Grammar Gazette- Issue 1, 2023

‘WHEN IT’S NIGHT-TIME IN ITALY, IT’S WEDNESDAY OVER HERE’ Far beyond the Everly Brothers’ observations, and beyond direct vocational considerations, an arts-rich education is a worldly education. The very essence of the Australian Curriculum is to focus on seven general capabilities that we value for all students, through all subjects. Going further afield from the obvious links with literacy, numeracy, and ICT capability, let’s now consider the ‘other four’ that form the very core of arts curricula. • Arts learners develop intercultural understanding , a genuine interest in not only the lives of others, but in others’ deepest emotions, as expressed through song, movement, and art. The arts harness lifelong dispositions such as empathy, respect, and responsibility through (literally) acting in others’ shoes and bringing their stories to life. • Arts learners develop ethical understanding by using art, theatre, and music as tools to help manage conflict and uncertainty. Through our programmed harnessing of the girls’ potential to be creative, we foster both an ethic of caring and one of pragmatic moral decision-making (Bierly et al., 2009). In particular, the Drama classroom functions as an extended, powerful moral dilemma. • Arts learners focus on personal and social capability , developing empathy for others and understanding relationships, working effectively in these teams, handling challenging situations constructively and developing leadership skills. They work as groups and full-class communities, focusing on collaboration as a core feature of learning assessment practices as students move through the School. • Arts learners spend most of their time engaged in critical and creative thinking , analysing, and interpreting the works and performances of others to find new ways forward, new angles, and rhizomatic connections with culture, science and history. ‘I WON’T WEAR MAKE-UP ON THURSDAY’ Jess Glynne articulates a common view in her 2018 hit Thursday : ‘I wanna sing, I wanna dance, I wanna feel love inside my hands again. I just want to feel beautiful’ . And so, it is a pity to have come this far without articulating the obvious: Music, Visual Art and Drama simply

albums of original works. And similarly, in Visual Art, students construct small- and large‑scale pieces and beguiling installations to complete the curriculum work. To generalise, our co-curricular arts offerings provide us with converse experiences, professional in their execution and well-refined by nature. Rather than the creation of original work, students focus on perfecting an existing body of creative work or realising a director’s vision. These kinds of activities are more constrained and achievable when groups only meet once or twice per week to polish their work. Together, our curriculum and co‑curricular facets of Arts learning help students strike a balance between the messiness of original, individual artistic pursuit, and the exactness and discipline of facilitated master-apprentice learning. As an educator, it is wonderful to see the students across all year levels flex and strain between these two ways of working, primed for a life enriched by arts learning. ‘IT’S A PRETTY GOOD CROWD FOR A SATURDAY’ And finally: Here we are, celebrating Gordon Hookey’s powerful artwork at the Institute of Modern Art in Fortitude Valley on a summery Saturday morning. The Visual Art teachers lead a large group of girls, parents, other BGGS community members and staff through the precinct, lingering for hours as Hookey himself dissects his bold works. The girls stop to unpack his technique, diving deeply into his history and the history of our nation. As teachers, we are as chuffed as Billy Joel in a piano bar. After all, it’s a pretty good crowd for a Saturday. REFERENCES • Anatolitis, E. (2021, October 28). “Sculpting” a plan: 2020 Inquiry into Australia’s creative and cultural industries. https://estheranatolitis.net/2021/10/2 8/%EF%BF%BCSCULPTING-A-PLAN 2020-PARLIAMENTARY-INQUIRY-INTO AUSTRALIAS-CREATIVE-AND-CULTURAL INDUSTRIES-AND-INSTITUTIONS/ • Bierly, P. E., Kolodinsky, R. W., & Charette, B. J. (2009). Understanding the Complex Relationship Between Creativity and Ethical Ideologies. Journal of Business Ethics, 86(1), 101–112. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-008 9837-6 • Plato. (1943). Plato's The Republic. New York: Books, Inc. • Winner, E., Goldstein, T. R., & Vincent-Lancrin, S. (2013). Art for Art's Sake?: The Impact of Arts Education OECD Publishing.

hold intrinsic value. These subjects are, quite simply, internally rewarding for students. Young people love art, beauty, and form. They love acting with their friends, and to witness this as a Creative Arts educator can be both hilarious and heart‑wrenching. Guitar in hand, girls love jamming, and mashing songs together and laying things down with a loop pedal. To borrow loosely from Plato, ‘There is a kind of good which we would choose to possess not from desire for its aftereffects but welcome it for its own sake.’ An Organisation for Economic Co‑operation and Development (OECD) report, Art for Art’s Sake, supports this thread of thinking: The Arts are important in their own right for education. Students who gain mastery in an art form may discover their life’s work or their life’s passion. But for all children, the arts allow a different way of understanding … they free students to explore and experiment. They are also a place to introspect and find personal meaning (Winner, Goldstein & Vincent‑Lancrin, 2013). ‘GOTTA GET DOWN ON FRIDAY’ Friday night is quite often a co‑curricular concert night at BGGS. In addition to our curriculum subject offerings, the School also has myriad co-curricular groups—both auditioned and interest-based—including Grammar Dance, the Gypsy Band, the Symphony Orchestra, Big Band, Chamber Strings, Grammar Singers, Drama Studio, and the Songwriter Studio collective plus many more. These many co-curricular offerings are provided to augment or complement the curriculum offerings in the Arts, supporting students to find their home here at the School and allowing them to explore new interests. A delicate dance exists between the breadth and depth of the co-curricular program, and co-curricular pursuits provide the perfect complement to curriculum studies in Arts subjects. United we stand! A curriculum pursuit of Drama, for instance, provides us with the scope to delve deeply into the world of theatre, social commentary, script writing, directing and analysis. Work produced is more likely to be student‑devised—original works. Applying this to Curriculum Music, we see our student musicians create their own scores, arrangements, and whole

OPPOSITE CALEY MAHON (8W) WITH FELLOW STUDENTS IN MUSIC CLASS

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BRISBANE GIRLS GRAMMAR SCHOOL

GAZETTE • ISSUE 1, 2023 ISSUE 1, 2023