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Arts educators from across the state gathered at Meredith College on Sept. 7 for the Comprehensive Arts Education Conference to discuss best practices and resources associated with the N.C. Department of Public Instruction’s (DPI) updated standards for the arts disciplines.
During the conference, educators participated in various sessions regarding ideas for lesson planning, arts integration across subjects, teaching resources, and more.
“As an arts educator, you shape well-rounded individuals who are not only academically capable, but also emotionally and socially aware, creative, and culturally literate,” said state Superintendent Catherine Truitt in a video message played at the event. “This conference is such an incredible way for you all to meet colleagues from around the state while collaborating and learning from one another.”
Many conference sessions allowed arts educators to participate in interactive lesson plans demonstrating how the new standards could be implemented in the classroom. Some sessions focused on interdisciplinary arts integration in subjects like math or history.
One session led by Leslie Burwell, a visual arts teacher at Northwood High School in Chatham County, showed how educators can integrate multiple arts disciplines into a single lesson activity. Participants got the chance to create living “sculptures” out of scrap materials using sound, movement, and color, and then analyzed the sculptures.
“We’re going to give them past, present, and future ideas of what connecting is,” Burwell said. “Then the innovation (in) creation is more of that creative cycle that we do in inquiry-based teaching.”
More on new standards
In July, the State Board of Education approved the new art standard courses of study for music, dance, visual arts, and theater.
The current standards, approved in 2010, will remain in effect during the 2024-25 school year. The updated standards are expected to start being implemented during the 2025-26 school year, according to DPI, with full implementation taking place during the 2026-27 school year.
Lori Carlin, DPI section chief for social studies and arts education, said the updated standards provide minimum content guidelines for what educators should teach in the classroom.
DPI has identified three components of a comprehensive instruction for all four arts disciplines, which include arts education, arts integration, and arts exposure.
“Without any one portion, the entire thing falls apart,” Brandon Roeder, K-12 music and theater arts consultant for DPI, said at the conference.
During the event, presenters also said that all of the arts standards are separated into four major strands: Create, Present, Respond, Connect. The use of these sections aligns with those used by the National Coalition for Arts Standards, Roeder said, which many educator preparation programs study.
“Most educators, regardless of where they come from across the nation — if they are new teachers — they are experienced in the ideas of create, present, respond, and connect,” Roeder said. “So this will better prepare our brand new teachers to make the leap from studying standards to implementing standards.”
Each of the strands can be applied to all artistic disciplines and are composed of two standards each, resulting in eight total standards for arts educators.
Each of the eight standards focus on a learning objective and essential questions for students, which can be found on DPI’s arts education resource hub.
Laura Stauderman, K-12 dance and visual arts consultant for DPI, said the standards feature “through lines” which can connect learning within an arts discipline throughout a student’s educational journey, from kindergarten through high school.
“(It) really shows, what are these skills that we’re building within the theme of this objective, and how has the student been scaffolding on their learning?” Stauderman said.
As part of educational efforts on the new standards, DPI will host a webinar on Sept. 17 to provide resources and help educators better understand the new standards.
