SIGNIFICANCE OF FINE ARTS AS A SCHOOL SUBJECT

 INTRODUCTION

Art is now enjoying a very high status in the educational curriculum in our schools. It is now not considered as an extra subject. Through in the earlier times, art was not included in the syllabus of school education.

"Art is a form of expression". It enable one to express one's views, ideas, emotions, beliefs, sentiment and thought. Art provides the students hand to express them selves.

A child feels greatly relieved when he tries to express his views by drawing rough and crude surfaces, though his efforts are rough and crude but displays a great sense of satisfaction to him. Now art is not only a part of the school activities, but the centre of all the school activities.

IN THE WORDS OF COMENIUS A GREAT PHILOSOPHER:

"Impressions are complemented by expressions, by doing something pf one's own, how to do it".

Art is introduced is schools in the form of painting, music, dancing, craft etc, In order to ensure a harmonious development of the individual to bring forth his abilities, his innate talent and his faculties and instincts.

Art is of great importance for the children's all round development, intellectual, social, psychologist, educational educational and moral development  extra in ensured by art.

School can certainly change enormously the power to express and direct the emotions. The other purpose of art education is to train observation power to see accurately, to make one on realize the value of accuracy and to develop the power of invention, proportion, harmony and to encourage child's natural impulse to give a visible from to his ideas, to make him accurately aware of what is beautiful in nature, in art and what is fine and honest in craftsmanship.

Fine arts, as the school subject is not an extra subject but an essential and important subject for the overall development of the child. Subject of Fine Art is very essential as two periods give the students relax between the tough subjects of the time table.

IT GIVES:

- Out let is their creativity

- Development of the imagination

- Development of their aesthetic value

- Period of mental rest and mental growth

It helps the education by giving it service to the school by making the other subjects more easy and interesting. It breaks the monotony of the dull theoretical subjects.

SIGNIFICANCE OF ART AS SCHOOL SUBJECT

The significance of fine arts as a school subject is shown as under:-

1. It makes knowledge interesting
2. It develops aesthetic sense
3. Correlation with other subjects
4. Practical and manual training
5. Its save time
6. Art makes other subjects easy
7. Mental training through hands
8. It develops creativity
9. It  helps to acquire habit of concentration and application
10. All round development
11. Art fosters the power of imagination, observation and initiatives
12. Art develops memory, illustration and nature drawing
13. It develops a person psychologically
14. Art develops an individual morally
15. It develops a person intellectually
16. It develops a person socially

1. ART MAKES KNOWLEDGE INTERSTING:- With the help pf art we can make the dull theoretical subject easy and interesting. When we add a visual form with any theoretical subject or topic, it becomes very interesting. 

FOR EXAMPLE:-  A dull subject like math's, if we are going to teach a child addition or subtraction, instead of writing 2+2=? we can make the figures of 2 mangoes and 2 bananas. Then when we ask the students to count they will count the things fastly because it is an interesting game for them.

2. IT DEVELOPS AESTHETIC SENSE:- Art helps in the aesthetic development of a person and along with aesthetic sense self expression and the Rasa (feeling of beauty) is also developed. With the help of art a person is able to appreciate and criticize a work of art.

With the help of aesthetic sense we can make a thing beautiful. Otherwise without art,

FOR EXAMPLE:- Architectural designs of cities would be reduced to logs of cabins, without any sculpture we would have no monument. No coined money, no mural decorations no illustration will be there. 

So it is the aesthetic sense which helps a person to make the things beautiful and attractive.

3. CORRELATION WITH OTHER SUBJECTS:- By correlating the dull theoretical subject with art we can make them more interesting and easy to understand. We can motivate the learning power of the students and make the understanding level more higher by correlating the two or more subjects with each other. This will save the time of the teacher as he teach two subjects in one period. Here the correlation of art with some other subjects is given below as :-

EXAMPLES:-

• Science:- Student having the knowledge of art can draw diagrams and can do their practical work etc. more nicely like parts of body, parts of flowers and plants etc.
• Geography:- Drawing of maps, graphs, bar diagrams etc. Showing different places etc. can be beautifully done. Areas can be marked.
• History:- History is the knowledge about past life of the man, how he lived, kings that rules, culture that survived and things those development during the period, all these things can be easily shown by the students having the knowledge about art, like the king, his portrait etc. can be drawn for better understanding.
• Math's:- Geometry, whole of it is the representation pf different shapes etc. which can surely be done well by the art students.
• Economics:- Drawing of graphs, demand, supply etc. these can be shown better by the student having knowledge of art.
• Language:- It is skill of writing and expressing one's emotion which can be surely done well by the artist person done.
• Craft:- Craft and art are very closely related. Especially in the school student who is good in art will surely do well by the artist person done.
• Home science:- Art is helpful in arranging and decorating the things in a room, setting of a kitchen etc.
• Examination:- A student can get more marks if he knows the drawing. By drawing the diagrams and representation he can make his paper effective.
• Improves handwriting:- It improves writing of the person and leaves good impression on the mind of the on looker.

4. PRACTICAL AND MANUAL TRAINING:- Art develops in a man practical abilities and skill. It develops motor activities of a person and his observation power. Only on the basis of art, this practical ability can developed on the students. Practical work and skill is very much important in the field of education. We can develop the hidden talent of the students with the help of this skill. There are many crafts which are introduced in primary classes.

FOR EXAMPLES:- Wooden craft, gardening, pottery etc. Here when the practical and manual training is given to the students, this will further help the students to adopt these crafts as a profession for their future. this practical and manual training will increase his confidence and develop his skill to the best.

5. IT HELPS TO SAVE TIME:- When art is correlated with other subjects and two or more subjects are taught collectively then the time of both teacher and the students is saved. 

Secondly when the topic is taught with audio-visual aids students take more interest and they learn more is less time. The reason is that half the work is done when we show the aid or picture related to the lesson, surroundings and environment or regarding to the school curriculum. The students can understand by themselves by looking at that particular picture. teacher's work becomes less and easy. So it saves time while teaching.

6. ART MAKES OTHER SUBJECTS EASY:- Art is very much responsible to make other theoretical subjects easy to understand. Art is the basis of all the audio-visual aids. Because only with the  help of art (drawing) we can draw and paint a picture or we can make a model. These audio-visual aids help the students to clear those facts and concepts which are not so clear to them.

7. MENTAL TRAINING THROUGH HANDS:- Art gives mental training and helps and individual to develop his mental power. It develops imagination power, learning power, observation power, comparison quality etc. All these powers are very much useful for a person in his life.  When a person develops with all these mental developments he tries to use it with his hands.

FOR EXAMPLES:- When he looks at a beautiful landscape or scene he puts it into his memory and with the use of his hands, he draws his imagination on the paper or the canvas. So art gives mental training and develops skill in a person.

8. ART DEVELOPS CREATIVITY:- Art is the best medium to develop creative expression among children. Art itself depends on creativity. It also gives opportunity to create new things. It develops creative emotions in the minds of the children.

FOR EXAMPLES:- In a class if we give a topic to the students to make a poster on drugs addiction. No two ideas will be the same. Every poster will be different from each other because every person is unique and thinks according to his own way of thinking and choice.

It is the creativity of the minds of the students which helps to make a poster. Surrounding and environment gives the ideas to students. Creativity gives us the opportunity to create a new order of reality, its knowledge and understanding. Its function in education is to create intelligence.

9. ART HELPS TO ACQUIRE HABIT OF CONCENTRATION AND APPLICATION:- When  a person draws and paints a picture, he first of all concentrates over the scene which he wants to draw. Then he cares for the drawing or sketching. i.e. if it is similar to the imagination or not. And after drawing a pencil sketch he concentrates on the colours which he wants to use in his painting. So we can see the concentration first and after that application. Only after concentrating on the things to be drawn, one can apply it in his work of art. Both are very essential steps. Without concentration there will be no imagination and without imagination we will not be able to create a thing and we cannot apply it our work of art. So to make a good piece of art we should concentrate and only then it is possible o apply it in art.

10. ALL ROUND DEVELOPMENT:- Art is the best way to express one's views, ideas, emotions, and expression. It given freedom to the mind. It is very psychological in nature. It directs emotions. It gives pleasure and relaxes the man's mind. It helps economically as a man can earn his living by doting art as a profession. It makes a person socially reliable. It develops in a person all the moral qualities for example patience, endurance, satisfaction etc. It is a skill and the applied arts need a great intellect. So it develops a person intellectually. When he gets the training of these skills. By looking at all these facts and figures we can imagine the contribution of a person. Art is very much responsible for the all sided development of a person.

11. ART FOSTERS THE POWER OF IMAGINATION OBSERVATION AND INITIATIVE:- Art is very much responsible for the development of these qualities. First of all everyone who is willing  to make a painting a sketch, a portrait, a still life or a composition, he has to observe the surroundings and environment to get the idea for his own drawing or sketching. Secondly he has to set in his mind these ideas. Only then he will be able to imagine a new creative idea for his painting. 

12.ART DEVELOPS MEMORY, ILLUSTRATION AND NATURE DRAWING:- When art artist looks at a scene in the nature he tries to keep in his mind. As Keats says, "A thing of beauty is joy for ever". To make his joy for ever it is very essential to memorise that scene. Only then he  can use it in his illustrations and paintings or poem. Then only the memory of a thing will live for ever in his mind if he tries to memorise it. This will help him to concentrate and imagine  properly, to make his new creative idea on the canvas. In education also it is very essential for a student to learn and memorise subject matter very perfectly, Only then he can use it in his exams or in creative thinking.

13. ART DEVELOPS AN INDIVIDUAL PSYCHOLOGICALLY:- Art helps the students to relive to a great extent from the burden of theoretical tyranny of purely academic and theoretical instruction. It creates balance between intellectual and practical experience. This is the active knowledge which helps and individual, how to obey life circumstances, studies or bookish knowledge. They get themselves busy in their work of art and enjoy themselves.

14. ART DEVELOPS A PERSON MORALLY:- Art makes a person lenient. It creates in a person a sense of satisfaction. He develops the qualities of patience, because he do his work with great ease and comfort. Art develops the aesthetic sense, to look for beauty etc. Art makes a person humble, honest and truthful. And in this way helps a person in the development of his moral character.

15. IT DEVELOPS A PERSON INTELLECTUALLY:- Art is a skill and the applied arts needs a great intellect. T o create pleasing forms, like pottery, manual work like embroidery etc. all need a great  intellect.

16. IT DEVELOPS A PERSON SOCIALLY:- Art makes  a person socially reliable and self dependent. In the realm of art, the manual work in of great importance but in one society it was seen as a degraded job, but now an artist enjoys an equivalent status as a man sitting on the desk and working.

TO CONCLUDE

In the past it was thought that the art of drawing and painting flourished in some garden, pursued by a few talented person an far beyond the understanding of common people. Art was considered something academic, forcible and require some extra ordinary power to reach its depth to understand and appreciate its meaning. It may not be possible to define art but it can be experienced, lived and enjoyed by everybody, because it effects every attitude and every channel of human experience. It is a creative attempt to unfold the order and beauty of life. Since this enduring reality may be approached and reached through every aspect and channel of life, thinking, looking, making, feeling. There is no reason why it should not be included in the curriculum of our school.

Art is a school subject is of great value. It is the centre of all the activities. It develops in the students the aesthetic sense. An appreciation sense enables them to develop socially emotionally, physically, intellectual, psychologically and morally. We can say that without art every school subject will become dull and bore. So it is very important to include art as a school subject in school curriculum.