What is Teaching the Arts about?
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In the twenty-fi rst century, the educational landscape is changing quickly. With changing global economic
priorities, population shifts and demographics, education is once again being recognised as a
leading agent of change. Th e Arts, more than ever before, are needed for creative solutions, shared
communication and social and personal development. STEM may well develop technologies, but it is
the Creative Arts that will discover them fi rst.
Too often, the Arts have been marginalised or perceived to be elite. Th is fourth edition has been
signifi cantly updated to further empower all teachers and Initial Teacher Education (ITE) students
to not only have knowledge of teaching the Arts, but security and confi dence to do so successfully,
to allow their students to be successful, ongoing learners. At the time of writing this edition, there
is a call to educate more Mathematics and Science teachers for secondary schools from the highest
education offi cial in Australia. Th ere is a quote misattributed to Albert Einstein that states the defi -
nition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting a diff erent outcome. Yet this is
where many Western education systems are at the moment. Rather than attempting bold moves to
enable imaginative and creative solutions to seemingly intractable problems, they merely seek to give
us more of the same.