Wendi Callaway
142 Alaska Street
Wills Point, Texas 75169
(903)873-3099
Re: NAEA Research Commission Grant
Dear Sir or Madam,
I am writing to you to request a grant for $20,000 to be issued to me for the purposes of research in the field of Arts education. I am currently an art educator on the high school level. I intend to begin work on my Doctoral degree in Art Education in January of 2003. I would like to conduct a research project in the high school where I am employed. This research is explained fully in the accompanying research proposal. Basically, it will answer the following questions:
This research would be conducted during the months between September and May, by myself and one other qualified person. Visual communication is abundant in this society and an integral part of it; yet, the necessity for knowledge and appreciation of this aspect of existence is taken for granted by so many. People should consider this society without art. For the purposes of research, the term “art” includes everything from entertainment, such as museums, galleries, movies, theater, photography, magazines, music, and television to advertising, such as billboards, business ads, consumer products, shopping, and the Internet. Also included in the use of this term are newspapers, commercials, architecture, product design, interior design, landscaping, as well as many other things (Canaday, 1987). Art encompasses many aspects of society; yet, most people do not perceive it in that way. Without these things, there is practically nothing. This is solely the basis for stressing the importance of the arts in society and more specifically, the importance of arts education in schools (Hicks, 2001). For these reasons, the effects of integrating visual and performing arts in all subject areas on all levels will be investigated, especially on the secondary level, through action research.
In the BCATA Journal for Art Teachers, several articles discuss the effects of arts integration. One particular example explains how technology, combined with art, can facilitate the integration of the arts into all subject areas. Other articles describe ways to integrate arts into food science, botany, language arts, social studies, science and mathematics (1996). Visual art is the basis for mathematics and language, when cavemen used to draw pictures on cave walls to communicate with each other and to indicate the numbers in their herds, etc. The concepts of proportion, based on the Golden Mean, and perspective were developed by architects in the Renaissance era (Kleiner, 1996). Dance and theater-type storytelling existed before language. Ancient peoples used body language to communicate events to each other and ritual dances to communicate with the gods. Storytelling and folk tales were once a way of comparing different cultures and translating history, as were murals, which depicted the events of the Bible as well as other events (Cornett, 1999). When stories were first translated into books by the Celts, they were mostly illustrated. Mechanical devices were first designed on paper by artists like Leonardo da Vinci (Kleiner, 1996). Theatrical plays first originated in Greece in 356 B. C. as rituals and celebrations to the gods. The visual and performing arts date back thousands of years to the very core of human existence (Brockett, 1999). The arts are fundamental components of all cultures and time periods. “Very little that has come down through the ages has not in some way filtered through something that we can all identify as the arts” (Cornett, 1999). Yet, today, these things are considered trivial in most circles. These are just a few of the reasons why I believe this research is necessary, and why it should be done in as many secondary schools as possible.
Thank you,
Wendi Callaway
Addresses:
Terrell High School
400 Poetry Road
Terrell, Texas 75140
Phone number: 972-563-7525
Email: artonthemove_2000@yahoo.com