Inclusion of arts education in public schools has been a topic of widespread debate over the past fifty years in America. Many people wonder how the arts could ever be considered as equally essential to childhood learning as other, more prominent academic subjects. This section seeks to depict that children are vessels of learning and creativity. Art, it seems, is an important part of developing their hearts and minds.
The Impact of Arts Education upon Children
This video portrays the positive impact that dance has upon children. Dancing is a powerful tool of expression and communication. It also has the potential to be wonderfully freeing, lightening the heavy burdens that children in poverty may have weighing on their hearts. In the words of West Chester University psychologist Eleanor Brown, “Our study is the first we know of that demonstrates that the arts may help alleviate the impact of poverty on children’s physiological functioning." Eleanor Brown is the study’s primary investigator, and she writes in the journal Child Development (4). Minutes 3:20 to 11:55 in particular pertain to this concept. "Ana Nery Fragosa, one of the dance instructors featured in the video, states, "Dance is social in nature. You know, you can do solos, but most of the time we dance together. We dance with other people. We work a lot on how to work with each other, how to talk to each other, how to give positive comments to each other, how to phrase suggestions in a way that helps each other" (13:45) (2).