Interdisciplinary Learning

First off, to clarify any confusion…. What is interdisciplinary learning? 

"Interdisciplinary: a knowledge view and curriculum approach that consciously applies methodology and language from more that one discipline to examine a central theme, topic, issue, problem, or work." 

-Heidi Hayes Jacobs

Interdisciplinary Curriculum: Design & Implementation (1989)

Now that we have confirmed the definition, I would like to share two resources that I have found for ways in which to apply the arts to one of the many subject areas that I teach.  Integrating arts with health and physical education can be a very fun and engaging way to approach the curriculum in elementary school.  Two resources that I found to be very helpful in devising lessons plans that implement both the arts and PE are below.

http://art.pppst.com/movements.html

This website has a section that particularly refers to the different styles of art from various art movements.  Impressionism, surrealism, pointillism, cubism and realism can all be taught to elementary school children by being connected to an action.  Children retain information better when they have a physical action that they can associate it with.  For example, when teaching children what impressionism is, I would teach a mini-lesson and then have the children come up with a physical movement that “represents” impressionism.  They will get up, out of their seats and enact the movement while describing impressionism.

http://www.moveintheclassroom.com/

This website is amazing!  It was created by Dr. Julian Reed, who has studied the effects of movement on children’s abilities to stay focused throughout the school day.  He gives many ideas and sample lessons regarding ways to integrate movement into the classroom.  One of the ideas he has for art and movement is to show children different famous statues located in various locations in the world and have them jump up and strike the pose of that statue.  Eventually, this can be turned into a game, helping children to memorize statues simply by hearing the name of the statue read aloud.

When integrating multiple subject areas together, there is always a challenge in terms of planning and ensuring that you find a healthy medium between all subjects you are combining together.  You don’t want to overload the students with too much information in one of the subjects.  You also need to ensure that all activities blend together in a way that makes sense.  Interdisciplinary teaching requires more time in the planning stages and the lesson plan development.

That being said, interdisciplinary teaching and learning is valuable to students and teachers.  For teachers, it is a way for us to implement our passions and interests while engaging students in an entirely different subject area.  Students respond very well to interdisciplinary teaching, as they also may have a passion that is touched on during these dynamic lessons. 

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