Abstract:

Using previously learned vocabulary to describe artwork is a skill third grade classroom teachers rarely develop in their students. Describing an artwork in writing is an interdisciplinary skill that meets national and state standards as well as a skill students may need practice doing. This study explores four classroom teachers in one school with various reported backgrounds and interests in art and compares these teachers' reported art interest with the skills their students apply to describe an artwork using formal art elements. This mixed methods study surveyed four teachers and their seventy-one students at a low-income elementary school in a large metropolitan southwestern city. The study's hypothesis, that the teachers' reported art interest would correlate with higher scores from their students on a writing activity, was not confirmed. This study considers alternative factors that might account for higher scores achieved by students whose teachers did not report a strong interest or background in art.