Drama Tuesday - Do We Know Our Story?

Do we know our Arts and Drama curriculum story?

“…knowing and understanding the past assists us in placing all we do in perspective” 

(quoted in Green, 2003)

Curriculum – intended, published, enacted in the classroom – can be a confusing tangled story. Who says what we teach in the Arts and Drama? Where do these ideas come from? Sometimes when you read published documents such as the Australian Curriculum: The Arts  (ACARA, 2014), there’s a depersonalised, decontextualised anonymity. Curriculum documents often seem to be the illegitimate progeny of processes that obscure theory and those who wrote them.

Why should we know this story?

It is important that we name and know about our shared story. 

As Seddon (1989: 1) observes: "The dearth of Australian curriculum history is to be regretted. It means that Australian curriculum workers do not know their own past; neither the curricular past, nor the history of their profession”. Understanding educational change as a temporal process with its own rhythms and durational texture, she suggests, requires an historical imagination, one that takes full account of the complex relationships between past, present and future. (in Green, 2003 p. 3)

As an eyewitness to the unfolding story of arts curriculum in Australia and sometimes participant in the process, I feel that it is important to look beyond the published documents to inside the processes. Often succeeding documents devour what went before and there is a danger of losing the threads of continuity and paths not taken. 

Some moments in time

In this moment in time, I begin by naming and highlighting some key published documents that are signposts to the enfolding discussions that inform them. in the scope of this post, I can only introduce them and prefigure later more detailed discussion. 

In Australia …Drama is (1991) was written as part of the National Arts in Australian Schools that came from the establishment of the Australian Schools Commission and the Curriculum Development Centre in Canberra in 1975. Much of it resonates with current practice.

A Statement on the arts for Australian Schools (1994) and the accompanying A Profile of the Arts for Australian Schools (1994) was a first significant attempt to write a national curriculum. The Arts are defined as art forms of dance, drama, media, music and visual arts and recognised as significant ways of knowing. While each art form has its own way of knowing, there are common fundamental aspects to all of the arts disciplines which differentiate them from other key leaning areas of the school curriculum: The arts as aesthetic forms of knowing; as symbolic forms of knowing; and, as culturally constructed ways of knowing. Students are 'making' and 'responding as arts critics’; they are constructing aesthetic values and developing knowledge of the arts in varying contexts. Arts experiences are the right of every student. Teachers of The Arts need to plan a wide range of opportunities to observe artistic learning their students. 

To date there are four “Declarations on Goals for Australian Education” made by the Federal, State and Territory Ministers for Education: Hobart (1989); Adelaide (1999); Melbourne (2008); and, Alice Springs/Mpartnwe (2019). Each of these declarations have asserted the place of The Arts as one of eight learning areas (though sometimes blurring this clarity as the performing arts and the visual arts). This reinforces the Arts as forms of disciplinary knowledge. There is a tension in these declarations about the relationships between broad general knowledge and skills and disciplinary knowledge. In partnership with these declarations an Early Years Learning Framework (2009)has been adopted with direct implications for arts educators.

More Than Words Can Say (2019/1998, 2003) was a project of the National Affiliation of Arts Educators (NAAE, now known as National Advocates for Arts Education). This document, revised in 2015, argued the case for the role of the Arts in Literacy and Arts Literacy. The role of the NAAE in bringing together the sometimes disparate voices of the arts education community cannot be underestimated. For example, in 1995 responding to the Australian Government Creative Nation initiative the NAAE held a conference and wrote a report Creative Nation… The Arts leading the way (1995)

The National Statement on Education and the Arts (2007) jointly made by the Australian Cultural Ministers Council (CMC), and Ministerial Council on Education Employment and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA), is another attempt to bring national coherence to the Arts education story.

The Seoul Agenda on Arts Education (2010) provides a clear internationally endorsed focus on an arts education entitlement.

The Australian Curriculum: The Arts (ACARA, 2014) and its adapted forms (such as, School Curriculum and Standards Authority (SCSA), 2015) are the current versions of curriculum guidance and are at the forefront of thinking.

In this curriculum climate, there were a number of important documents that are important to note. Judith McLean wrote a monograph for what is now Drama Australia entitled An Aesthetic Framework in Drama: issues and Implications (1996). Robyn Ewing’s overview The arts and Australian education: realising potential (2010)  provides a comprehensive review of the field. 

Seeing a wider international context

As Chair of the Arts Committee established by the Curriculum Council in 1995 for the development of the Western Australian Curriculum Framework (1998), I put together a portfolio of documents that included

• Arts in Education: The Idea of a Generic Arts Community, Peter Abbs (1991) and a range of other documents from Abbs such as Living Powers: The Arts in Education (1987)

• Not a Frill, The Centrality of the Arts in the Education of the Future, Ontario Arts Council, (1994)

• The Arts are essential in the curriculum of New Zealand schools, Arts Council of New Zealand (1992) 

• The Vision for Arts Education in the 21st Century Music Educators National Conference (1993)

Also useful are more recent Arts curriculum documents such as: The New York City Department of Education Blueprints for the Arts: schools.nyc.gov/offices/teachlearn/arts/blueprint.html  and the Ontario Arts Curriculum Framework: http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/curriculum/elementary/arts18b09curr.pdf 

While sometimes criticised as a derivative curriculum nation, Australia has shown awareness and alertness to international trends. The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority ACARA have published comparative curriculum studies with Finland, British Columbia, New Zealand and Singapore, each with discussion of arts curriculum (2018). 

For an article in NJ, the Drama Australia Journal in 2009, I wrote and still affirm, “…there is a clearly articulated worldview and epistemology that provides a direct lineage between the past and current drama documents discussed in these Australian focused articles. There is a recognisable ‘DNA’ of Australian drama education that is strongly affirmed in policy and practice” (2009). But Juliana Saxton and Carole Miller reminded us in presentations at the 6th International Drama in Education Research Institute [IDIERI] and the American Alliance for Theatre and Education [AATE] 2009 conference) that drama education successfully operates in a post-modern curriculum framework. They note that ‘the teacher and class are always teetering in the midst of chaos “not linked by chains of causality but [by] layers of meaning, recursive dynamics, non-linear effects and chance”’(Osberg, 2008). Drama education celebrates the four R’s of Post-modern Curriculum: it is rich, recursive, relational and rigorous.

What are the seminal documents in your arts and drama curriculum history? 

A note on perspective, positionality and point of view

It’s also worth mentioning that in seeing the story through our own autobiographies, we need to remember the fragmented state-based perspectives on curriculum development. The constitutional responsibility for education rests with the Australian States and Territories. This gives rise to “regional and local inflections” and “that different State systems in Australia rarely explicitly reference each other, or seek to learn from each other” (Green, 2003 p. 7).

The bad habit of ghosting previous iterations of curriculum does a disservice to the discussion of how arts and drama curriculum develop over time. What are the markers of continuity and change over time?

Bibliography

Abbs, P. (Ed.) (1987). Living Powers: The Arts in Education. London: Falmer Press.

ACARA. (2014). The Australian Curriculum: The Arts. Retrieved from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/the-arts/introduction

ACARA. (2018). Australian Curriculum comparison studies released. Retrieved from https://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/news/2018/07/australian-curriculum-comparison-studies-released/

Aspin, D. (1995). The Structure of an Educational Revolution: The Arts Leading the Way. Paper presented at the Creative Nation … The Arts Leading the Way (Australian Arts Education Conference), Olims, Hotel, Ainslie.

Australian Education Council. (1994). The Arts: A Curriculum Profile for Australian Schools. In. Melbourne: Curriculum Corporation.

Council of Australian Governments. (2009). BELONGING, BEING & BECOMING The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia. Canberra: Australian Government

Council of Australian Governments Education Council. (2019). Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration. Canberra: Australian Government Retrieved from https://uploadstorage.blob.core.windows.net/public-assets/education-au/melbdec/ED19-0230%20-%20SCH%20-%20Alice%20Springs%20(Mparntwe)%20Education%20Declaration_ACC.pdf

Cultural Ministers Council (CMC), & Ministerial Council on Education Employment and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA). (2007). National Statement on Education and the Arts. Retrieved from http://www.cmc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/7366/National_Education_and_the_Arts_Statement_-_September_2007.pdf

Curriculum Council of Western Australia. (1998). Curriculum Framework: Curriculum Council of Western Australia.

Ewing, R. (2010). The arts and Australian education: realising potential. Retrieved from Camberwell, Victoria: 

Green, B. (2003). Curriculum Inquiry in Australia: Towards a Local Genealogy of the Curriculum Fireld. In W. F. Pinar (Ed.), International Handbook of Curriculum Research. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers.

Hammond, G., & Emery, L. (1994). A Statement on the arts for Australian Schools. Melbourne: Curriculum Corporation (Australia)/Australian Education Council (AEC).

John O'Toole. (1991). In Australia Drama Is... In: NADIE National Arts in Australian Schools Project (NAAS).

MCEETYA Ministerial Council on Education Employment Training and Youth Affairs. (1989). The Hobart Declaration on Schooling. Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs Retrieved from http://www.educationcouncil.edu.au/EC-Publications/EC-Publications-archive/EC-The-Hobart-Declaration-on-Schooling-1989.aspx

MCEETYA Ministerial Council on Education Employment Training and Youth Affairs. (1999). The Adelaide Declaration on National Goals for Schooling in the Twenty-First Century. Retrieved from http://www.mceetya.edu.au/nationalgoals

MCEETYA Ministerial Council on Education Employment Training and Youth Affairs. (2008). The Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians. Retrieved from http://www.mceetya.edu.au/verve/_resources/National_Declaration_on_the_Educational_Goals_for_Young_Australians.pdf

McLean, J. (1996). An Aesthetic Framework in Drama: issues and Implications. Brisbane: NADIE National Association for Drama in Education (Australia).

NAAE. (2019/1998, 2003). More than words can say – a view of literacy through the arts. Retrieved from https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5c7763c2778897204743a4c4/t/5ce4e34ad77bf50001a63f5c/1558504312124/MTWCS_2019.pdf

Osberg, D. (2008). The Politics in Complexity. Guest Editorial. Journal of the Canadian Association of Curriculum Studies, 6(1), iii-xiv. 

Pascoe, R. (2009). Postscript to Special Edition Drama Curriculum: looking forward. NJ (Drama Australia Journal), 33(1). 

School Curriculum and Standards Authority (SCSA). (2015). Western Australian P-10 Arts Syllabus. Retrieved from http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/p-10-curriculum/curriculum-browser/the-arts

UNESCO. (2010). Seoul Agenda: Goals for the Development of Arts Education. Retrieved from http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=41117&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

What's so special about graphic novels? (November 2010). Retrieved from http://splash.abc.net.au/home#!/media/1249323/what-s-so-special-about-graphic-novels-