The visual arts in the New Zealand Curriculum constitute a wide range of fields, including sculpture, painting, printmaking, photography, design, electronic media and film, and the history of art. Students become increasingly literate in the visual arts as they learn from example, practise ways of working, and explore and reflect on the conceptual, perceptual, and practical processes of two-dimensional, three-dimensional, and time-based art.
Students learn in, through, and about the various forms and processes of the visual arts. Through practical work and a study of others' art, they learn to make objects and images, to source and develop ideas, and to communicate and interpret meaning. They come to understand visual art works as social and historical texts as they investigate the contexts in which the visual arts are made, used, and valued.
Education in the visual arts may include the art forms of all cultures, past and present. In Aotearoa New Zealand, all students should have opportunities to learn about traditional and contemporary Māori art forms.
As makers and viewers, students gain knowledge about the content, structure, and meaning of art works and develop visual literacy in their representation and "reading" of the visual world. They develop appropriate critical skills and understandings as they analyse and question the parameters of visual arts practice.
The Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum, page 71
http://www.tki.org.nz/r/arts/curriculum/statement/pg71_e.php
The visual arts in the New Zealand curriculum
The exemplars for the visual arts represent a selection of the art forms students are expected to learn about in the visual arts. In addition, the exemplars have been selected so that, as a group, they cover learning in each of the strands of The Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum and in a variety of significant learning ideas and contexts. Each exemplar focuses on one key aspect of learning and illustrates other key aspects.
Collectively, the exemplars for the visual arts are intended to:
- support teaching
- indicate progression
- provide a framework for ongoing formative practices.
They are not offered as a programme of learning in their own right.
Teachers are encouraged to relate these exemplars directly to The Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum and to the Ministry of Education's resource materials in print and electronic formats and online.
See
References
Resources
The visual arts exemplars can also be viewed on the double CD-ROM The New Zealand Curriculum Exemplars: The Arts on CD-ROM (item 30154) that was distributed to New Zealand schools with the print versions of the exemplars.
Introducing the visual arts exemplars
Level 1
Clay Animals
This exemplar demonstrates both drawing and sculptural experiences. Drawing is valued for its own sake and also as preparation for a sculptural experience.
The teacher focuses the students' learning particularly on developing practical understanding and skills through exploring the visual arts elements.
They first use drawing techniques, focusing on the elements of line, point, shape, form, and texture. Next, they use sculpting techniques with clay, focusing on the elements of line, point, shape, forms, and textures and referring to their drawings for visual information. (Print, CD-ROM, online)
Pictures of Greedy Cat
This exemplar clearly illustrates the level of dialogue that can be attained at level 1 when students are responding to an art work.
Revisiting illustration after related work earlier in the same year, the children consider how the artist works and what messages her work conveys. Their teacher leads them through the process using rich questioning techniques. (CD-ROM, online)
Level 2
A Strip of Aotearoa
This exemplar shows students using overlapping to convey the element of space and incorporating Māori symbolism with an understanding of its meaning and significance to Māori. Students use two types of drawing media: coloured pencils and vivid markers. They incorporate their responses to several motivations into a vertical image, sorting subject matter into three identifiable zones. (Print, CD-ROM, online)
Colonial Houses
In this exemplar, the students' learning focuses on changing the scale of objects to convey foreground and background (the element of space). They incorporate and build on the concept of using overlapping to convey depth, as seen in A Strip of Aotearoa.
The exemplar is drawn from an integrated technology/visual arts learning experience in which the students researched and made drawings of early New Zealand houses. In a visual arts extension, they focus on the elements of texture and space in creating a collograph print. (CD-ROM, online)
Emotional Cats
This exemplar demonstrates the ways in which students develop ideas to convey an intention and create sculptures using paper-construction techniques.
The students consider how visual arts elements and principles can be used to convey emotion. In a preceding science learning experience, they studied how cats convey emotion through their body language and expressions. This learning informed their approaches to making cat masks that convey emotions. (CD-ROM, online)
Level 3
Animated Animals
This exemplar demonstrates the students' ability to use time-based art processes.
The students were asked to create an animated sequence based on aspects of the life of a native New Zealand animal in an integrated science (conservation)/visual arts unit. They developed their ideas through observation and research, using electronic media to explore the process of animation. (CD-ROM, online)
Gabled Constructions and Māori Figure Forms
This exemplar shows students working in a richly cultural context as they explore customary and contemporary Māori approaches to representing the figure and its placement in relation to architecture. They make their own responses, incorporating the figure in a shallow gabled construction. They use Māori or Pasifika motifs to personalise their work. (Print, CD-ROM, online)
Level 4
Killeen Meets Siapo
This exemplar shows students exploring ways of using symbolism.
They create patterns that incorporate customary and contemporary approaches to siapo and personal symbols. These patterns are used to decorate cut-out shapes based on the work of Richard Killeen. (Print, CD-ROM, online)
A Story from Italy
This exemplar demonstrates students developing ideas in response to a design brief.
The students were asked to select an incident from a given story and design the layout for a page that includes an illustration and associated text and that clearly conveys the sense of the incident. (CD-ROM, online)
Level 5
Plants as Subject Matter
This exemplar demonstrates:
- the students' understanding of the conventions used by the artists they have chosen to study
- the students' ability to make links between social contexts and related art works.
The students were asked to explore the concepts of appropriation and influence. They created a richly layered complex composition incorporating customary Māori designs and the approaches of contemporary Māori, Pacific, Pakeha, and American artists. (Print, CD-ROM, online)
Reference
Ministry of Education (2001). The Arts in the New Zealand Curriculum. Wellington: Learning Media.
Print version of visual arts teachers' notes (PDF, 64kb)
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