Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell (1857-1941), founder of the Boy Scout Movement in 1907, was a British military hero during the Boer War. Within an ethos and era of empire-building, athleticism, soldier-heroes and the pursuit of "manliness," Baden-Powell valued the arts and adapted his artistic skill to his wartime and Scouting activities. His…

This study examines a series of children's drawings ("Draw for Math" tasks) to determine the relationship of students' spatial understanding and mathematical problem solving. Level of spatial understanding was assessed by applying the framework of central conceptual structures suggested by Case (1996), a cognitive developmental researcher.…

This article describes a participatory action research study that examined participant's perceptions of community and of the West End neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio, where the study took place. It is argued that oppressive situations have developed strong collective identities and social capital among residents, which can lead to the development…

This article presents a conversation between the authors, James Marriott and Suzi Gablik. Marriott is a founding member and co-director of PLATFORM, a London-based, award-winning organization focused on social and ecological justice. Gablik is the author of "The Reenchantment of Art," "Conversations Before the End of Time," and "Living the Magical…

This essay attempts to affectively politicize the visual art educator to the global condition of water in the larger context of designer capitalism. The ethical concerns of "designer water" are raised within the broader agenda of ecosophy as inspired by Giles Deleuze and by the last great essay by Felix Guattari. The essay takes an aesthetic line…

Teaching about Native artworks as part of school arts curriculum can serve to pass on traditional ecological knowledge while also contextualizing colonialism's influence on traditional and contemporary Native arts practices. This article explores how schools can actively engage in community arts partnerships with American Indians who have…

In contemporary life and education, the local is marginalized in favor of large-scale economies of consumption that are indifferent to ecological concerns. The consequences of neglecting local human and natural communities include a degraded habitat, loss of wilderness, alienation, rootlessness, and lack of connection to communities. Critical…

In current research, place is a concept with multiple meanings, rich with personal, socio-cultural, historical, and political complexities. Through a phenomenological investigation of place meanings with preservice art teachers, I weave my narrative as a writer with my role as an artist/teacher/researcher who examines their performance art as one…

This article advocates for art curriculum to be guided by the goal of challenging the discrimination, stigmatization, marginalization, and medicalization of disabled people. The Disability Arts Movement provides an important site through which to engage students in exploring the sociopolitical issue of ableism in art curriculum. The pedagogical…

"Art practice as research" casts artmaking as inquiry--as a particularly experiential and constructivist process of learning in which imaginative synthesis and creative image making are ways of constructing knowledge. This article explores how artmaking functions as research through the creation of visual images, especially images that picture…

This article discusses the results of a one-year study in a physically isolated school community in Queensland, Australia. The decision-making processes in the selection of school subjects became the focus for interviews conducted with the school community (students, parents, and teachers) and the vehicle for identifying the held conceptions of…

Although several art educators have called our attention to the importance of studying visual culture, others have widened the discussion to include material culture and its effects on our lives. Because of growing concern for the value of exploring the personal and social functions of visual and material culture, the purpose of this article is to…

Design thinking can be a powerful way to engage the world, allowing interactive understandings that are both analytic and experiential. When fully functioning, design thinking necessarily calls upon faculties often considered a-rational, a-causal and a-logical. Unfortunately, such faculties often give rise to academic suspicion. That is to say,…

Sustainable design is a philosophy adopted by people concerned with the health of society and the natural environment. The practice of sustainable design works toward the improvement of the quality of the built environment, while reducing or eradicating the negative impact on the natural environment (McLennan 2004). It is a philosophical approach…

This article tracks the generative role of research and fragmentation as a means for integrating technology and form within an architecture technology lecture class and a co-requisite design studio. The complexity of teaching building systems integration within a design studio context is achieved by removing any expectation of building design…