Visual Thinking Strategies: Using Art to Deepen Learning Across School Disciplines - Softcover

Yenawine, Philip

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1612506097 ISBN 13: 9781612506098

Publisher: Harvard Education Press, 2013

Synopsis

“What’s going on in this picture?”

With this one question and a carefully chosen work of art, teachers can start their students down a path toward deeper learning and other skills now encouraged by the Common Core State Standards. The Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) teaching method has been successfully implemented in schools, districts, and cultural institutions nationwide, including bilingual schools in California, West Orange Public Schools in New Jersey, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

It provides for open-ended yet highly structured discussions of visual art, and significantly increases students’ critical thinking, language, and literacy skills along the way.

Philip Yenawine, former education director of New York’s Museum of Modern Art and cocreator of the VTS curriculum, writes engagingly about his years of experience with elementary school students in the classroom. He reveals how VTS was developed and demonstrates how teachers are using art—as well as poems, primary documents, and other visual artefacts—to increase a variety of skills, including writing, listening, and speaking, across a range of subjects.

The book shows how VTS can be easily and effectively integrated into elementary classroom lessons in just ten hours of a school year to create learner-centred environments where students at all levels are involved in rich, absorbing discussions.

About this title

Review

"Eloquently written and easily accessible, the book is organized in a way that permits teachers working in a broad variety of settings to be successful, including those working with English-language learners, special education populations, and others." -- S.T. Schroth, CHOICE

"Visual Thinking Strategies allows teachers to help students grasp unfamiliar material, define new problems and find innovative solutions collaboratively, while giving students what Yenawine calls 'permission to wonder, ' Full of real-life and classroom examples, this is an insightful and inspiring book, valuable to schoolteachers, museum educators and parents alike." -- John Strand, Museum Magazine

From the Back Cover

"What's going on in this picture?"

With this one question and a carefully chosen work of art, teachers can start their students down a path toward deeper learning and other skills now encouraged by the Common Core State Standards. Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS), a teaching method that has been successfully implemented in schools and cultural institutions nationwide, provides for open-ended discussions of visual art that significantly increase students' critical thinking, language, and literacy skills.

Philip Yenawine, former education director of New York's Museum of Modern Art and cocreator of the VTS curriculum, writes engagingly about his years of experience with elementary school students in the classroom. He reveals how VTS was developed and demonstrates how teachers are using art--as well as poems, primary documents, and other visual artifacts--to increase a variety of skills.

This book shows how VTS can be easily and effectively integrated into elementary classroom lessons in just ten hours of a school year to create learner-centered environments where students at all levels are involved in rich, absorbing discussions.

"You don't have to convince me of the power art has to open the mind to new ways of seeing and thinking. I'm sold on Visual Thinking Strategies. This insightful book unpacks a technique that transforms classrooms into engaging, exciting laboratories for the critical thinking and communication skills our children need to master." -- Daniel Pink, author of To Sell Is Human and A Whole New Mind

"Practical and inspirational, this is arts integration for the twenty-first century. Distinguished museum educator Philip Yenawine presents a persuasive argument for using the art discussion approach called Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) to develop the sophisticated thinking skills required by the Common Core. A lively blend of theory and practice, this book shows how VTS has sparked creative teaching in schools across the country." -- Peggy Burchenal, Esther Stiles Eastman Curator of Education and Public Programs, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Philip Yenawine is cofounder of Visual Understanding in Education, a nonprofit research organization that trains teachers to use VTS.

Edition details

• Publisher: Harvard Education Press
• Publication date: 2013
• ISBN 10: 1612506097
• ISBN 13: 9781612506098
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 208