danceintro&rationale

= Dance Kindergarten to Grade 7 = = Introduction and Rationale =


 * //<<< Note: The text contained on this page has been taken directly from the [|Fine Arts K to 7 (1998) IRP]. Please provide comments on the text within the discussion tab above to guide the final revision to the Dance K to 7 curriculum. >>>//**

This Integrated Resource Package (IRP) sets out the provincially prescribed curricula for dance, drama, music, and visual arts for Kindergarten to Grade 7. The development of this IRP has been guided by the principles of learning:
 * Introduction**
 * Learning requires the active participation of the student.
 * People learn in a variety of ways and at different rates.
 * Learning is both an individual and a group process.

Fine arts instruction is crucial for the educational growth of all students. From Kindergarten through Grade 6, dance, drama, music, and visual arts are required areas of study. The prescribed learning outcomes for all four subject areas are therefore required at every grade level. Beginning in Grade 7, students are required to select at least one fine arts discipline. Schools are encouraged to provide more than one fine arts opportunity for students to select from.

The curricula for fine arts contained in this IRP have been designed to allow flexibility in organizing and implementing programs to best meet the needs of students, teachers, and communities. Schools can use a wide variety of methods, programs, and resources to deliver these curricula. Schools may also choose to develop programs that integrate more than one of the fine arts disciplines.

People participate in the fine arts for a variety of reasons
 * Rationale**
 * to learn and play
 * to communicate
 * to honour rites of passage
 * to define, strengthen, and preserve culture and heritage
 * to nurture the emotional, social, intellectual, physical, and spiritual self

The fine arts are important to our understanding of society, culture, and history, and are essential to the development of individual potential, social responsibility, and cultural awareness. They also contribute significantly to the intellectual, aesthetic, emotional, social, and physical development of the individual. The study of the fine arts reveals distinct and common characteristics of societies throughout history. Dance, drama, music, and visual arts are central to the development and expression of cultural identity, and are a means of both reflecting and challenging the values and norms in a pluralistic society. The fine arts are expressed in and influenced by personal contexts (e.g., gender, age, life experience, beliefs, values), social and cultural contexts (e.g., ethnicity, religion, socio-economics, evolving technologies), and historical and political contexts. An understanding of the fine arts fosters respect for and appreciation of the diverse cultural heritages and values within Canada and around the world. Each of the fine arts has its own essential skills, techniques, and processes that provide students with unique insights and ways of assimilating and expressing all learning. As students engage in the fine arts, they devise and solve problems and apply these problem-solving processes to concrete experiences. Dance, drama, music, and visual arts provide opportunities for students to make connections among their cognitive, psychomotor, and affective learning. Fine arts activities and experiences foster development of students' critical-thinking skills, including skills for describing, analysing, interpreting, and making judgements and thoughtful responses to creative works.

The fine arts provide opportunities for students to represent their learning concretely in creative and personally relevant ways. Through creating, communicating, performing, and responding to artworks, students grow in their creative abilities, curiosity, open-mindedness, independence, persistence, and flexibility. Dance, drama, music, and visual arts also encourage the development of particular skills and competencies in their respective disciplines and related technologies, and students develop critical awareness of how those disciplines and technologies may be used for communication and expression.

Dance, drama, music, and visual arts offer expressive means for students' self- discovery and exploration of the world around them. Through the creative process, students are able to communicate, giving form and meaning to their ideas and emotions. The fine arts stimulate students' imaginations, innovation, and creativity. They also develop self-discipline, self-motivation, and self-confidence, and learn skills and competencies useful to their future employability. Through the fine arts, students also find a source of pleasure and enjoyment and gain a deepened awareness of themselves and their place in their environment, community, culture, and world.


 * Common Areas of Learning in the Four Fine Arts Subjects**

Collectively, the disciplines of dance, drama, music, and visual arts are referred to as the fine arts. Because each discipline is distinct, requiring unique knowledge, skills, and attitudes, the curriculum and resource material provided in this IRP is set out in separate sections, one for each discipline.

However, all four fine arts curricula do provide opportunities for growth in three common areas of learning:
 * personal, social, cultural, and historical contexts
 * knowledge, skills, and techniques
 * creating, expressing, perceiving, and responding

Although not always explicitly named as such, these common areas of learning are represented in the curriculum organizers chosen for dance, drama, music, and visual arts from Kindergarten to Grade 12.

The common areas of learning make it easier for teachers to integrate instruction in the fine arts at the elementary level. Such integration offers many advantages for both students and teachers, provided the unique characteristics of each discipline are respected and made evident to students. In planning instruction, teachers will also want to consider that the three common areas of learning are themselves closely interrelated­ none can be properly addressed without reference to the others.

The goals for aesthetic and artistic development in the primary years include providing experiences that enable students to:
 * The Fine Arts in the Primary Years**
 * think, learn, and communicate through the fine arts
 * express and represent
 * imagine and visualize
 * interpret, respond, and create
 * appreciate the fine arts
 * develop enthusiasm for the fine arts

Fine arts experiences in the primary years acknowledge, respect, and further develop the expressive experiences students bring to the school environment. From an early age, students' expressive play includes movement, music, and visual and dramatic exploration, all of which are significant in the development of body, mind, and spirit. Play is central and natural to students' learning. As students develop in the primary years, they acquire artistic knowledge, skills, and attitudes through play. Fine arts education provides opportunities to develop the imagination, and encourages students to co-operate, develop friendships, and appreciate their own and others' abilities and cultural identities. Fine arts experiences simultaneously engage the various senses, resulting in a balanced and integrated development of students' innate artistic potential.

The goals for aesthetic and artistic development in the intermediate years support learning experiences that help students to:
 * The Fine Arts in the Intermediate Years**
 * wonder, explore, and create
 * describe and interpret through a variety of expressive forms
 * value diverse expressions of culture
 * discover and appreciate beauty
 * express their individual spirits
 * respond and reflect

Fine arts experiences in the intermediate years continue to expand the knowledge, skills, and attitudes gained through ongoing, active participation in dance, drama, music, and visual arts. As students move through the intermediate years, they develop artistic literacy and use it to extend skills in creating, responding, and presenting. Students gain increasing competence through activities that require the practice and use of these skills within an expanded range of expressive options. Students are further encouraged to incorporate the arts in the development of their intellectual and social lives, both within and beyond the school. Fine arts education in the intermediate years also helps to develop good work habits, and promotes further awareness and understanding of career opportunities in dance, drama, music, and visual arts, and of the contribution of the fine arts to society.