Arts-Based Pedagogy

SHERRIE CARROLL

­Framing the Issue

Arts-based pedagogies enlist the arts in the service of learning. They create spaces
for exploring the nuances and complexities of human experience and the many
ways of engaging in the world—physically, emotionally, socially, culturally,
­relationally, aesthetically. As Eisner (2008) writes, “The arts are a way of enriching
our awareness and expanding our humanity” (p. 11). Through artistic activities,
learners are encouraged to pose questions and make connections among ideas and
experiences.
Though this discussion focuses on using the arts in pre-service and in-service
teacher development, many of the guidelines are also applicable to ESL/EFL
teaching contexts. In this entry, teacher education includes any form of learning
program for pre-service or in-service teachers who are often referred to as teacher-
learners in recognition that all teachers are also always learners.
It can be argued that all significant learning engenders identity reconstruction,
whether that be learning a second language or learning to teach. And, learning that
engages our identities is far more than cognitive: it is social, cultural, affective,
embodied, and aesthetic. Through arts-based learning experiences, teacher-learners
can develop more nuanced understandings of themselves as teachers and their
(potential) students.
Given the unpredictability of the teaching and learning contexts in which
teachers will find themselves throughout their careers, the most important skills
teacher education can impart are those of critical reflection and inquiry.
However, to refer to reflection and inquiry as skills is to minimize the breadth
of these concepts, for they characterize a way of practicing, relating, and being
in the world. Arts-inspired learning experiences can foster such dispositions
and engage the whole person—her implicit beliefs, emotions, passions, imagi-
nation, and creativity—in constructing complex understandings of teaching
and learning.
Carts-based pedagogies put into practice constructivist, postmodern, and often
critical conceptions of knowledge. They encourage teacher-learners to mine their

The TESOL Encyclopedia of English Language Teaching.

Edited by John I. Liontas (Project Editor: Margo DelliCarpini; Volume Editor: Gloria Park).
© 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2018 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
DOI: 10.1002/9781118784235.eelt0266
2 Arts-Based Pedagogy

personal experiences to produce socioculturally situated knowledge, rejecting the

notion of a singular truth and embracing multiple ways of knowing. Critical arts-
based pedagogies question how power and ideology operate in teachers’ lives and
the lives of their students. Arts-based pedagogies make no pretext of extricating
emotion from the learning process. To the contrary, affective understandings are
valued as they add often a layer of complexity and embodiment to the construc-
tion of knowledge.

­Making the Case

Underlying arts-based pedagogy is an expansion of what constitutes knowl-

edge or valued ways of knowing. Knowledge within the positivist enlighten-
ment paradigm is objective, cognitive, and cerebral, separated from the
experiences of the body and emotions. Such knowledge is produced and con-
trolled by academic authorities and transmitted to students. Freire (1970)
referred to this as the banking model of instruction in which knowledge is
“deposited” into passive learners. He writes, “In the banking concept of educa-
tion, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowl-
edgeable to those whom they consider to know nothing. Projecting an absolute
ignorance onto others … negates education and knowledge as processes of
inquiry” (p. 53). Traditional notions of knowledge render teacher and learner
identities mutually exclusive. Conventional academic discourse practices rein-
force this dichotomy and foster a teacher-centered, transmission model of
instruction. Freire argues though that teachers and learners have a reciprocal
relationship; each teaches and learns from the other.
Teacher education has increasingly embraced constructivist conceptions of
knowledge. Once seen as objective, neutral, and separate from knowers, knowl-
edge is now understood to be constructed by individuals from their experiences
and shaped by their sociocultural positions and within their communities. As
such, all knowledge is partial and perspectival. The notion of one omnipotent
“Truth” has been discredited in favor of multiple and evolving “truths.”
Clearly there is still a place for generalizable knowledge produced by positivist
research; however this often falls short when applied to domains as complex and
fluid as human experience, relationships, learning and teaching. More than amass-
ing technorational knowledge, teachers need to develop ways of knowing that
will shape how they approach their work and relate to their students. Arts-based
learning activities can help teacher-learners become aware of nonverbal, affective,
and embodied aspects of learning that may not be sufficiently treated within con-
ventional teacher preparation. “The rational, language-based approach to most
educational practices often leaves emotional and embodied ways of knowing
untouched and unpracticed” (Cahnmann-Taylor & Souto-Manning, 2010, p. 63).
Such emotionally laden and embodied insight may have a greater impact on the
ways people teach and interact with students.
 Arts-Based Pedagogy 3

With postmodernism has come the questioning of the role of representation

in knowledge creation and dissemination. Artistic inquiry and pedagogy
decenters the primacy of the written word, the linear, logical argument. A
wider array of representational “languages” is needed to communicate affec-
tive understandings and other human complexities often inadequately
expressed by literal language. Eisner writes, “If we indeed know more than we
can tell, then we should try telling what we know with anything that will carry
the message forward” (2008, p. 9). Once we free knowledge or knowing from
the strictly verbal, we make way for the possibilities for multiple forms of
knowledge and multiple ways of knowing.
The arts are not especially well-suited for solving problems or providing defini-
tive answers. Rather, their usefulness rests in their ability to raise awareness,
­illuminate the complexities and nuances of a situation, and evoke empathetic
understandings: all essential in professions such as teaching which center
around working with people. The arts also promote inquiry through challenging
understandings and generating questions. The strength of artistic inquiry “may be
closer to the act of problematizing conclusions than it is to providing answers in
containers that are watertight” (Eisner, 2008, p. 7).
Where traditional conceptions of knowledge aim for linear arguments and
exactitude, arts-based pedagogies are at their best when they facilitate the con-
struction of multiple and even contradictory understandings, when they create a
space for a conversation of many voices, when interpretations generate additional
questions and lead to examinations from alternative perspectives. Ambiguity,
often a characteristic of artwork, is an asset rather than a problem because it pro-
motes a proliferation of interpretations. Arts-based pedagogies can be said to be
generative; they seek to open up issues or phenomena, leading to further musings,
questions, and connections.

­Pedagogical Implications

Visual art, creative writing, performance art, poetry, drama, music, dance, film and
photography, all offer opportunities for learning. Art projects, in both the creation
and display, should engage intellectual and emotional sensibilities. These activi-
ties are usually highly experiential, fostering embodied, affective, and aesthetic
ways of knowing.
Students can convey through artistic expression their conceptualizations and
engagements with course content. For example, in the exhibition concluding
an  arts-based course on curriculum theory (Dixon & Senior, 2009), a group of
­students spent several hours creating a sand mandala to represent their under-
standings of curriculum worlds. They then swept it completely away. One student
wrote that a palpable sadness swept over her as the mandala was swept away: the
evidence of their painstaking efforts and time erased. Then she realized that this
must be how curriculum designers feel when their work is replaced with a new
4 Arts-Based Pedagogy

curriculum. She understood in a visceral and embodied way that curricula must
be provisional in order for it to evolve.
Artistic learning experiences are often rooted in learners’ lived experiences and
perspectives and offer opportunities for self-exploration and expression. Eisner
states, “Art helps us connect with personal, subjective emotions, and through such
a process, it enables us to discover our own interior landscape” (2008, p. 11).
Collage is a particularly powerful medium through which to explore identity and
subjectivity. Through creating collages, teacher-learners can explore ideas, emo-
tions, beliefs and values, discovering who they are and want to be as teachers.
Through working in non-linear and intuitive ways, implicit beliefs, assumptions,
and emotions can be brought to awareness and questioned. Sometimes a collage
can provide a new lens for thinking about a phenomenon or reveal a new dimen-
sion of an issue or of self. Collages are visual conversations. Though they at first
appear random or chaotic, they can represent useful exploration and questioning
around an idea.
In making a collage, the learner browses through print media with a theme in
mind but without much deliberate thought, selecting phrases and images that
draw her in. S/he collages the fragments to express a felt sense of an experience or
subject. The fragmentation and juxtaposition of imagery and text suggest new
connections and create ambiguities that generate multiple meanings. Collage
allows learners to play with ideas, trying them on for fit, without having to com-
mit to them.
Collage can illuminate the many dimensions of identity. Learners need not sup-
press experiences, perspectives, or feelings in an attempt to construct a unitary
cohesive self. Instead, collage legitimizes and provides them the space to explore
their multiplicities, contradictions, and ambivalences. They can make connections
between self and other, between their past, present, and future selves. Moreover,
teacher-learners can forge connections between their identities as teachers and
their personal identities with their commitments, passions, fears, and desires.
Previously unseen relationships surface, allowing teacher-learners to interrogate
common educational practices and roles. Through playing with novel connections
and association, teacher-learners can begin to imagine new ways of practicing and
being a teacher.
In some art pieces, learners embody the experiences of others. In a class study-
ing colonialism, a group created six propaganda posters, arranged in pairs, pictur-
ing individual students experiencing acts of abuse. For example, in one set of
posters one student had a rope around her neck and another, a leash. Juxtaposed
with the violent portrayals were these colonial inspired slogans for each pair of
posters: “We Are Not Here to Conquer/We Are Here to Train; We Are Not Here To
Abuse/We Are Here To Guide; We Are Not Here To Harm/We Are Here To Teach”
(Chappell & Chappell, 2016, p. 301). Through the juxtaposition of shocking
imagery and text, the posters conveyed both the justification of colonialism and its
impact on indigenous peoples. This was a powerful experience for the students
posing for the poster photographs and for their classmates viewing them sub-
jected to violence.
 Arts-Based Pedagogy 5

Arts-based pedagogies often destabilize the traditional dichotomy between

teacher and learner. Learners are seen as knowledge makers, advancing under-
standings. Arts-based approaches resist prescription, aiming instead to encourage
the students’ agency in creating their learning experiences. Therefore, students are
given a great deal of freedom in designing their projects. Consequently the instruc-
tor needs to be willing to relinquish a lot of control. S/he cannot plan or predict the
ideas the students will introduce with their artwork, the interpretations made by
their classmates, nor the emotions provoked by the learning experience. Instructors
sometimes make their own art during the class, engaging in a similar process of
inquiry as their students. In many ways, the instructor becomes one more member
of the classroom community drawing meaning from the artistic encounters. Like
the students, her knowledge is partial and situated. This blurring of learner and
teacher identities can be disconcerting for both, but it can also lead teacher-learners
and teacher educators to reflect upon their identities as teachers.
The novelty of artistic learning experiences can be freeing for some and a source
of stress for others. Artistic activities can sometimes help leaners bypass the confines
and anxieties often accompanying academic discourse practices. Students are not as
concerned with getting the correct answer, sounding intelligent, or expressing their
ideas with exactitude. Arts-based pedagogies can offer a welcome change for some
NNES students who may find it at times difficult to fully participate in the fast-
paced verbal exchanges so characteristic of many North American classrooms.
However, not all learners find opportunities to express themselves within the arts
liberating. Those who have chosen to become teachers have often done well in
school settings and are comfortable with academic assignments. Language teacher-
learners in particular often have highly developed verbal abilities. Asking learners
to express ideas in other modalities with which they may be unfamiliar can make
some anxious. Rudimentary training in technique and/or scaffolding activities can
help put them more at ease. Students may need emotional support as they work in
unfamiliar territory. They should be frequently reminded that there is no “right
way” to do the assignment. The goal is to use artistic processes to explore ideas,
notions, and emotions and not to create a great piece of art. It is in the creation pro-
cess where much of the learning happens. In group projects, students co-construct
their understandings through conversation as they work on the art piece. Students
should be encouraged to play with ideas and connections and experiment with new
ways to evocatively communicate understandings. It is also beneficial, particularly
for second-language teachers, to experience some discomfort in working in what for
many are new languages. This feeling of disorientation can help them better under-
stand some of what their second-language students experience when expressing
themselves in another language and often unfamiliar academic tasks.
The learning experience is not over when the art project is completed. Its exhibi-
tion and the responses it provokes are part of the learning process. Those viewing
the art construct for themselves individual meanings and interpretations informed
by and resonant with their own experiences and sociocultural positionings. Through
classroom sharing and responding to artworks, collective meaning making occurs.
The aim is not consensus but rather to explore and understand the multiplicity of
6 Arts-Based Pedagogy

meanings and interpretations that emerge, ultimately broadening learners’ perspec-

tives. Creating a space for individual reflection, usually done through writing, is
necessary to fully engage all members of a class. In this way, students have time and
space to explore their reactions and to allow for the unfolding of further meaning.
Arts-based pedagogies can support learners in developing multiple forms of
literacy. This is particularly important for teachers who are routinely expected to
incorporate new instructional technologies into their practice. Moreover, by
employing the literacies of their students, teachers can facilitate their learning.
Many teacher educators are committed to helping teacher-learners develop
understandings of themselves and their students as cultural beings, shaped by his-
torical, political, cultural, social, economic and linguistic forces and ideologies. To
that end, they introduce teacher-learners to critical scholarship to raise their aware-
ness. Yet this appeal to intellect and attitude is often insufficient in bringing about
the desired level of commitment to social justice. Through engaging teacher-learners
in impactful, aesthetic, embodied, and affective learning, critical arts-based pedago-
gies offer a more holistic approach to developing deep empathetic understandings
as well acute social analytical skills needed for teacher-learners to become cultural
workers. Artistic explorations within this framework often culminate in interactive
art installations, performance art, or participatory drama activities. Chappell and
Chappell (2016) argue that such political art to be effective “cannot be propagandis-
tic or promote a singular certain truth. Instead, the work must raise questions, dis-
mantle simple hierarchies, and build relationships instead of divides” (p. 300).
Within this approach, art projects often highlight the experiences and perspectives
of marginalized communities, disrupting dominant ideologies and narratives.
Critical artwork asks viewers “to re-imagine the centre, to question their assump-
tions as they experience the emotions, rhythms, spaces, and relationships of those
whose voices are often ignored” (Chappell & Chappell, 2016, p. 296). Through build-
ing awareness the effects of cultural ideologies on learners and communities,
teacher-learners can begin to craft more inclusive pedagogies.

SEE ALSO: Critical Pedagogy; Funds of Knowledge and Critical Pedagogy

References

Cahnmann-Taylor, M., & Souto-Manning, M. (2010). Teachers act up: Creating multicultural
learning communities through theatre. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.
Chappell, S. V., & Chappell, D. (2016). Building social inclusion through critical arts-based
pedagogies in university classroom communities. International Journal of Inclusive
Education, 20(3), 292–308. doi:10.1080/13603116.2015.1047658
Dixon, M. & Senior, K. (2009). Traversing theory and transgressing academic discourses:
Arts-based research in teacher education. International Journal of Education & the Arts,
20(4), 1–21.
Eisner, E. (2008). Art and knowledge. In J. G. Knowles & A. L. Cole (Eds.), Handbook of the
arts in qualitative research (pp. 3–12). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York, NY: Continuum.
 Arts-Based Pedagogy 7

Suggested Readings

Butler-Kisber, L. (2010). Qualitative inquiry: Thematic, narrative and arts-informed perspectives.

Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Lambert, J. (2013). Digital storytelling: Capturing lives, creating community. New York, NY:
Routledge.
McDermott, M. (2002). Collaging pre-service teacher identity. Teacher Education Quarterly,
29(4), 53–68.