“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up,” said celebrated Spanish painter Pablo Picasso on the creative ability that each child possesses and how the society fails to nurture this intellectual and artistic repository.
There are several reasons why children should be introduced to art and music at an early age. While most parents focus on vocabulary and numbers, the arts fulfill a great learning purpose. It helps students stay in school, increases motivation, improves attitudes and attendance, and improves academic performance.
It also has been proven, art programs build character in community’s youth. In its “Arts Education Navigator,” Americans for the Arts includes statistics about the importance of arts education and says, “The arts teach students innumerable lessons. … They teach children that there are several paths to take when approaching problems and that all problems have more than one solution.”
Learning shapes and colors becomes a game of memory, creativity and discipline in finishing a project that they are proud of. Young people will look forward to entering contests, showing off their work and striving to improve their skills.
Who doesn’t remember seeing their handiwork on the refrigerator door and the joy that it brought? By giving our young people the opportunity to draw, paint or play a musical instrument; we are furthering their learning capacity by up to four times.
“The more we can engage our youth in the arts, culture and history of our state, the stronger our future becomes,” said Randall-Reid Reid-Smith, now West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History curator. “When we give them opportunities to be creative, we give them skills that will serve them well.”
A prime example in the Lake Area Arts Group is Kale Sudhoff, now a high school student in Celina Public Schools, loves writing stories and then he figures out how to do the illustrations, and he has! Being released this September 2021, “Danny The Duck Heads South” will be on the bookshelves.
The storyline is about Danny the duck on his seasonal trip south. He is left alone and unable to fly after an unexpected accident. He will not let his new disability stop him from finding clever ways to reach his destination. Will he get there before he freezes his tail feathers?
Of course, Kale’s artwork didn’t just one day go from the refrigerator to the publishing market; he has been creating since his single age years, when he was in Celina Intermediate School, nabbing the Local Fire Prevention poster contest, which his work was also sent off to the State of Ohio contest level.
What more can be said about an education in the Arts? Whether it be the visual arts like drawing, painting, sculpture and design works or the performing arts like dance, music and theater, the most accurate findings are through the arts, the human in us develops skills like: resilience, grit, a growth mindset, which to aids us to master a craft, achieve academically and succeed in life after our secondary education years.
More on Kale and his other recent written accomplishments at: https://www.facebook.com/people/Kale-Sudhoff-AuthorIllustrator/100082921624454
About
The Lake Area Arts Group is a group of artists and those who appreciate art, who share ideas and promote the artists and visual arts in the Auglaize/Mercer County areas of Ohio and beyond. They are located in the Lake Area Arts Group Center in downtown Celina, Ohio. More at: https://www.facebook.com/Lakeareaartsgroup