After watching most of the Art presentations in the class, one that struck out to me and connected to me a lot was Olivia’s presentation. I loved the approach she addressed art from, relating art to the hospital and sick kids. It was really touching to understand her perspective on art and how she had a personal experience with a friend of her’s being ill. It was interesting how she saw art in the hospital, on walls. I did see art from a different perspective when I was looking at the murals, they are colorful and happy. If I were a child that was in the hospital sick, I would enjoy seeing those murals. These murals are a way to distract the children from the pain they are in, allowing them to feel happy inside. I think this a great escape for the children. If art didn’t continue to exist and be recognized, children couldn’t experience this. Art I believe should be recognized in a variety of places, and I think that it was awesome to see a hospital using the power of imagination and skill to design murals for these children. I loved how she set up her presentation with images of her and her friend that was sick, as well as actual pictures of the murals themselves. I took great attention to the detail and abstract that these murals had. I think overall Liv did a great job with her art project, showing a different perspective that art can bring to people.

Link to Olivia’s presentation:

My Personal Experience With Art

For this blog post, I had to “connect the parts.” After using They Say/I Say I was able to further address my essay. I highlighted my claim sentences in yellow, the points of focus in pink, and the transition sentences in blue. I also realized after re-reading my essay that I have repeated the word “focus” a lot in my essay. This specific exercise in They Say/I Say helped me realize the words that are often repetitive. I can now go back when I am editing it again, to make sure I incorporate other words besides “focus”, as there are many synonyms I can use instead.

I noticed that I have errors that can be fixed within my essay. I can improve my paper a lot, by just directing my attention on the little things. I think that if I focus on my claims, and have the proper evidence to back it up, all while incorporating a strong opinion, I will have a better written essay.

A specific paragraph I know that I will need to spend some more time working on, is my conclusion. I have some ideas about how I am going to approach it, I just have to focus on wrapping up the essay in a strong way. I know that I need to address the authors and their stance with art, as well as my own opinion. Doing that, I would have a strong conclusion and a great way to end my thoughts.

The main focus that Jonah Lehrer has is the implementation of art in the sciences. His argument centers the idea that the educational system should be recreated to incorporate art in the subjects. He even has examples that help him in supporting his argument. His ideas are to change the current STEM model in education to the STEAM model, the A being Art. He states in his article that there are often unanswered questions in science, and with the help of art it could reveal more answers. I noticed that Lehrer tied emotions into his explanation of the effectiveness of art. There are lots of emotions that can be revealed with incorporating art, and this is a very beneficial idea that can tie into the sciences and elaborative thinking. This would open up and allow a student to focus on the bigger picture while still staying with the main idea of study. He mentions that the skills that come from art- collaboration, flexible thinking, and disciplined imagination, allow a student to be successful in the sciences. The way the author incorporated these two subjects together made me think about the benefit students could have if the educational model was changed. His idea about creating a culture that derives from both science and art, gives way to a successful future a student could have if this idea was implemented in the educational setting. All professions could benefit from this change, as student’s would have the skills needed to conquer complex tasks in their jobs.

Glossing the text

Heisenberg uncertainty principle: any of a variety of mathematical inequalities asserting a fundamental limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties of a particle, known as complementary variables such as position x and momentum p, can be known

Bridging principle: How a pair of concepts are connected but also focused on separately, containing similarities and differences between the two

Reductionism: the practice of analyzing and describing a complex phenomenon in terms of phenomena that are held to represent a simpler or more fundamental level, especially when this is said to provide a sufficient explanation

Synapse: a junction between two nerve cells, consisting of a minute gap across which impulses pass by diffusion of a neurotransmitter.

Epiphenomenon: a secondary effect or byproduct that arises from but does not causally influence a process, in particular

Holistic perspective: a perspective in which many different factors are taken into account to generate a picture of the culture as a whole

Metaphor: a thing regarded as representative or symbolic of something else, especially something abstract

Bolster: support or strengthen; prop up

Qualia: the internal and subjective component of sense perceptions, arising from stimulation of the senses by phenomena

I chose to look up Richard Feynman and Virginia Woolf. Richard Feynman was a theoretical physicist who formed the quantum mechanics and composed multiple scientific theories as well. Richard Feynman was was of value to research, because his statement in Lehrer’s article was that science has more beneath the eyes, if focused on. He supports the idea that if we have art in science, we are able to focus on the bigger picture instead of the little things. This would build on our understanding of the sciences. Lastly, the second contributor that I researched was Virginia Woolf. She was an English writer recognized as being a powerful writer in the 20th century. She focused on the idea of consciousness and incorporated her ideas in her writing. She was very modern, and her influence can reflect on the idea of combining both the sciences and arts together as one and bringing out the consciousness in education.

The start of Yo-Yo Ma was when his article was first published in January 2014 in Switzerland. From context clues and annotating, I have been able to learn a lot about Yo-Yo Ma. He was a cellist and songwriter, very interested in art since he was very young. Reading his short biography, I noticed that he contributed to positive influencers: Elon Musk and Tony Blair. One concept I enjoyed reading about in his article was his piece on STEM and STEAM. I enjoyed how he talked about education, and how art should be added to the curriculum. His idea is to be able to incorporate the idea of creativity into education, in the form of art for all ages. I believe it is important to continue teaching art, as it it’s complexity is beneficial to students. There is more than just STEM: science, technology, engineering, and math. Art as stated in the article art focuses on concepts such as “integration, collaboration, flexible thinking, and disciplined imagination” that add to a student’s learning. Understanding the STEAM model, I never really realized the impact that art could have on a student’s learning. I am in favor with Yo-Yo Ma’s ideas and concepts, as they are only beneficial to one’s education, and do not hinder their overall learning. His ideas are elaborated nicely in his essay, and get the reader like me really thinking about what art could bring to society if it was accepted and appreciated more. The purpose of this essay is to demonstrate the positive effects that art can have on society, varying from education to everyday life. The scope is greatly expanded, as the author mentions lots of aspects that add to art. The purpose of the scope is to integrate art in the educational system, possibly changing STEM to STEAM. I believe if we had more art in everyday life, it would improve our futures and the world. The question that Yo-Yo Ma presents is whether art should be introduced and focused on in the educational system. The author is trying to convey the message of art, and the benefits it had. This new way of thinking provided by Yo-Yo Ma, will enhance our minds and get student’s and educators believing in the power of art.

The three words I glossed and discovered in the text were:

Interdependence: The dependence of two or more people or things on each other

Empirically: By means of observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic

Tandem: Having two things arranged one in front of the other

(Definitions obtained from Google Dictionary)