The Heart and the Journey: Case Studies of Collaboration for Arts Integrated Curricula

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to begin to articulate a model for collaborative arts integration curricula that honor the value of creative and critical thinking in the arts. This work is intended to extend the work of such writers as Liora Bresler, Nick Rabkin and Robin Redmond, and Larry Scripp,' all of whom have provided studies to examine and categorize arts are integrated into curricula. From these researchers (and others^) we have learned that arts integration can be a powerful force in children's lives and learning. Arts-integrated curricula can provide meaningful and powerful learning experiences for students of all ages and capabilities. Unfortunately, when arts integration is poorly organized and implemented the results may be less powerful and can be frustrating to teachers.^ There has been little research on the ways that the more positive and powerful curricula are developed and implemented; neither the collaborative relationships nor the influences external to the teaching partnerships have been documented in depth to leam such programs can be developed and maintained. This paper presents both challenges and possibilities in collaborations between arts and nonarts organizations and teachers by examining the process of curriculum development in two case studies. In this study, two collaborative programs were examined to see what made the partnerships work. The initial guiding questions for this study were What is the nature of the curricula that develops through the partnerships? What is the process of collaboration between the arts-teachers and the on-arts teachers? and topical queries that helped shape initial interviews and data collection. These were inquiries about the choices of partners and program participants, the participants' beliefs about what should be learned and how, the stakes of the participants and organizations, the developing relationships, teaching strategies used in the classroom, student responses to the experience, and the programs themselves determined whether the collaborations were successful. A grounded theory approach was used to take the rich data collected from observations, interviews, and artifacts to discover patterns in the interactions between organizations, teachers, students, and instructional content. The purpose of grounded theory research is to use discoveries from data to generate theories that explain how and why in a meaningful context, rather than to situate data within the context of known theories.'* Where previous writing has often focused on the products of curricular partnerships and on models of curricular content to show teachers can design arts integration curricula,' this article examines the process of collaboration, the how and why the partnerships worked as they did.