The Importance Of Art In Education

"Art is all around us" is an interesting saying that shows us the diversity and versatility of one of the most essential part of human beings. Art is the product of human activities and has an ability to enrich people 's lives. Art has been created since time began, evidenced in cave paintings and rock art, and still has a great impact almost on every field of human life.There may be various opinions of why we need art, although many will agree that art helps us have a full range of expressions, it helps us better understand who we are and where we are coming from, it makes us complete human beings and connects us with the world around us.

According to the New York State Education Department Office of Bilingual Education and Foreign languages Studies (2010), the growing interest in second language learning make teachers find more creative and beneficial ways to engage their students in learning process. Thus, art becomes an invaluable tool for EFL teachers. It provides EFL teachers with great opportunities for discussions, focused language learning and skill-based activities. Art helps students challenge their intellect, provide them with diverse experiences in exploration, analysis, observation, imagination, reflection, experimentation, communication, and so forth.

Using art in EFL classroom

Guggenheim Museum in New York, the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, and various universities and education program departments all over the world paid a great attention to the integration of art in ESL learning classrooms. Some of this museums consultants prepared curriculum models to help ESL teachers, some of them conducted trainings for teachers in order to provide them with skills needed to teach English through art. Different universities made research to figure out whether using art in education may have a positive impact on students ' language learning ability and help them become better