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Art Makes Students Smart
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "For many education advocates, the arts supposedly increase test scores, generate social responsibility and turn around failing schools but research that demonstrates a causal relationship has been virtually nonexistent. Now the NY Times reports that with the opening of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, a large-scale, random-assignment study (abstract) of school tours to the museum has determined that a strong causal relationship does in fact exist between arts education and a range of desirable outcomes. Students who, by lottery, were selected to visit the museum on a field trip demonstrated stronger critical thinking skills, displayed higher levels of social tolerance, exhibited greater historical empathy and developed a taste for art museums and cultural institutions. Moreover, most of the benefits are significantly larger for minority students, low-income students and students from rural schools — typically two to three times larger than for white, middle-class, suburban students — owing perhaps to the fact that the tour was the first time they had visited an art museum. Further research is needed to determine what exactly about the museum-going experience determines the strength of the outcomes. How important is the structure of the tour? The size of the group? The type of art presented? 'Clearly, however, we can conclude that visiting an art museum exposes students to a diversity of ideas that challenge them with different perspectives on the human condition,' write the authors. 'Expanding access to art, whether through programs in schools or through visits to area museums and galleries, should be a central part of any school's curriculum.'"
THIS much difference from ONE field trip to a museum? Why, by all that is correlated, we MUST start opening up museums like 7-11s! There should be one on every streetcorner!
Students, picked by lottery, to experience alcohol for the first time also became more social, took strong interest cultural history and developed a taste for falling down flights of stairs.
lt;dr people enjoy free trips to new places, more if you ask them right after they get back
I'm confused to why this is even considered news since this doesn't have much science behind the data. There were no extensive studies, just random data that isn't verifiable. This is also a story from NYT so it's less reliable than a PC review from soulskill xD Anyhow, I didn't know many students when I was a kid that took going out to a museum seriously. We all treated it as a day off and just ignored education for the day. Perhaps if museums for kids were better tailored for interactive education instead of going through and being told to read each sign and label students would care. Maybe times have changed and that's how it generally is today, I hope that's true.
I thought someone would say this, even though the story doesn't mention that these were art students. Looks like someone could use some art in their lives.
"Researchers" were contacted by.. uh.. well.. the Museum... developed a "methodology" for the "experiment" after the fact, then based their definitions and metrics on an assessment program developed in conjunction with ... another museum.
Solid!. No way this is just another case of confirmation bias.
This sounds like BS. One trip to a museum and the students have measurable increase in critical thinking, social tolerance, and historical empathy? I am just not buying it. The only part that sounds even measurable is that some of the kids might, after visiting a museum for the first time, say "Yeah, I would go again."
very simply: 99% of classroom education isn't actually visual, tactile, nor aural. Math is numbers, graphs are relationships, algebra is logic, english is literary, poetry is aural, and plays are visual but how many poetry readings and plays are in classrooms these days?
The museum is 90% visual and 80% tactile (even when you aren't permitted to touch it, you can still see the texture and infer the tactile). Welcome the part of the brain that's bored in the classroom.
More parts of the brain being engaged, more to knowledge to associate with other knowledge, less being bored and blinder-focussed, better learning.
The Nazis were really, really smart, confiscating all that art from conquered territories.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Its all about the environment.Pretentious activities make you want to be smart. duh
So sayeth
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/27/psychologists_study_shows_violent_video_games_can_make_kids_smarter/
Ahm !!
How do we know it was a museum that produced the effect, and not field trips in general?
Could be the Hawthorne effect: The students who believe the school cares enough to send them on an 'intellectual' field trip will study harder. Those who believe the school views them as battery hens won't bother.
Who could imagine that increased exposure to different thought patterns (art is/was materialized thought) would increase their ability to think?
Who could imagine that Europeans, with vastly greater exposure to varying cultures than Americans, would be comparatively more tolerant and creative? Who would have guessed that Americans, with more exposure to other cultures than Asians (East and South, who are all fairly secluded for the most part), would exhibit the same trend? Who could imagine that being able to experience more ideas means being able to incorporate those ideas into everyday problems?
Studying art through a textbook is meaningless though. Who'd'a thunk?
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
Yes, I read the article.
If you list the 'positive' outcomes, you'll see that one aligns almost perfectly with left wing dogma terminology ('diversity', 'social tolerance', 'historical empathy'), another is circular reasoning (more likely to return to a museum, so what?), and 'critical thinking skills' (which, without context, means nothing). What did this program do? Count the number of times the student used 'diversity', 'social tolerance', 'historical empathy' and possibly others? How does that prove overall intellectual improvement? If anything it just shows how much the propaganda has been reenforced.
The article then goes on to claim a causal relationship, when, at best, it does no more than show the same set of correlations it says were made in the past. So which is it? Does going to art museums give people these attributes, or do people with these attributes end up going more often? Or are these people going just for the social kudos/'faux' sophistication because of the novel exclusivity? Really, all they proved was that exposing people to new experiences causes some of them to want to do it again. How is that interesting?
Since the value of art really depends on what the viewer makes of it, I think they have it backwards: potentially, more intelligent people get more out of it. It doesn't make people more intelligent by osmosis, and honestly, there are a lot of intelligent people out there who are not content with the simple mental masturbation that comes with viewing/talking about art.
Oh, it's the NYT, what a shock. They pull many of the same logical contortions as fox. The only difference is they're better at hiding it behind screeds of big words and compound complex sentences.
Belial6 never visited a museum when attending school and his/her mind has not fully developed as a result.
Basically the study seems to claim that teaching kids makes them smarter. Who knew! Is going to a museum that unusual in the US?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
The "control" group didn't go on any kind of field trip. They just continued to attend class like normal. So there's no reason to believe that the art had any influence. It could just be that giving kids a day off from the usual school grind, getting them away from their usual neighbourhoods, and showing some kind of interest in them beyond the norm had a positive impact.
I do happen to believe that exposure to art can aid in personal development, but this study does little to prove that.
-deane
To me the BENEFIT of something is my enjoyment of it. I see no great benefit in empathy tolerance and other 'artist" type attitudes in others. Helping others LEARN, WORK, PRODUCE now that might be useful to me. Making them nice people is as far as I am concerned up to them, I don't give a damn if others are tolerant or Nazis at heart.
Apparently these students gained "...stronger critical thinking skills, ...higher levels of social tolerance, ...greater historical empathy and ...a taste for art museums and cultural institutions".
So. Basically, students with little or no arts background went on an arts trip and gained a degree of improvement in arts skills. And that was most strong in those with least previous exposure. A little broadening of a child's intellectual and cultural horizons is clearly, therefore, a good thing (gosh, who'da thunk it?). But it's a huge, unjustified leap from that to the conclusion that: 'Expanding access to art... ...should be a CENTRAL part of any school's curriculum.' (my emphasis). Apart from anything, the study itself shows that the effect is limited, with clear evidence of diminishing returns.
As to the broader proposition that "(T)he arts... ...increase test scores, generate social responsibility and turn around failing schools" (with the unstated but desperately wished subtext from the arts world that the arts somehow do this in a way that the sciences don't, and should therefore be given a much more prominent role in education) - this goes nowhere near having anything of value to say on that. Which, I have no doubt, won't stop the arts world trotting it out as (wholly anecdotal) "evidence" of the worth and importance of the arts for years to come.
Pretty sure even museum goers has to be told what they are looking at in order to even begin to appreciate something.
Better result with literature and philosophy than simply looking at museum pieces I am sure.
People who aren't sociopaths, that's who!
I recommend that everyone read How To Be Rich by J. Paul Getty. He was the richest person in the world in his day, and yet he had some enlightened things to say. For instance, he advocated cooperating with labor unions (when have you ever heard a billionaire do that?). From this book, I received the best management advice ever - praise in public, punish in private. He also thought that spectator sports were a waste of time. But what Getty was most passionate about was art. He amassed an amazing collection, and then made it available to the public for free. If you're ever in Los Angeles, if at all possible, set aside a day or two to visit The Getty - it will make you smarter. And I encourage you to visit museums whenever and wherever you travel - you'll see some amazing things.
Did all the students invited on the field trip eventually come? Of course not.
Alternate possible explanation:
1) Let's assume that 20% of the students invited did not come, and
2) Let's assume that the most desocialized students are the most likely not to come, because they think that it's not interesting / because they're not with their friends / because they just jump the field trip / because they are afraid it could cost money / whatever, and
3) Let's assume that eing desocialized is highly correlated with having bad grades & bad empathy
At "whole foods" there are only good looking apples, but the only reason is that they were selected like that to begin with.
A strong concert and marching band program reaching down into the elementary grades will uplift students quite measurably. This has been known for many decades yet politicians have ruined many school band programs. My high school band program produced numerous band directors and life long musicians of professional caliber and our band members did well in college as well. Frankly every parent needs to make certain that their kid plays in the school band and fight like crazy to get proper funding for the band.
First refering to anything in the NY Times to be factual or logical is an instant FAIL.
Second - an 'experience' 'tour' is what led to this great measurable turn around of all these students ??? (that is in some real statistically provable way beside the usual method of using 'wishful thinking' and 'predetermined study outcomes' usually used by this newspaper. Fortune reading via configuration of cat feces in a litter box is likely to be far more accurate a reporting.
Actually it could eaily be proven that systematiclly arming properly trained instructors with cattle prods could virtually overnight DOUBLE the measurable intelligence of most public school students.
BTW was not there already in place (as in endemic) all those special programs and projects and teaching methods in use recommended by the usual crowd that operate big city public schools to improve 'learning' resulting in the existing piss poor performance???
Does it make them smarter than playing violent video games?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/27/psychologists_study_shows_violent_video_games_can_make_kids_smarter/
In Plato's Republic, the essential education of the ruling class required musical and artistic study. Plato thought that arts were a good way to cultivate creativity, and music was good for making people balance out emotional and logical thinking. It turns out he was absolutely right, at least about music: Centuries later, they've determined that musicians have a larger corpus collosum connecting the right and left brains, which enables them to better connect different kinds of thinking into a coherent whole.
Of course, teaching both art and music costs money for cash-scrapped school systems, and many states do not require that either be offered. So guess what is first to fall by the wayside when budgets are tight?
I am officially gone from
the "scientists" who created this study probably took too many art classes because they are idiots. a more likely explanation of the correlation is that the kids got to ride the bus and that helped their scores.
Art is mostly a joke, in what other "field" can a single white vertical line sell for 44 Million? What about the two circles that sold for 10 Million? What about the paintings that are paint just thrown onto canvas? I can keep going but I don't think I need to. Art will not help with test scores, it won't help with knowledge and it won't help you in your life unless your the one selling these pieces of junk. With the exception of realism, art is just random crap on a medium. Once a line or a circle gets defined as art then the entire definition of art has to fall apart. I can't just put a hub on my desk, not plug it in and call my self a networking expert. I can't just open a terminal and let it sit there and call my self a linux expert. Basically art is the only field where nothing is still defined at greatness.
Yet our government keeps cutting both physical education and art, to save money. At the same time the school superintendant in my city makes $500k / year, plus benefits.
We don't have a liberal arts shortage. We have a STEM shortage. We don't lack educators. We lack programmers. Is it possible that by increasing empathy in these students, we're reducing the traits that nudge kids towards computers, math and science? Since we can't dedicate resources to compensating for that reduction, is it really profitable to do it at all?
Nice thing about my computers is, they don't have need for me to be empathetic.
OK, so some went to the art museum and others didn't. So that makes art the answer to our problems? What about sending a bus load of kids to a museum of science and nature? When advocating for art, the studies tend to compare students engaged in art activities against kids spending the same amount of time staring at a blank wall. Surprise! Art makes you smarter!
I hate to say it, but from my experience in America this is like a "laundry list" of things that American conservatives condemn: - empathy - social tolerance - critical thinking If I recall correctly the conservatives in the state of Texas proposed an educational code that literally sought to prevent critical thinking. I loved my time in Mountain View and my friends there but for the U.S. as a whole, this sort of thing is going to be a tough sell.
I think it may have to do with getting a well rounded education. Students who are receptive to (not just suffer through curriculum requirements) a wide range of subject matter are probably better at critical thinking, empathy, social interaction, etc. And later in life, they are more adaptable to changes in their careers. I've seen people graduate from college with something odd like a degree in geography go to work as a software developer and actually surpass CS grads. Particularly the kind of STEM graduate that thinks all they need is the curriculum specific to their field. (I pick on STEM because this attitude seems to be rampant in these fields.)
I find it interesting that an art museum is conducting an experiment to see if art makes a person smart. I wonder if a statistics museum would conclude that courses in math and statistics make for better research study designs.
Have gnu, will travel.
cant normally fart without gas
Hey, look! A study that doesn't conform to the common narrative that STEM is the be-all-end-all! Let's rip it to shreds with our flawed understanding of how testing works, our limited understanding of sociology, our complete lack of understanding about education, and completely ignore the fact that this study was performed by people who have dedicated their lives to doing this sort of thing and then peer reviewed and published by people who have also spent their lives doing that sort of thing.
But sure, our layman-level understanding and knowledge of phrases like correlation vs causation, reproducibility, and falsifiable and ability to trivialize findings by "selectively" quoting out of "context" completely is enough to totally invalidate any study, particularly when we only attack the news article about the study itself!
The road to tyranny has always been paved with claims of necessity.
Challenge: take a belief you have and prove it. You get to design the experiment, collect the data and publish your results.
Unless you try to fail, you won't, you'll "prove" exactly what you set out to prove. As noted above, can independent researchers reproduce the result. That is, people that are doubtful that art will magically fix kids.
SMRT
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Funny how those who get their money pulling oil made millions of years ago out of the ground, have a different philosophy from those who earn it.
We teach everything as separate disciplines; is it any wonder kids fail to learn to see interrelationships and often loose interest when "education" is almost exclusively about abstract memorization, as opposed to a comprehensive *understanding* ?
If you want kids to excel in mathematics and chemistry, stop teaching it separate from history and music. If you want kids to have a future, stop gauging them exclusively by test scores based on flawed assumptions about education.
The arts are part of the history of the species, inseparable from how we developed, our technology, politics, and science. Teach these subjects they way they unfolded : together, inter-related, in a *sensible* way.
art EDUCATION, instead of art history
make them capable of doing art themselves, and the benefits will be immeasurably greater
My sister is a art major, and she is not very bright. She believes any conspiracy theory she hears about because if they say it on TV and her friends agree, then it must be true. She has next to no critical thinking, she leaves the thinking up to others like a typical democrat.
People who believe articles like this lack critical thinking.
No. Education makes students smart. Art just makes them smarter at things related to the art they're studying. Kind of like how math/science makes them more logically intelligent. The bottom line, though, is that education is what makes people smart, as well as their innate desire and capacity to learn.
How to be rich is in the public domain, the link is to free ebook versions. If you're going to buy a book, buy mine -- I'm still alive and can use the money a lot more than the dead Mr. Ghetty! If you're poor or "thrifty" you can read mine for free, too.
Guys, before you post links to Amazon or B&N see if you can link the text itself. If the author's been dead for a hundred years, his work will be on the net. Surprisingly, some newer work is, as well. I've even found Asimov short stories online.
For instance, he advocated cooperating with labor unions (when have you ever heard a billionaire do that?).
Not since the 1980s when the head of a major, then non-union airline said "any company that gets a union deserves it," meaning that if you treat and pay your workers fairly, they won't form a union. Unions are for asshole bosses. If your workforce unionizes, you're probably a heartless sociopath.
Free Martian Whores!
That's the real problem. Per the abstract the measure was not really cognitive ability per say. The kids "demonstrated significantly stronger critical thinking skills when analyzing a new painting". So, a guided tour of an art museum gives/refreshes your knowledge of art terminology and the sense that art docents have of how art should be looked at. They didn't demonstrate math, reading, writing or IQ improvement in this experiment.
I wish I hadn't just used my last mod point. Well said.
when it's deviantART. It'll be "smart-ass" instead.
Of course the arrow of causation could also be reversed - or both are caused by some third factor (wealth?). Or research bias/fraud? Or just chance.
But that will not stop most from quoting this as cause and effect.
Genetics is pretty close to a total crapshoot, really. You can shape the odds a little either way with good parenting and good ancestors, but not reliably (or we'd all be happily living in monarchies).
My biological son, on target to be (quite literally) a third generation rocket scientist, is unsurprisingly brilliant.
My adopted daughter, born a so-called "crack baby" and the biological child of ghetto dwelling high school dropouts... is equally brilliant.
And your point is what, exactly? I suppose you're trying to spew forth ad hominems at people you don't even know to... somehow debunk their arguments? Or what?
our complete lack of understanding about education
I think that was their main problem.
Good stuff, mcgrew. A little searching goes a long way. Here's one for you,
http://www.fourmilab.ch/
guy has Tom Swift books on a page; putting 'em up is one of his hobbies. Interesting site. Spent some hours there recently. His stuff on physics is interesting. Among other things.
Last para is good. Treat people right, they'll return the favor. Seems to be changing these days, tho, but it could just be I need new glasses.