Imagination and creativity are important for children, but beware of "routines"
In recent years, aesthetic education has received more and more attention from all walks of life, and various interest classes have sprung up. But when we talk about aesthetic education, what exactly are we discussing? Is it the skill of artistic creation, or the cultivation of imagination and creativity? In the eyes of artist and practitioner of aesthetic education Ding Haibin, these may not be the most important...
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Wen 丨 Kochagin Ed. 丨Leon
Nowadays, there are more and more finely divided and personalized extracurricular interest classes, reflecting the increasing demand of parents for their children's education. However, despite good expectations, various educational philosophies often leave parents scratching their heads.
For example, many children go to art classes, and after a few months of training, they may draw more "realistically" or look "imaginative". But it's hard to tell the difference;
After visiting Ding Haibin, a post-80s artist and art educator, and doing some in-depth discussions on children's learning to paint, Bund Jun had some new inspiration.
Ding Haibin, young artist, host of Avenue Children's Art. Participated in the preparation of national undergraduate textbooks for teacher education. Published the ink teaching book "The Voice of Growth".
Teacher Ding Haibin often has some surprising words, such as: "Children do not have to pursue drawings", "Encourage children to doodle and doo", "Don't take drawing seriously", "Imagination may be an illusion"... So, what kind of aesthetic education is more suitable for children?
Two major misunderstandings of aesthetic education: realistic and creative?
Back 20 years ago, after graduating, Mr. Ding Haibin entered a high school in his hometown as an art teacher; With his wife, who is also an art artist, he opened a children's art education studio, and created art while working.
Teacher Ding's class was different from the beginning, he respected children, did not cater to parents, and only guided according to the heart of art. This has to do with his own upbringing.
Ding Haibin said frankly that he has been learning to paint for many years, until Mr. Yu Rongguo, an enlightenment teacher and artist he met in college, gave him great inspiration and help.
He realized that the training he had received in the test-taking environment was mechanical, patternal, and actually anti-art.
During that period, Mr. Ding had a self-awareness of art and slowly felt the fun that art brought him.
Teacher Ding with the students
In the process of actually teaching, he summarized two most common misunderstandings about art:
First, I always want to teach children how to "draw like"
"Stick figures have been around for a long time and are very harmful to children."
For example, the teacher draws a house, and the child follows to draw a house; The teacher draws a tiger, and the child follows to draw a tiger. The teacher teaches step by step, and the child learns step by step. In this way, the child will soon be able to produce results that are "satisfactory" to some parents.
"There are still many teachers who are still teaching at this level."
Teacher Dante pointed out: As everyone knows, entering the program and techniques too early can do great harm to children's creativity.
"Painting, there is no right or wrong", can "be wrong is wrong", this is the concept that Ding Haibin established from the beginning.
In teaching, he broke the concept of "Chinese painting", deliberately staying away from those common Chinese painting themes, removing all imitations and routines, but borrowing the form of graffiti art to guide children to show "traces of emotion".
The work of Mr. Ding's students
In order to make children focus more on self-expression, Ding Haibin puts technology to the minimum, and more guides children's feelings, intuitive abilities, and protects children's nature.
"For children, the simpler the technique, the better, and the less distractions there are, the better it is." Teacher Ding said.
For example, he taught children the simplest "stroke drawing method", that is, let the brush eat the ink first, and continue to draw on rice paper until the ink color is dry. In this way, the child naturally understands the various changes in the ink color "burnt and light, dry and wet".
With one stroke, children can easily understand the ink color changes
Second, focus too much on children's imagination and creativity
In the era of scientific and technological innovation, people pay attention to imagination and creativity. You might be thinking, aren't imagination and creativity important for children? Teacher Ding pointed out: Of course, creativity is very important, but we must be wary of "imagination" and "creativity" routines.
Many children's "imaginative" and "imaginative" works always make people feel repetitive and familiar, and some creative methods are applied.
For example, the "displacement method" commonly used in graphic creativity, or replacing dragonflies with airplanes, or replacing the body of a fish with a kite, or replacing the cap of a water bottle with a fruit...
There is nothing wrong with these methods, but at the same time, methods are not the goal, and children need to be wary of the patterning of creation when using these methods.
Teacher Ding believes that painting not only requires the teacher's transmission and application of painting knowledge. More importantly, it is necessary to return to the needs of children and children's psychology.
The work of Mr. Ding's students
How to motivate, how to mobilize their inner motivation and fun, is a more important factor in teaching to achieve children's creativity.
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Therefore, the opening of the mind is often more important than technology;
The stimulation of children's interest is more important than what kind of content they learn;
Painting confidently without obstacles is more important than the picture effect;
Being happy and satisfied is more important than getting the approval of teachers and parents.
This practice of not catering to parents' "expectations" was not initially understood. But gradually insisted, from the few people who founded the studio in 2009, Mr. Ding gradually got more and more parents to follow his teaching philosophy.
During the nature tour, Ding Haibin also insisted that parents accompany their children to class and paint.
Parents attend classes with their children
"If parents are just outsiders, they will never understand what their child is doing and why," he said. ”
The change of aesthetic education concept actually starts with parents.
Leaving Songshan: The wild fun of "wild children" in the mountains
The German philosopher Jaspers said that education is when a tree shakes another tree, a cloud pushes another cloud, and one soul awakens another.
However, when he first started teaching, Ding Haibin admitted that teaching was actually spent in constant frustration. He said that it was one thing to make art, and quite another to educate children, which was much harder than he thought.
1. The classroom should not be too far away from nature
In 2013, Mr. Ding quit his job as a high school art teacher for 10 years, threw away the envious compilation of others, and ran to Songshan to engage in creation.
In addition to painting, Ding Haibin called some children in the nearby mountains and took them to paint for free, even providing them with painting utensils.
Children have fun, playing in the mountains, creating on stones and in cornfields.
"Children in the mountains, nature, aura, full of strong vitality."
Little cadets in the mountains
Seeing the state of these children's paintings, Ding Haibin seemed to be hit head-on. "Too wild, too raw, they completely broke my past experience."
Teacher Ding found that in the previous classroom in the city, the children were generally well-behaved and step-by-step, lacking a bit of artistic wildness and aura.
He quickly realized that the nourishment of nature and the cultivation of children's "sensibility" are particularly important.
Student work
2. Open up the senses and liberate the mind
Teacher Ding realized that sensitivity is especially important for children's development, and tried to train and open his senses in class.
For example, in his study tour, he guides children's whole body to participate in it, using the strength and momentum of the body to drive painting.
In the fall of 2015, Teacher Ding led the children on an outdoor study tour, bringing felt, buckets and brushes, and plunged into the fields, exposed to the sun, breathing the smell of earth and feeling the breath of nature.
Cornfields, feel nature up close
"Go shake hands with corn, touch it with your hand, smell it with your nose... Through close observation and feeling, starting from a specific leaf and branch, the children first grasped the growth form of a corn and slowly discovered the growth characteristics of corn. ”
Student cornfield works
After the children began to write, Teacher Ding encouraged them to mobilize the participation of the whole body, "according to the needs, the body can move left and right, up and down, as much as possible to guide them back to their own feelings." ”
In the current emotions and feelings, the children showed a very amazing expressiveness, and even in the brushstrokes can express the mood of broken and injured corn leaves;
In the process of children's painting, it is also a process of independent exploration, such as drawing thicker leaves and "lying" the brush to paint;
Some children naturally found dirt and grass to stick to the painting in the process of painting - they asked Teacher Ding if it was okay, and Ding Haibin smiled and said that of course it was no problem.
Confident, happy, relaxed, dare to "draw wrong"... Such an atmosphere can allow children to truly gain spiritual liberation.
"During the nature tour, I collaborated with artist Li Ning to guide children to use their bodies to 'speak', playing a tree, a mountain, a mineral water bottle... I realized that the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, these can actually be part of the child's self-expression. Teacher Ding said.
The ultimate purpose of aesthetic education: to give children happiness
In 2013, Ding Haibin's daughter was born. As his daughter grows, he observes more closely the budding of a life.
At a very young age, my daughter was willing to take a pen and doodle and draw. Ding Haibin found that for children, art has nothing to do with technology, or even aesthetics, and at first, it is just a game.
He does not "teach" his daughter to draw, and whenever he has time, he just accompanies her to play:
The father draws a stroke, the daughter adds a stroke, from a blank piece of paper to a colorful piece; Or do a "chase" game, the daughter's red pen runs in front, the father's blue pen chases behind, the lines are sometimes entangled and sometimes separated, which is a gushing out of fun and vitality.
The work of the daughter
When my daughter was older, there was a time when she painted, she had an extra eraser in her hand, and after drawing for a while, she said that she had drawn the wrong one and wanted to wipe it.
Ding Haibin asked her daughter to throw away the eraser: "There is no right or wrong in painting, if you want to be wrong, you can transform it, you can be naughty, you don't have to paint a portrait, but you have to draw happily." ”
Gradually, her daughter made painting a way of life, like eating when hungry and drinking water when thirsty, and her home was full of her large and small works.
Children who learn to draw in the studio often say, "Painting is not tired, coming here to paint is like resting." ”
Over the years, Ding Haibin has tried to practice aesthetic education in various forms: taking children to major art museums, "meditating" with stones in Taihang Mountain, building beach castles on the beach... He kept thinking: What is the ultimate purpose of children learning to draw?
Pile beach castles by the sea
He slowly realized that drawing is not the ultimate goal, for children, how to become happy, interesting, how to open wisdom, become a happy person is the most important. Art itself is only a medium and a carrier.
"Treat people as ends, not means". Kant's wise words more than 200 years ago still seem to have a long way to go.
Teacher Ding drawn by students
Today, many of the children Ding Haibin has taught have grown up. Some of them are engaged in art-related industries, and some are in fields that have nothing to do with art.
But the common point is that they all regard painting as nourishment in life, and enrich their spiritual world because of painting, which is the most gratifying thing for Teacher Ding.