Teaching the whole brain

Stockdale Elementary School has transformed. Floor to ceiling artwork lines hallways and adorns tables. A harpist strums softly in the library as a fifth-grade student plays classical music in front of a Michaelangelo display in the multi-purpose room.

It isn’t the Louvre or the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but tell that to the parents strolling among the vast, one-of-a-kind pieces of artwork on display at Panama-Buena Vista Union School District and Stockdale Elementary School’s first ever “Night at the Museum” event March 12.

The artwork isn’t what one would associate with an elementary school. One display is in surrealism, and one wall is dedicated to recreations of “The Son of Man” by René Magritte.

The son of who? Ask the students.

At a school that is small in comparison to others in its district in terms of enrollment and certainly among larger campuses in Bakersfield, students are learning how to think in a big way: by using both the right and left side of the brain.

It isn’t part of a wacky scientific experiment, and the school’s motives aren’t driven by any curriculum-bolstering, standards-boosting ideas implemented to secure funding for special programs.

It’s art. Think Picasso, Van Gogh. And Stockdale Elementary School thinks it’s pretty important.

“It’s a fun program to get kids interested in art from a young age,” said Julie Fleming, artist in residence and the elementary art specialist for the Panama-Buena Vista Union School District. Fleming is a professional artist who has worked for Stockdale Elementary for 17 years, as well as 12 years at Bill L. Williams Elementary School.

The program shuffles 1,500 students per month through Fleming’s door, 300 from the district’s Gifted and Talented Education (GATE) program. No child is too young to start learning elements of art. Students from kindergarten to sixth grade see Fleming once per month for at least an hour, where they are treated to an entire lesson in art, from art history to the actual production of a piece of artwork they can take home that day.

But why art? It must be difficult to justify a non-standards based subject during a budget crisis, but art is something that Stockdale Elementary is not willing to forego.

“Test scores and art studies point out that students who have art in school are better academically and have better focus,” said Fleming.

Stockdale Elementary’s Growth Academic Performance Index (API) report supports that theory. In 2007, the school scored 870, well above the state’s recommended target of 800.

In layman’s terms, they are doing well.

Could art have helped the students learn their core subjects better? Perhaps. But that isn’t groundbreaking news to longtime teachers.

Gayle Steele was a California teacher for 44 years and has watched a decline in the arts in lieu of more academic pursuits.

“Rather than educate the entire student, the whole person, education now is limited to curriculum aimed at meeting California test scores,” said Steele.

California standards testing is a means to measure a student’s progress and is also an indicator of the school’s strengths and weaknesses. Students are tested yearly in English-language arts, mathematics and science. However, according to Steele, the tests cannot measure everything.

“There is no objective test for art. You cannot measure originality and creativity,” said Steele.

Art may not be on the STAR test, but it’s an important part of the curriculum to Stockdale Elementary’s principal of 21 years, Ron Madding, who says that if the current budget crisis ever dictated the dissolution of the art program, his parent club would raise the funds to keep Fleming on campus.

“Julie Fleming makes the students feel successful,” said Madding. “And success breeds success.”

If feeling successful during an art project turns into the confidence to answer a scary question on a math test, or, maybe later, on a job application, perhaps there’s more to art than putting paint to canvas.

“There’s always a kid who’s not good at sports, but he can draw,” said Fleming. “Because of that, he’s somebody. You have to give them an identity.”

There are some things that will never be measured by standards testing.

Family Week essay contribution

Why is my family so important to me? My family is very caring. They love me no matter what.
They treat me like I have a mind. They are very encouraging in everything I do. My family treats me with a lot of respect.
My family cares and loves me for who I am, not what I look like. My family cares if I do something wrong. They love me when I do a bad thing or if I have a bad day. If I need to talk they are there for me. Like I said, they are there for me whenever I need them.
My parents encourage me to do my best in everything I do. No matter what I do, they always are there for me 100 percent. They never let me quit. My parents say I can do anything if I try. They never doubt my abilities, or discourage me.
Those are the reasons why my family is so important to me. They love and care for me. They also encourage me to do my best. I hope nothing ever happens to my parents. I wish to become better parents than they are. Yeah, like that would happen!

Stockdale: The Southwest Voice

Teaching the whole brain

Family Week essay contribution