Evaluation and documentation are critical tools for arts and cultural organizations to identify the most successful arts integration practices as well as build continuing support for arts integration among all stakeholders. The best arts integration programs develop over time, combining promising pedagogical ideas with the experience of teachers and arts specialists, tailored to the needs of particular classrooms and communities.

Below are some suggested purposes for engaging in research:

• Examine how and why educators are able to change their understanding of the role of arts in every classroom
• Examine how changed attitudes translate into changed practice
• Contribute to the collective knowledge about arts in learning
• Contribute to models for alternative assessment
• Participate in sharing research with a wide variety of audiences
• Be able to make statements about the relationship between arts integration and student learning
• Be able to make statements about the relationship between formal research and practitioner research
• Establish a theory of action that will include novice and experienced teachers and artists
  

Suggested primary research questions:

• What are the effects of arts integration on teachers and students?
• What strategies of integration lead to positive results in students?
• What are the transformative interactions within arts integration instruction that actually cause teachers to change their practice?
  

Documentation is critical to improving arts integration practices and building a case for the necessity of such practices in every classroom.

Research from the Field:

Sharing your results is important—it furthers the idea that an arts integrated education can achieve greater levels of success than non-arts integrated programs.

• Arts Integration Frameworks, Research & Practice: A Literature Review
• Arts Survive: A Study of Sustainability in Arts Education Partnerships
• Champions of Change: The Impact of the Arts on Learning
• Creating Quality Integrated and Interdisciplinary Arts Programs
• Critical Links: Learning in the Arts and Student Academic and Social Development
• Envisioning Arts Assessment: A Process Guide for Assessing Arts Education in School Districts and States
• Journal for Music-in-Education
• Learning Partnerships: Improving Learning in Schools with Arts Partners in the Community
• More than Measuring: Program Evaluation as an Opportunity to Build the Capacity of Communities
• Priorities for Arts Education Research
• The Qualities of Quality: Excellence in Arts Education and How to Achieve
• Thriving Minds: Quality in Arts Education
  

Additional Resources in Research/Data Collection:

Arts Education in Public Elementary and Secondary Schools: 1999–2000 (Fast Response Survey System: FRSS)

This report presents information on the characteristics of public elementary and secondary school arts education programs, including data on the availability of instruction in the arts, staffing, funding, supplemental programs and activities, and administrative support of arts education.

Related Links

• Frameworks and Tools for Evaluating Arts in Education