Picasso for kids
7234
New technique tried
A five-year-old boy in Kansas City liked the pictures his kindergarten teacher showed in class. Could he have one for his birthday?
Mother checked—and discovered the teacher was showing slides of paintings by Cezanne, Picasso, Renoir. The boy settled for a color reproduction.
The teacher was proving a point to be stressed Oct. 22 at a kindergarten conference at the University of Kansas—children can learn more than adults have given them credit for, and kindergarten teachers need to be aware of the possibilities.
Consider the hours of beadstringing, says Prof. Evelyn Swartz, a KU elementary education professor who has spent more than two years guiding research programs with kindergarten children. Prof. Phil Rueschhoff, in art education, shared the research.
"Most of the time bead-stringing tends to be busy-work—something which keeps the kids quiet
"But a teacher who knows her job can use beads to teach counting, design, eye-hand coordination, even simple geometry."
Prof. Swartz uses similar techniques in teaching five-year-olds. For example, the teacher will give a student two pieces of tile—one rough, one smooth. The student is told to feel both, then look at them. Five-year-olds are quite capable of making the mental shift from the "here-now" of the tiles to the abstract concept of smooth and rough and what each looks like.
Then the colored slides of the great art works are introduced, and the children study Van Gogh to see how Van Gogh made a canvas look smooth or rough.
Some very unscholarly questions immediately arise. Why should children study great art? If they can learn more, why not teach them to read earlier?
Before a child can learn to read, he must be able to "conceptualize," or be able to look at this page with printing on it and call up a mental image of "newspaper," or the abstract notion of "read."
Adults tend to take this ability for granted—they've been doing it for years. Children haven't—and that ability, essential for reading,
is what Prof. Swartz' methods teach.
"Just shoving the first-grade program down into kindergarten is not the answer," Prof. Swartz declares.
Besides the ability to conceptualize, children learn vocabulary—they know more words, many of them art terms—to use when they do start learning to read. That makes reading easier and less frustrating to children—and therefore more fun.
Today's children aren't really any smarter than the children of 10-15 years ago, Prof. Swartz says. But they are different, and television had something to do with it—a kind of mixed blessing.
"Children travel more, they see more things today than they did 15 years ago," she said. And children with more experiences have an easier time learning to use concepts and to think in terms of remote objects.
"What child today doesn't know something about space flight?" Prof. Swartz asks. "They know there is something beyond the here and now."
Dwight Boring* says...
"You get so much more for your insurance dollars from College Life's famous policy, THE BENEFACTOR, because College Life insures only College men and college men are preferred risks. Let me tell you more."
*DWIGHT BORING
2020 Harvard Lawrence, Kansas Phone VI 2-0767
representing THE COLLEGE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY OF AMERICA
... the only Company selling exclusively to College Men
TUNNEY TROPHY
NEW YORK — (UPI)— The Tunney-Muldoon Trophy was established in October, 1928, by Gene Tunney on his retirement as heavyweight boxing champion. William Muldoon was the chairman of the New York Boxing Commission.
When You're in Doubt—Try It Out, Kansan Classifieds.
14
Daily Kansan Thursday, October 20, 1966
Gallant, this new breed of trousers the Proprietor has assembled for the Gentleman's autumn wardrobe. Fearlessly defying wrinkles, redoubtable against sag and bag, they are premanently pressed, b'gad! Knightly garments, eminently suited for daily wear!
University Shop
On The Hill
THE Town Shop