning) I noticed a group of school children and their teacher patiently waiting for one of the docents to bring them up to the gallery floor. As I scanned my badge in, I turned to their teacher and politely asked, “Is this your first educational trip to the MFA, are you here to see the new Linde wing?” “No,” she replied, “we’re here for a VTS tour.” “That is wonderful,” I exclaimed. After pausing, I politely stated, “I am just about to write a paper on VTS, would you mind telling me where you are from?” Kindly responding, the teacher stated, “We are a social studies class from the Boston public school system, and we have a partnership with the MFA. This is our last lesson of the curriculum and it ends with a VTS tour at the Museum.” In my opinion, teachers in all subject areas find themselves with the challenge of bringing that subject to life for their students, especially students who struggle to grasp the concepts of the course. Constantly trying new strategies and educational techniques, the best teachers try to reach those students in an unconventional way. In this case, I presume the social studies teacher turned to Suzi Fonda, Manager of Teacher Programs and School Partnerships at the MFA, to help her students draw connections between the content studied in the classroom and the collection of American Art currently displayed at the MFA. Since the culture and environment of the museums considerably differs from those prevalent in the classrooms, educators frequently wonder whether the productive techniques used by the museum educators are applicable in the environment of the classroom. In this paper, I will examine the productivity of Visual Thinking, and its connection to the classroom. Upon providing an in-depth look at VTS itself as a teaching tool, I will then examine further the applicability of the technique to the school classroom, more specifically within the social studies curricula, and evaluate its results and make recommendations if any as to how it may be improved. In particular, I will utilize class readings, discussions, case studies, and museum curricula, and I will transfer these experiences into my evaluation. Finally, I will conduct interviews with two Directors of Education, both of whom are involved in the VTS implementation at their art museums, and I will discuss their concerns, results and issues of the program. Curriculum In a typical VTS lesson, students look carefully at a work of art, and talk about what they observe. This method uses art to build the capacity to observe, think, listen and communicate. The guiding principle is that self-discovery is a powerful way to learn, and that such self-directed learning is stimulated by discussion amongst peers.1 The curriculum of VTS is fundamentally based on the discussion held among the students. The role of a teacher in it is that of a facilitator of discussion among the students. There are three basic questions that the facilitator uses in order to guide the students towards the path of conducting the discussion among themselves. These three questions include; “What is going on in this picture?” (Walker), “What do you see that makes you say that?” (Walker), and “What more can you find?” (Walker). The facilitator identifies the responses of individual students by their respective names, and points towards the relevant parts of the painting while paraphrasing the responses. In addition to that, it is equally important for the facilitator to keep track of the various threads of conversation so that they can be interlinked and the students can be provided with the opportunity to connect their thoughts with the thoughts of their class fellows. These questions have been designed in a very prudent manner. “The wording of the first question gives tacit approval of the story-finding, playing to the beginner’s strength. But it also gently suggests that effort be expended, addressing a tendency amongst beginners to stop their viewing without probing” (Yewane cited in Ferris 8). Meanwhile, the second question necessitates the students to back up their statements with evidence from within the piece of art. Lastly, the third question requires the students to continue looking into the piece of art. As Yenawine said, “beginning viewing is often cursory. At first, the viewer observes a few salient details then stops” (Ferris 8). The third question causes the students to continue viewing, that is in turn linked with the successive stages of aesthetic development. “When students remain silent in school, often it is because they are not sure that they know the right answer, which they know the teacher and some very smart classmates know. Students keep silent to avoid being evaluated; they want to avoid making mistakes and looking foolish. But with art there is no single right answer” (Housen 16). This provides the students with that confidence that they generally lack in the traditional educational setup. As a result of this, their tendency to participate in the lecture and group discussions is increased, and they are more likely to achieve their optimal potential in studies. While designing the curriculum, Housen and Yenawine decided to consider the strategy of story-telling of the beginner viewers. This is why the early lessons draw upon the naturally narrative works. “We decided to concentrate initial lessons on works which the artist has intentionally depicted narratives …. This decision enables viewers to do what they naturally want to do. It also respects the artist’s intentions; we want people to be operating in a way that makes sense on many levels” (Yenawine 6). Theory The development of VTS is explained by the Piaget’s theory as it explains the learning process of children. Children observe things, and incorporate the information thus gained into their memory. There are several stages in the process of children’s development, and each stage requires the child to complete the requirements of the preceding stage to commence. A similar stage theory known as Housen’s aesthetic development explains the developmental process similarly. Empirical observations distill both the theories. “Her research for understanding of what she came to call aesthetic development was based on the same empirical approach that had guided both Piaget and Vygotsky --- she looked for patterns and order in behaviors she could observe in the world, and allowed any interpretations to emerge from her observations” (Housen cited in Ferris 5). The Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) comprise a simple activity aimed at developing the learners’ background knowledge and critical thinking skills. The educators tend to enhance the learners’ understanding using visual details. This method has been frequently used by the educators around the world as a substitute to the literary passage working since the thinking skills with which the artwork is analyzed is transferable to the literature. The founder of the VTS method of learning is the cognitive psychologist Abigail Housen. VTS helps develop innovative and critical thinking skills in the learners. “A teacher must offer strategies fitting to the stage of the viewer: developmentally inappropriate concepts will not "stick." This is confusing because students can be “taught” stage-inappropriate information, for example, and it can be memorized and retained for the short-term, and perhaps recalled with prompting” (DeSantis and Housen 14). However, the research conducted by Housen has revealed that teaching the students content that they are at their verge of learning with would not generate the anticipated results for them. As Vygotsky and Piaget have asserted, attitudes which are not contained in the natural arc or are irrelevant to the fundamental needs of the students would not reflect in independent behavior. In order to gain maximal benefit from knowledge, it is imperative that it is incorporated into the habits of the learners. The learning process in the VTS starts with the selection of an interesting picture by the teacher. The picture is purposefully and meaningfully chosen so that it is related to the topic under discussion. The teacher places a copy of the painting upon the overhead projector. Internet is a very rich source of such paintings. Paintings from library databases as well as museums can be accessed online. Let’s consider a painting showing an old man with a pet dog walking beside him on the road while the man is holding the rope tied around the dog’s neck. The teacher tells the students to look at the painting with full attention for a minute, and asks them what they see going on in it. The students begin with saying that they see a man walking with his pet dog. The students would probably assess the era which the painting depicts by considering the culture and fashion reflected in the painting by the old man’s clothes, and the things in the background. The teacher then draws upon the response of the student and asks the student what made him/her draw the said inferences from the painting. In an attempt to justify their responses, the student draws the teacher’s attention towards the evidence within the picture that led the student to certain conclusions. The student may point out certain objects in the surroundings of the main object in the painting to emphasize upon the belongingness of the painting to a certain era. The teacher then encourages the students to share differing opinions with one another and provide rationale for their respective opinions and judgments. This ignites a lengthy discussion among the students in which they express their opinions about the objects in the painting from their conflicting view-points until almost all possible aspects of the painting have been recognized at least once. After that, the teacher summarizes the content of the students’ discussion, in which he/she tends to sum up all important points, so that they are revised and ingrained in the memory of the students. This activity is followed by another activity in which the teacher asks the students to write a few sentences about their individualistic and collective discoveries. “The teachers are amazed by some of the kids who up to that point never said much or goofed off. The kids often become incredibly engaged and the teachers often say they wish the parents could hear the rich discussion” (Burchernal cited in Ferris 9). Case study: Massachusetts State Social Studies Curriculum The Massachusetts State has developed five standards of learning for the curriculum of social studies. These five standards are implemented at three basic levels, namely elementary, intermediate, and continuous. The VTS learning curriculum imposed by the both the Gardner Museum and the MFA breaks the groups implementation curriculum into grades, starting with K-2, 3-5, and 6-8. For the purpose of this study, I will focus on the standard imposed for 3rd Grade: Massachusetts and its Cities and Towns: Geography and History. 2 Ideas within the 3rd grade standards principally emphasize upon the development of links among the swaths of the history of the USA and the Massachusetts State. When students reach the stage of graduation from the high school, they are expected to have a firm understanding and comprehensive knowledge of the American culture and the American history. In addition to that, a lot of emphasis is placed upon the development and interpretation of the sources of text. The curriculum guidelines explicitly state: “In the third grade, using local historic sites, historical societies, and museums, students learn about the history of Massachusetts from the time of the arrival of the Pilgrims. They also learn the history of their own cities and towns and about famous people and events in Massachusetts’ history. In addition, they read biographies of prominent Massachusetts people in science, technology, the arts, business, education, or political leadership in order to learn how they contributed to Massachusetts history” 3 Although a vast majority of the primary sources are expected to consist of graphic or artistic sources including maps, charts, and graphs, yet the sources are expected to be comprehendible. The perception of the VTS critical thinking skills as transferrable is of extreme importance when the link between VTS and these Standards is considered. According to these standards, students are expected to consult the documents for the purpose of gaining information like they are expected to read a work of art in the case of VTS. Likewise, the students are expected to retrieve information from the textual content and apply that in the context of discussion and report writing. The skills that are primarily inculcated in the students in the VTS are the very skills which have application across curricula. The Massachusetts State Department of Education is extremely particular about the content that is supposed to be taught rather than merely providing the students with learning standards to follow. In the year 2003, the Massachusetts History and Social Science Curriculum Framework was published by the Education Department. This framework distorted the curricular points with respect to years. This way, the Education Department laid out eight aspects of learning and teaching that included “intellectual skills, multidisciplinary approaches, depth and breadth, unity and diversity, multiculturalism and multiple perspectives, patterns to organize data, multiple learning environments and resources, and student-centered teaching, learning and assessment”.4 VTS is suitable for most of these aspects of learning and teaching. Considering the applicability of VTS in a classroom of the subject of social studies, VTS plays the role of a student-centered and diverse approach to teaching and learning. Teachers tend to take the students out of the regular educational environment to such distant places as museums for visits in an attempt to encourage them to learn. By doing so, they basically provide the students with an alternative environment of education. VTS promotes the inculcation and nurturing of the intellectual skills in the students and provides them with basic organization patters by means of inculcating the transferable analytical skills in the students. In turn, the students are required to provide documentable evidence in support of their claims and assertions. In addition to that, teachers can employ VTS as a means of increasing the diversity, unity, and depth of perspectives in the educational setup depending upon the types of paintings the teachers select. This makes it possible for a teacher of the social studies to meet all eight aspects of learning and teaching which are encouraged by the state with the help of VTS. All that is required on the part of the teacher to achieve this is a little strategic planning, and organization. According to the Department of Education, it is believed that the best evaluation of the Massachusetts social studies curriculum comes in the form of yearly examination. The MCAS or Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, tests in the subject of history and social science and is administered beginning in grade 3. The tests are seen as the primary indicator of the student’s academic process within the public school system. Students must answer a number of multiple choice and open-ended document based essay questions. On the document-based essay question, students must analyze a selection from a primary source document and must create a one-or two-paragraph response in writing or in the form of a narrative or a chart, table, diagram, illustration or graph, as appropriate. Students can respond correctly using a variety of strategies and approaches.5 Specifically in Massachusetts, as required by the Education Reform Law, the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education established a rating system and standards for improving student academic performance that schools and districts must meet. Several administrators and advisors have turned to Art Museums who facilitate VTS programs to integrate this teaching method in hopes that student’s tests results will reflect such results as Lasker and Desantis reported on. Educational perspectives offered by Directors of Programming at the Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum and The Museum of Fine Arts will be discussed below. In 1992, The Boston VTS Consortium was founded as a collaboration between the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Visual Understanding in Education (VUE). The Consortium aims to broaden the use of VTS in more Boston Public School Districts. Although the framework of the program is the same throughout both museums, there are several differences which must be noted. Size Although there are fourteen schools that are members of the Boston VTS Consortium, only a handful of those actually participate in the VTS program. At the Gardner, the maximum number allowed is three schools with a minimum commitment of three years, while at the MFA the number of participants is five schools with a “rolling” commitment dependent upon progress. Suzi Fonda, Manager of Teacher Programs and School Partnerships at the MFA states the reason behind this is the difference in size of the endowment at each museum. The MFA has a little more flexibility with staff because the budget for this program is slightly higher. Suzi believes that although there may be enough manpower to handle up to eight, it is best that the number of school participants remain low so that the quality of developmental growth within the program continues to be successful. “This is one of the problems I struggle with on an on-going basis,” said Fonda. “The Development committee wants numbers, so they feel it’s better to take on more schools, but the more schools we take on, the less interaction we will have with teachers and administrators, so our program will suffer.” Fonda continues to state, “Our procedures have to be in place where schools communicate more with museum educators, whether it is through monthly progress reports or emails, we must have a continual buy-in from the principle and school administrators. The more schools you have participating, the more lack of communication there will be, and with that the student will suffer.” Fonda continues to explain that the reason the MFA is on a “rolling” basis, is because before when the minimum three year commitment was in place, half of the schools involved pulled out after one year. Her staff was continually “chasing down” principals and teachers to obtain progress reports, and no one was communicating. “We decided to implement a letter of agreement between ourselves and the participating school. This letter allows the school to participate for up to three years, but is dependent on their adherence to our checklist and in addition to that, a yearly evaluation done by the public school psychological coordinator. Ultimately, his/her evaluation decides whether or not the school will be allowed to participate further. Activity In addition to size differences between the MFA and the Gardner, VTS activities amongst participating schools also vary. For example, at the Gardner, the schools who participate in VTS are instrumental in organizing a yearly event, “Community Creations,” which takes place at the end of each school year. According to Michelle Grohe, educational director, “each group displays artwork that the students have created in response to the Gardner’s collection.” Grohe works with the curatorial department to put together this exhibition which remains on view at the museum for a full week, and offers all visitors a chance to see the Gardner museum through the eyes of the young people. Grohe added, “This is sort of our way of showing the community the importance of school participation within the art community. Not only does Visual Thinking Strategies allow students to develop visual literacy skills, but they also foster a bond between the Gardner staff, which further allows the teaching method to become part of the schools culture and the museum’s educational culture as well.” In my opinion, this is visibly the biggest difference between the MFA’s VTS program and the Gardner. While both foster excellent results and stem from a purist approach, I believe this activity organized by the Gardner enhances the comfort level of the student, as it removes the intimidation one might feel from the art museum setting. Educational Approach According to VUE, “the images selected for the VTS come from many world cultures and different eras. The diversity itself increases the flexibility of students’ thinking as they realize they can find meaning in all sorts of visual languages.” (See Appendix 2) Learning goals are divided by grade, and each lesson draws from images housed at the specific museum that is participating. At both the MFA and the Gardner, gallery docents who are versed in VTS train each teacher before lessons begin, and periodically make visits to co-teach two or three out of the nine lesson curriculum. The MFA VTS curriculum ends with the final lesson being taught the museum itself, whereas the Gardner introduces museum visits throughout the curriculum. Michelle Grohe states, “We believe it is important to diversify the location of the lessons being taught, as it becomes repetitive if they are all originating in the classroom. Taking the students on fieldtrips to the museum for their lessons and integrating related studio projects gets them comfortable with the idea of being in a museum setting, and also makes their learning environment more exciting. This has worked very well for us, and again the progress of the student’s confidence in an art museum setting is just as important to us as the developmental skills themselves.” Fonda takes another approach to this by stating, “We are such a large museum, and that can be overwhelming to some, so we feel that introducing the child to this discipline in their own environment eases their comfort level a bit. Our docent goes into the classroom and co-teaches a few lessons to get the student comfortable with someone from an art environment. Forming a relationship between the two in the classroom early on, not only creates a comfort level for the child, but builds excitement as well, so that by the time their final visit to the museum occurs, they are in a place where they can thrive both intellectually and environmentally.” Issues that should be explored further I find it very interesting that both the Gardener and the MFA participate in “pure” VTS, yet their strategies for incorporating it into the museum/classroom setting vary vastly. While both institutions believe VTS to be successful, it would be interesting to explore further ADI results, and compare their developmental and educational progress. It was also interesting to me that Fonda had no problem sending over a sample MFA/VTS curriculum for grades 3-5 (see attached Appendix 2); however, when I asked Grohe for this same packet, she was unable to provide this. Therefore; if both institutions are purist in their VTS methods, then why did it pose a problem for the Gardner to release their curriculum? In addition to this, after speaking with both Grohe and Fonda, I believe that it is difficult to isolate how much growth is VTS and how much is outside experience of being 10 months older. While I do believe this strategy is definitely valuable and worthwhile, I suppose it would be hard to formulate a benchmark that would distinguish between the two. Another issue I see with VTS in art museums is the pressure the museum receives from the board to perform. I think it would be worthwhile for museums to nominate a liaison from the appropriate department who oversees performance or budget reporting. If this procedure was in place, I feel the pressure would be relieved from museum educational directors, as the liaison would see the inner workings of VTS and base their review on performance rather than solely on numbers. Conclusion Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) is one of the most useful and productive educational techniques meant to improve the students’ learning as well as aesthetic development as per Abigail Housen’s research. The VTS facilitator causes the participants to conduct a discussion with the help of three probing questions. Although the theory of VTS is conventionally implemented to enhance the aesthetic development of viewers particularly in the initial two stages, yet there is considerable amount of research which emphasizes upon the tendency of this theory to inculcate the critical thinking skills in the learners, which can be transferred to several content areas. Its significance is further enhanced by the increased tendency of the educators to adopt VTS. The topic of VTS is of immense value for all educators in general and those of the social studies in particular because it uses art to provide connection between the learning standards and creative researched techniques of education. Teachers have lately been subjected to immense pressure of making students successful, particularly with the implementation of the No Child Left Behind policy since 2001. In these circumstances, VTS provides teachers with a way to foster success among the students by enhancing their observational, analytical, and critical thinking skills, which are integrally required for the standardized test taking in the present age. From the developmental point of view, the origin of the theory of VTS can be traced to the psychological research work executed by a number of researchers including Howard Gardner, Vygotsky, and Piaget. All of these theorists have emphasized upon the need to make the discovery process student-centered and increasingly conversational. From this, it can be concluded that the theory of VTS is not only objectively related to the educational theory, but also connects to the findings of some of the extremely famous and renowned psychologists of the twentieth century. Taking into consideration its historic and educational significance as well as an in-depth analysis of the learning standards prevalent in the Massachusetts State, VTS can be considered as an extremely eligible educational technique for adoption in the classroom. In order to make best use of the theory of VTS for its employers, it is imperative that the employers seek administrative help and cooperation from the schools and teachers, and also refer to the models of educational programming conventionally employed in the art museums. Overall, VTS has been readily found to play a huge role in the inculcation of critical thinking skills that the students need in order to achieve their optimal potential in all curriculums in general, and the curriculum of social studies in particular, in terms of the exam of MCAS as well as the level of performance expected of them by the state. Moreover, referral to the artistic paintings in the social studies classroom makes the educational experience more diverse and interesting for the students, which boosts their interest and participation in the lecture, and maximizes their learning. Works Cited: DeSantis, Karin; and Housen, Abigail. “A Brief Guide to Developmental Theory and Aesthetic Development.” June 2007. Web. 18 May 2012. . Ferris, Jill. “Integrating Visual Thinking Strategies into a New York State High School Social Studies Classroom.” 2007. Web. 18 May 2012. Housen, Abigail. “Eye of the Beholder: Research, Theory and Practice.” Visual Understanding in Education. New York. (2001): 1-26. Web. 18 May 2012. . Walker, Michael. “Visual Thinking Strategies Workshop: The Basics of VTS.” 28 Mar. 2012. Web. 18 May 2012. . Yenawine, Philip. “Theory into Practice: The Visual Thinking Strategies.” VTS: Visual Thinking Strategies. 27-29 Sep. 1999. Read More