Expanding Our “Frames” of Mind for Education and the Arts

Abstract

In this article, Jennifer Groff explores the role of the arts in education through the lens of current research in cognitive neuroscience and the impact of technology in today's digital world. She explains that although arts education has largely used multiple intelligences theory to substantiate its presence in classrooms and schools, this relationship has ultimately hindered the field of arts education's understanding of the relationship between the arts, human development, and learning. Emerging research on the brain's cognitive processing systems has led Groff to put forth a new theory of mind, whole-mindedness. Here she presents the evidence and construct for this frame of mind, how it sits in relation to multiple intelligences theory, and how it might redefine the justification for arts education in schools, particularly in our digitally and visually rich world.

A Systematic Review: Using Habits of Mind to Improve Student’s thinking in Class

“…support from psychometric findings or a brain susceptibility to a symbol system encoding), resulting into defining seven types of intelligence. Criticizing the theory for many misconceptions, it was further combined with the theory of mind and formulated as the theory of whole-mindedness, using the recent proceedings in cognitive neuroscience (Groff, 2013). The main aspects outlined in a new theory is that intelligence should be associated with certain learning domains while not positioned as the distinct domain type not intersected with other domains.…”

“…The main aspects outlined in a new theory is that intelligence should be associated with certain learning domains while not positioned as the distinct domain type not intersected with other domains. It was also specified that multiple intelligence theory tends to mix intelligence with learning styles, labeling each student as a certain type of learner (Groff, 2013). To address those misconceptions, the theory suggested seeing the learning process not through types of intelligence but through the non-verbal information processing pathways.…”

“…To address those misconceptions, the theory suggested seeing the learning process not through types of intelligence but through the non-verbal information processing pathways. According to Groff (2013), these pathways comprise the visual-object pathway that recognizes shapes, colors, and textures, the visual-spatial pathway that is applicable to spatial relationships in natural sciences or the movie production industry, and the text-based pathway that uses the language to transmit information and is most frequently used in education. Considering the neuro-scientific research, Groff (2013) pointed out that all learners are capable to possess all three information processing pathways, while learning acquisition normally shapes those to a single pathway.…”

“…According to Groff (2013), these pathways comprise the visual-object pathway that recognizes shapes, colors, and textures, the visual-spatial pathway that is applicable to spatial relationships in natural sciences or the movie production industry, and the text-based pathway that uses the language to transmit information and is most frequently used in education. Considering the neuro-scientific research, Groff (2013) pointed out that all learners are capable to possess all three information processing pathways, while learning acquisition normally shapes those to a single pathway. This was later confirmed by the web-based study conducted by the Group Brain Project that clustered over 80% participants being strong non-verbally, and about 50% as object-visualizers among the sample of 3,800 participants.…”

Los límites de la disrupción en el orden académico:

“…Se encuentra, así, en propuestas curriculares (Guzzetti, Elliott, y Welsch, 2010;Groff, 2013) -incluso en la educación superior (Kamenetz, 2010)-para dar a docentes y estudiantes la oportunidad de crear, compartir y aprender en colaboración (Williams y Černochová, 2013), así como de aprovechar las facilidades de la gente joven, tanto para generar como para acceder a información multimodal y multimedia (Groff, 2013).…”