Transformative Learning for Pre-Service Teachers: When too much Art Education is Barely Enough!

Education ‘in’ and ‘through’ the arts has been identified as a powerful vehicle in assisting students to understand their world and providing students with a range of positive influences on approaches and attitudes to learning. Growing evidence indicates that educators should seriously consider the role the arts can play in their pedagogical practice, regardless of the age group of students or the learning discipline that they teach. In this paper the authors outline how the arts take on a pivotal role in a unique pre-service teacher education program based in rural Victoria, Australia. After completing their undergraduate qualification, students embark on a twelve month graduate studies program, which enables them to teach all levels in primary and post-primary schools, specialising in at least one subject area in the later years of schooling. During their course of study in the program all students are required to undertake both visual and performing arts as a learning discipline. Due to the diversity of backgrounds and undergraduate degrees with which students enter the course, there are many who have reservations about the arts. The course provides a variety of learning and teaching approaches that challenge, and aim to break down, mythconceptions about the arts. In examining a range of evidence, such as evaluations of the course and the authors teaching practice, journal entries and work produced by students a picture is emerging that something transformative is occurring. Something potent that encourages the development of a respectful disposition that is both sensitive to the arts and provides the confidence and skill to incorporate meaningful arts learning as part of an educator’s pedagogical repertoire