EDCU11021 The Arts

The Arts is seen as an essential part of everyday experience and as an integral part of social values and beliefs, including issues of social justice. As such, issues such as personal identity will be reviewed and students will be challenged to reflect critically upon the way conceptions of social justice are constructed by the arts. The Arts is one of the eight Key Learning Areas of the Queensland school curriculum, and consequently prospective educators in schools and other settings need to understand why and how The Arts are taught and learnt. Students will therefore be introduced to a range of skills, knowledge and classroom strategies selected from Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts and Media. On the basis of acquisition of such competencies in these distinct art forms, integration and articulation of the arts is encouraged. As a mode for the new millennium, the intregrated Arts mode accords dance, drama, music, media and visual art as a collective, central and pivotal role in education. Children's natural enthusiasm for the arts, as major and valid sources of knowledge, is evident from birth and should be nurtured from the first day of school. Maintaining this motivation and commitment to the arts, particularly for children in primary years, will enhance their disposition for life-long and life-wide learning.