Innovative Forms Of Art Teachers’ Activities

Abstract

The article analyzes the innovative forms of teachers’ activity in music and art education. The projects “Children on the Opera Stage”, “Mobile Exhibition of Children's Drawing”, and “Composer's Workshop” are considered as innovative forms of the pedagogical activity of art teachers, and their relevance is determined. Effective forms of teacher activity stimulate students' interest in art, manifesting in the increased creative activity of students: the creation of the author’s product, readiness and ability to broadcast their experience in public events. The article describes the original pedagogical technologies that are implemented in line with the modern paradigm of education and orienting the learning process to the fundamentality, continuity, integration, dialogue, subjectivity, developmental orientation. The study took into account the specificity of each project and art form. Based on the analysis of projects, the criteria for their effectiveness are singled out: novelty of artistic and pedagogical ideas and ways of its implementation, children's interest in art and cultural activities, interactivity of joint productive activities of students and art teachers, developing the traditions of educational institutions and cultural institutions in the region. Rapprochement of creators’ and recipients’ creativity of art works, closer dialogue between them are considered in the article as the main way of updating the forms of activity of teachers of art. As a result, it is concluded that the innovative forms of art teachers' activity presented in the article and the criteria for their assessment can be used as a diagnostic tool for use in a wide pedagogical practice.

Keywords: Innovationsocializationactivityteacherartcreativity

Introduction

Modernization of school education carried out in the country, draws special attention to innovative educational activities. Innovation has been widely developed - a field of knowledge that involves the introduction of innovations that meet current trends in the development of the subject area of education to a radically new level of needs and demands of modern society (Lazarev, 2004).

The Concept of Teaching the subject area “Art” in educational institutions of the Russian Federation implementing basic general education programs notes a number of unresolved motivational, substantive and methodological contradictions: underestimation the importance of individual creative development of students and individual / collective educational projects aimed at developing artistic and musical culture as part of spiritual culture; weak continuity of the main and additional education content; the lack of elaboration of interaction variant models between educational organizations and cultural institutions taking into account the specifics of the region (Kontseptsiya prepodavaniya predmetnoy oblasti «Iskusstvo» v obrazovatelnih organizatsiyah Rossiyskoy Federatsii, 2018).

Problem Statement

In the pedagogy of art, systematic development of ways to update the content, technologies, and forms of art education of schoolchildren, the criteria for the effectiveness of the music teachers’ and visual arts teachers’ activities is being conducted.

The problems of innovative pedagogical activity in the context of the humanitarization of education in the information space were researched by Akishina and Savenkova (2018). The interaction of tradition and innovation in the process of modernization of general music education was studied by Krasilnikova (2016). Vardanyan, Koptsev, and Koptseva (2018) devoted their work to the study of the effectiveness of the art-pedagogical movement “wandering” in art education.

Many works were devoted to various aspects of pedagogical innovations in the field of art education, new forms and technologies of art pedagogy: various aspects of creative interaction between a teacher and children (Kim, Morton, & Gregorio, 2019); questions of the effectiveness of digital technologies in education (Forsler, 2018; Duisenbayev, Daumov, & Kuzdybayeva, 2018), as well as the inclusive art education of bedridden children (Koptseva, 2018); innovative technologies in the American undergraduate music program (Webster & Williams, 2018); the importance of improvisation and composition in the musical development of schoolchildren as a leading component in the new educational technology in music lessons (Alekseeva & Usacheva, 2018); the integration of arts and science, technology, technology and mathematics (STEM) (Kinsella, 2018); solving the problem of leisure culture - the perception of the environment as a place for learning and enjoying (Veledo, Belen, Manrique Lopez, & Fombella Coto, 2018); improving the vocal skills of future teachers (Jia, 2016), the development of giftedness (Nogaj & Bogunovic, 2015).

The existing forms of pedagogical activity, the structure of the school as an organization, ways of evaluating pedagogical activity and the activities of students inhibit the achievement of a qualitatively new level of music and art education. The contradiction between traditional teaching and the content of innovative educational technologies has identified the problem of the present study: what features of the pedagogical activity of art teacher make its form innovative.

Research Questions

The forms of pedagogical activity depend on the content, and are in a dialectical connection with it, with goals and objectives, methods and means of teaching.

Based on the characteristics of the teacher’s activities and modern requirements and tasks facing modern education, it is necessary to determine which external and internal factors characterize the activity of a teacher as innovative.

The development of criteria for the effectiveness of innovative forms of pedagogical activity will make it possible to develop diagnostic tools and recommend it to a wide pedagogical practice.

Purpose of the Study

Development and experimental verification of effective innovative forms of art teacher’ activity.

Research Methods

Within the framework of the system-activity approach, the methods of analysis, survey, questionnaire, creative task, systematization and generalization of pedagogical experience, expert evaluation, and observation were used.

Findings

Socio-cultural orientation is the basic position for the implementation of innovative forms of artistic and educational activities. Therefore, a high cultural level of the general public is the key to the preservation and development of the great traditions of domestic art. Such reference points unite such innovative forms of art teachers as the “Traveling Exhibition of Children's Fine Art”, “Children on the Opera Stage”, and “Composer's Workshop”.

The innovative form “Composer's Workshop” unites the students from different departments and levels - a general education school, additional education (secondary school and music schools), professional educational institutions (music school) in the creative activity. This form is based, on the one hand, on the connection of art with life as an objective reality, on the other - on appeal to the child’s individuality, its existence (Annushkin, 2013). Such values of education as freedom, the development of individuality and the conditions for its self-realization, as well as the creative self-realization of the child, come to the fore. Most fully in music education, they are revealed in the creation, composing their own music (musical intonation, melodies, themes, plays), i.e. creativity in its very "pure".

The existence of all components of the system in the field of creativity should unite multi-level musical education with the new quality of knowledge and the process of its acquisition. It is characterized by reliance on an independent musical experiment (improvisation and composition) in mastering any necessary ability and skill.

The specificity of each level of the project "Composer's Workshop" is as follows:

1. Primary and basic general education with class-lesson form of education is mandatory for all. The used innovative technology is aimed at: a) children’s research of the possibilities of their own “musical speech” - intonations, melodic turns, various means of musical expression and visualization; b) the formation (in dialogical communication with the teacher) of a musical “model” that prepares students for musical perception of a new work. This method of “composition composed” (Shkolyar, Shkolyar, & Usacheva, 2017) allows the student to be in the position of a composer, as if “re-writing” the composing works of musical art. Thus, at the lesson, the creative nature of a person is revealed in every child or teenager.

2. Additional education. Composing music acts as a method of knowledge, the center of which becomes the student by himself. Here, features of the emergent approach to pedagogy, for example, the openness to the reality and what is happening “here and now” (models of life situations, literary, historical, mythological allusions, personal reflection) are manifested. Being in the world of music is an individual life, filled with the experience of a person's relationship with the world in the process of musical creation.

At the pre-professional level, emphasis is placed on the self-determination of each student, and the results of his creative activity are integrated into other subjects (music literature, solfeggio).

3. Professional education. Improvisation and composition (as one of the productive activities) intensify the creative perception of adolescents, come an integral part of the process of mastering theoretical knowledge, sometimes inspires a dry analytical approach to special subjects, accumulate professional and psychological characteristics of adolescents as future musicians and teachers of professional and educational institutions.

The result of the passage the above levels becomes students’ performing public activities. Concert performance of their music forms an understanding the significance of the author's activities in society, increases the responsibility for the artistic level of the work, sometimes changing the attitude to their own musical activities. Public success increases interest in composing and stimulates the birth of new ideas, contributes to a deeper interaction with the music of the studied authors, reveals the causes, possibilities and means of updating the musical language, helps entry organically into modern music based on their own musical experiments.

Pupils from Moscow’, Krasnodar’, St. Petersburg’, Nizhny Novgorod’ educational institutions, as well as institutions of supplementary and vocational education in Moscow took part in the research (from 2015 to 2018). Total number of participants included 700 people, among which 610 students of primary and basic schools, 70 - professionally oriented students of music schools and 20 students of various departments of children's music schools. The criteria for assessing their musical and creative development, common for students of all educational institutions, were identified: interest in the process of composition and the desire to engage in it; activation of musical perception and ability to master the content of works; increase in efficiency in mastering the musical performing and analytical "tools"; readiness for public creativity in the classroom, at a school event, a concert report, as well as qualitative and quantitative (according to a 12-point system) indicators of musical and creative development of students (low 1-3; medium - 4-8; high - 9-12) . The obtained data are summarized in Table 1 .

Content of filling criteria could vary depending on the level at which they were used. For example, “Interest in the composing process” at the general educational level is deepened due to the readiness for musical improvisation, and at the pre-professional and professional levels important factors clarifying this criterion are initiative in searching for a musical idea, originality of design, ability to complete the work of creating to a holistic work.

The indicators of the table clearly demonstrate, in addition to the positive dynamics of all the formulated criteria for musical and creative development in children and adolescents, their interdependence and indicate the effectiveness of the innovative form “Composer's Workshop”. Music teachers also note a direct dependency between the effective musical and creative development of students and their success in mastering various areas of scientific and artistic knowledge, between creative efforts in self-determination and self-knowledge and interaction in a peer group.

The project “Children on the Opera Stage” as an example of innovation in music education

The project is based on classical musical and stage works (for example, the operas by M.I. Glinka "Ivan Susanin", A.P. Borodin "Prince Igor", M.P.Mussorgsky "Boris Godunov", N.A.Rimsky-Korsakov “The Tsar's Bride”, etc.), revealing socially significant themes at the highest artistic level and meeting the age interests of students. The process of immersion the children in these works integrates various forms of lesson and extracurricular activities, artistic and research approaches, becomes a way of creating and enhancing school traditions of an educational institution, provides cooperation and co-creation of students of an educational institution with children's and adult creative teams of the city, professional artists. The management of publicly executed projects improves all components of the music teacher’ professional activity.

The implementation of the project “Children on the Opera Stage” (in the cities: Perm, Samara, Yoshkar-Ola) allowed students to be brought to a new level of interaction with the bearers of academic musical culture. By combining the efforts of music teachers, parents, professional musicians, teaching staff of schools and teams of opera and ballet academic theaters, they succeeded (not formally) through aesthetic to solve the problems of socialization of students, their moral, patriotic, environmental education. Work on the project includes three closely interrelated levels.

The first level is connected with the activity of children in a focused way and is aimed at the gradual holistic mastery of operatic masterpiece by themselves, understanding of its ideas, drama, composition.

In order to keep students interested in such a work, you should not only watch and think about music, but also model the development of musical action, actualizing the students' perception through live intonation - choral and solo singing, instrumental music and dramatization. The staging of opera scenes helps children to better understand the inner world of the characters, to feel the artistic space of the opera. Solving the moral problems that arise in the characters of the opera in connection with the unfolding events arouses interest among students.

The second level - work at the composition in extracurricular activities takes place at the school choir classroom and solo circles, in a variety of creative workshops. At this stage, the most interesting are the creative design works: sketch productions of operas on the school stage, as well as preparing children for participation in performances on the stage of opera houses. In addition to the musical part, the project includes the production of costumes, and for sketch productions - also scenery. Children and their parents do a lot of things by themselves and become real co-creators of the opera performance.

Third level. At lessons and at extracurricular activities, the child assigns the vertex works of world musical art under the teacher’ guidance. Next, the student and the teacher improve their understanding of the composition and their performing skills in joint musical activities with the artists of the theater - chorus master and choir, director and conductor, soloists-bearers of academic musical culture. Participation in the project gives children a bright cultural character (meaning), and knowledge about the indissoluble unity of the composer, performer and listener, obtained in the classroom, turns into their own creative experience of communicating with great art. Moreover, this experience initiates the process of appropriating musical masterpieces by other people - parents, teachers, peers, for which they sincerely thank the young performers.

In the course of testing the effectiveness of the project “Children on the Opera Stage” for the development of students' musical culture, changes were studied in relation to the genre of classical opera, the availability of large musical compositions for students of different ages as integral phenomena, the ability to memorize and reproduce the most important themes of works by students, children’s interest to the historical, literary and domestic basis of the libretto opera, etc.

Studying the difficulties and risks of implementing the project by teachers revealed that about 70% of teachers noted the difficulties they had in connection with the initially insufficient knowledge of the musical material: “it was necessary to know not the words about the music, but the music itself”, “to conquer peaks by myself to bring children there”, “"attachment" to the musical score prevented to communicate with children by music, lead their musical activities”. Without teacher’ free possession of musical material, the rate of composition passage, especially the epic genre, slowed down in the classroom, children lost a sense of the composition’ integrity, which turned into an alternation of individual fragments, the sketch performance of operas on the school stage acquired the features of musical and literary compositions, and at rehearsals before the “exit” to the opera stage, there was a technological bias. As the teacher mastered the compositions, these shortcomings were overcome.

Exploring the interaction of public (including sketch) performance of operas with school music lessons, it was revealed that the overwhelming majority of students (93%) consider participation in the sketch and academic production of operas to be an interesting and entertaining exercise. In the course of the study, dynamics was discovered in the development of students' performance manifestations, both in choral and solo parts. So, if in the 1st grade there were about 15% of students who wanted to perform a song by Vanya from M.Glinka's opera “Ivan Susanin”, then in subsequent performances about 45% of primary school students and 37% of secondary school students expressed their desire to be soloists. The children’ attitude to the public opera performances is influenced by such factors as the attitude to the operatic art of the school administration, primary school teachers, parents; the presence or absence of school traditions of opera performance; the presence or absence the choir in the school, the circles of solo performance and the direction of their work to help the staging of the opera. Taking into account these factors, the number of students interested in this art event is in the range from 70% to 95%. Moreover, each successful implementation of a new project increases the number of people willing to participate in the opera performances.

The effective project of introducing children to art is the educational project “A Mobile Exhibition of Children's Fine Art”, which has been implemented for twenty-five years in a number of Russian regions: Moscow, Irkutsk region (Angarsk), Mordovia (Saransk), Perm region (Tchaikovsky), Smolensk, Tver, Vladimir region (Pokrov) and others. The essence of the project is to develop a model of interaction between educational organizations and cultural institutions, which is oriented towards the preservation of a single cultural space of Russia, taking into account the specificities of each region.

“Wandering” as a pedagogical movement is based on the motto “I see the world” as a form of reality reflection by the means of visual arts. The thematic principle of work organization allows at a different level of its implementation to follow a common goal and solve common educational tasks. Thus, in 2017 was declared the Year of Cinema in Russia. The traveling exhibition “I see the world: the world of cinema” contributed to familiarizing children and adolescents with cinema art, revealing their cinema and television preferences. In 2018, a children's drawing competition was held and the 28th traveling exhibition “I see the world: the World of Theater” was formed, which was particularly popular due to the announcement of 2019 - the year of the theater in the Russian Federation. In March 2019, the 29th traveling exhibition has begun, which was the result of the competition "I see the world: holidays of the peoples of the world." An important educational landmark of the project was the development of a tolerant attitude towards people of different nationalities, identifying the favorite holidays of children and adolescents. The relevance of this project is evidenced by the fact that the 29th mobile exhibition of children's drawings “I see the world: holidays of the peoples of the world” received about 3,000 drawings from all regions of Russia.

The project implementation is based on the concentric principle of developing forms of work with children and assumes different levels of its implementation: individual, school, district, regional, all-Russian, international. At the lesson level, this is a personal, group or collective exhibition of students' creative works, at the school level this is a school competition and an exhibition of children's drawings. The winners of the school stage are delegated to the regional and international stages. At the international stage, the winners take part in a traveling exhibition that travels in different regions of the country.

The originality of this project lies in the fact that, along with children's drawings, creative works of teachers take part in it, which forms the exhibition “I See the World”, shown online or intramural in the interiors of kindergartens, schools, institutes, depending on the route.

The traveling exhibition of children's fine art moves along a route consisting of 6–11 addresses (kindergartens, schools, institutes, exhibition halls, museums, theaters, etc.). At the same time, educational programs with children and teachers in the region include not only excursions, but also work at master classes and round tables.

Within the framework of the project, dialogues, conversations, questioning with children and teachers are carried out, analysis of which allows judging the effectiveness of the traveling exhibition as a form of familiarizing the younger generation with the visual arts and children's creativity. Criteria were developed by which the effectiveness (high, medium, low) of the educational project “Traveling Exhibition” was evaluated: novelty, interest of children and teachers, creative activity of teachers and children. Table № 2 shows how over the years the appraisal of effectiveness of the educational project “Mobile Exhibition” among its participants was increased, how gradually the interest of children and teachers in the exhibition process grew, their creative activity increased, which was expressed in the systematic participation in competitions and exhibitions of various levels and in creating copyright product. All this is evidence of the effectiveness and efficiency the innovative form of visual arts teachers’ pedagogical activity.

The table below shows how the children’ attitude to the educational project “Traveling Exhibition” has changed, interest in it has increased, the motivation for art activities has increased, which has expressed in the desire to participate in the competition and exhibition movement.

An important indicator of the effectiveness of "Wandering" is the increased teachers’ activity. They began to take part more often in exhibitions of teachers’ creative works, to show a methodical initiative, expressed in writing articles, manuals and personal participation in conducting master classes, round tables, mini-exhibitions, and mini-movements in the field.

Conclusion

In the process of analyzing innovative forms of art teachers’ activity in institutions of various types, criteria for the effectiveness of innovative forms of pedagogical activity as diagnostic tools that can be recommended in a wide pedagogical practice were developed taking into account the specifics of the project and type of art.

Innovative form of teachers’ work in the educational field “Art” can be described as “pedagogical art”, “art of cooperation” of children and teachers. The result of this activity is not always noticeable at once, since it aims to obtain profound, qualitative changes in the personality of the child and the entire team of students. Nevertheless, considering the innovative activities of art teachers, it is possible to isolate the following quality characteristics:

productivity of education - the use of new in form and effective in nature of the impact technologies that require high basic skills of teachers, musicians and artists aimed at the formation of creative abilities of students and teachers;

effectiveness - focus on student self-development, on actualizing the interaction of rational and emotional, theoretical and practical, conceptual and figurative principles in the development of his thinking;

learning activity - a high heuristic level of complexity with the use of active teaching and education methods, participation in creating the artistic environment of a school, a region in the process of creating an author's product and relying on original folk art, classics and modern art, using information and communication technology’s capabilities, systematic interaction between families and schools , interdepartmental cooperation of institutions involved in the education of children and youth.

Acknowledgments

The work was completed within the framework of the government assignment the Ministry of education and science of Russia (publication Number: 27.7394.2017/8.9),

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