ABSTRACT
The Effect of Art Appreciation Activity Using VTS
on Visual Literacy of 5-year-old Children
by
Kwon Dong-soon
Major in Museum and Art Gallery Education
Graduate School of Education
Kyungin University of Education
(Supervised by professor ...
ABSTRACT
The Effect of Art Appreciation Activity Using VTS
on Visual Literacy of 5-year-old Children
by
Kwon Dong-soon
Major in Museum and Art Gallery Education
Graduate School of Education
Kyungin University of Education
(Supervised by professor : Ahn Geum-hee)
The modern society is an era in which numerous images are produced through the spread of image-based culture and communicated through images, so visual literacy is required to understand, utilize, and create visual images in life. In accordance with the changes of the times, changes in art appreciation education methods that can increase visual literacy are required in art museums and early childhood education sites.
Eisner(1972) and Feldman(1970) said that language enables appreciation of works of art, and is not only a tool of appreciation, but also plays an important function in the process of human thinking in understanding, remembering, representing and applying works(Ko Youngja, 2012). Based on this argument, Feldman's art criticism method has been proposed as a teaching and learning method for art appreciation education and has been used in the field of early childhood education not only in Korea elementary school art textbooks, but also in the scholarship material for art appreciation activities developed by the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development in 2005. Many researchers, including Ko Young-ja(2012), Jeong Su-in, Kim Hyun-ju(2014), Kim Seong-hee, and Bae Yul-mi(2016), found that art appreciation activities using Feldman's art criticism method have positive effects on children's creativity, drawing and language skills. However, Park Da-eun's(2018) study suggests that the Feldman art criticism method is not an appropriate teaching method not only for children but also for teachers, and as a result of this researcher's application in the kindergarten education field, it was determined that Feldman's art criticism method was not an appropriate in art appreciation for children. Therefore, I would like to propose Visual Thinking Strategies(VTS), an art appreciation method that helps 5-year-old children to read visual images through free dialogue and develop their thinking skills and language.
As an implementation study of qualitative research, this study examines the progress of VTS and its educational effects through literature research in order to apply art appreciation activities using VTS to the kindergarten field. Also the study focuses on the competencies of visual literacy and visual literacy related to VTS. As a result, it was found that the competencies of visual literacy, such as perceptual sensitivity, visual reasoning, considering various possibilities, aesthetic openness, and narrative development of personal experiences, are highly related to VTS.
Based on this thesis, I modified and supplemented the VTS program to suit 5-year-old children and reorganized the class and applied it to the field. This program was conducted over a total of eight sessions for five children aged 5 years old at P Kindergarten in Gimpo City. All content materials were recorded the conversations between 5-year-old children when appreciating works by time, language activities that help personal interpretation after appreciation, interviews for 5-year-old children and parents before and after the program, and group interviews for 5-year-old children about the revision of the first question of VTS after appreciation of the works of the 4th and 8th sessions. As a supervisor, I led classes every time, and wrote a study journal by taking notes on the behaviors and characteristics of 5-year-old children in the process of appreciating works. All collected data were transcribed, recorded and stored on a computer, and analyzed through a qualitative research and analysis process.
As a result of the analysis, the effects of art appreciation activities using VTS on 5-year-old children's visual literacy were as follows. First, it showed the improvement of 5-year-old children's perceptual sensitivity. Perceptual sensibility means observational power. As the number of times of appreciation increased, the time to observe quietly and focus increased, and it developed from simple observation to detailed and elaborate observation, and the number of observation elements and formative elements mentioned by the 5-year-old children increased. Second, it showed improvement of 5-year-old children' visual reasoning ability. In the early stages of the program, there was a lack of observational power, prior knowledge, and experience. However, it can be seen that as the number of times of appreciation increases, the visual reasoning based on the pre-knowledge or experience of the child and the observational elements in the work increases. Third, the attitude of young children to accept the diversity of interpretation of works has improved. During the first session, an infant responded to a friend who had a different idea from him/herself, saying 'Does it make sense?' The children responded with ‘Sound that makes sense' or ‘It’s nonsense.’ However, as the sessions progress, they responded with the same reactions such as ‘It could be’ and ‘Oh good.’ In addition, when a friend presents an opinion that is different from his/her own opinion, various possibilities of interpretation are provided, such as correcting his/her opinion, refuting the opinion of another friend by listening to the evidence, or organizing the opinion by adding his/her opinion to the friend's opinion. The attitude of acceptance has been improved. Fourth, the aesthetic openness of 5-year-old children increased. As the number of times in appreciation of works increased, the conversation time for 5-year-old children to appreciate works increased, and in a comparison between before and after the program for five children, the number of 5-year-old children who wanted to go to an art gallery rather than an amusement park changed from 0 to 3. In addition, the children tried to use the image as a way of sharing their thoughts with other people, recognizing that their friends, who were not confident in art expression, express their thoughts as images and that anyone can express them differently. To this end, a small art museum using VTS for children, a form of group activity with friends, was conducted. The accumulation of aesthetic experiences influenced aesthetic openness, which is consistent with the assertion that the accumulation of aesthetic experiences is necessary in order for the stage of aesthetic development to develop to the next stage, which Hausen said.
As discussed above, it was found that art appreciation activities using VTS had significant positive effects on 5-year-old children's visual literacy. As a suggestion for supplementing this study, first, a follow-up study on appreciation education in museums is needed through collaboration between kindergartens and art museums in the local community. Because this study was only observed in the classroom due to Covid-19, 5-year-old children did not experience the sympathetic and emotional feelings of the original work. Since appreciation in the classroom is different from appreciating the works directly at the museum, I hope that a follow-up study conducted at the museum will proceed.
Second, this study was conducted to only five children aged 5 years old out of twenty six students in a class. Therefore, it is hoped that a follow-up study on art appreciation activities for small groups using VTS, which I attempted with the voluntary participation of 5-year-old children will be conducted. The art appreciation method using VTS will be useful in early childhood education institutions since VTS is a useful method for young children who do not know the text. Therefore I hope that a follow-up study to compare the age differences of children aged 3, 4, and 5 who attend kindergarten will proceed.
Considering these findings and suggestions, I hope that various discussions on art appreciation education using VTS in early childhood education and follow-up studies on art museum education will continue.