Jamie

Higgins
Art 133
9/7/17

Unit Paper #1

According to these two readings, Teaching Meaning in Artmaking and Artmaking

as Meaning-Making the main idea is to have the students create and understand a

meaning to their work, before creating it. Big ideas are the larger, underlying concept

of the art itself. Therefore, in order to create, there needs to be a big idea to be able to

take the steps toward developing the art piece. Once you understand and make meaning

then artist can begin making. The meaning-making idea reiterates the necessity to

understand the meaning of the deeper concept before one begins to just make art.

Students need to form an understanding of the art before making connections to whatever

their subject matter may be. Sometimes the concept is lost because the art does not

connect to the learning or the big idea, and therefore the final product is lost as a

somewhat meaningless expression of simple self-expression that does not further a point

or ideal. When teaching the students these concepts and rules, students need to have a

chance or opportunity to deeply explore and investigate the greater idea through their

paradigm (a system of beliefs that guides thoughts and actions), (p. 43 Franco, Ward,

Unrath) before beginning to create. By doing so, the students have a chance to include

their personal experiences and beliefs. The objective, from a teachers standpoint, would

be to first get the students to understand, set them out, explore the connection between

the world, themselves and the idea, and then create. After the creation, the students

should reflect on everything produced from the very beginning, starting with how they

found the answers. Then, progressing into why they made what they did, and the

connections they made while doing it all. Finally, according to Walker make certain that

the big idea is the focus of instruction, regardless of where the planning began (p. 7).
 Jamie Higgins
Art 133
9/7/17

Reference

Franco, M. J., Ward A., Unrath K (2015). Artmaking as Meaning

Making. A New Model for Preservice ElementaryGeneralists.

Walker, S. R. (2001). Teaching Meaning in Artmaking. Art

Education in Practice. Davis Publications, Inc.