The problematic relationship between knowing how and knowing that in secondary art education

Abstract

Leslie Cunliffe is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Education and Lifelong Learning, University of Exeter, where he has experience of undergraduate and postgraduate teaching and higher degree supervision. He has taught undergraduate students studio-based practice, art history and critical theory. He runs the secondary PGCE course, which has a national reputation for excellence. His research embraces a range of subjects to include empirical aesthetics, cognitive processes and art education, assessment and learning in art education, the relationship between sociocultural processes and psychological processes and art education, the relationship between declarative and procedural knowledge in art and art education, through to his more recent work on reconstructive aesthetics and art education that draws on Wittgenstein's work and other ideas related to aesthetic and ethical value. He has also published papers on Ernst Gombrich and Peter Fuller. His most recent publications have appeared in the Journal of Aesthetic Education, the Journal of Cognitive Education and Psychology, the Journal of Empirical Aesthetics, and the International Journal of Art and Design Education. AbstractThis article explores and attempts to rectify the current conceptual confusion found in secondary art education in the UK, including the national examination known as the General Certificate of Secondary Education taken by students at the age of 16, between procedural knowledge or "knowing how" and declarative knowledge or "knowing that". The paper argues that current classroom practice confuses procedural knowledge with declarative knowledge. A corollary is that assessment evidence for "knowing how" which is shown or demonstrated is confused with assessment evidence for "knowing that" which requires spoken or written forms of reporting. The article traces this confusion to three dualisms: the Cartesian dualisms of mind and body, an individual mind and the distributed mind of culture, and the more recent mind-inbrain hemisphere dualism. The article advocates a Wittgensteinian solution to the current conceptual confusion in art education in the UK, so that mind is understood as embodied and relational.The Problematic Relationship between Knowing How and Knowing That in Secondary Art Education. 2The idea of thinking as an occurrence in the head, in a completely enclosed space, makes thinking something occult. (Wittgenstein, 1970, # 606) 'Thinking', a widely ramified concept. A concept that comprises many manifestations of life. The phenomena of thinking are widely scattered.………..It is not to be expected of this word that it should have a unified employment; we should rather expect the opposite. (Wittgenstein, 1970, #110-112) This article analyses the current malaise in the respective treatment and teaching of declarative knowledge in relationship to procedural knowledge in art education in England. The current confusion between "knowing how" and "knowing that" which this article will attempt to rectify is symptomatic of much deeper and w...

Visual Arts Declarative Knowledge: Tensions in Theory, Resolutions in Practice

“…This research has examined a topical problem expounded by Cunliffe (2005a;2005b), namely, that of teaching and learning of declarative knowledges in art education. The analysis showed that the form of knowledge requiring understanding (the visual art work) and the form by which that understanding is represented (written description) is both subject specific and complex.…”

“…This evidence is usually produced in a spoken or written form. Cunliffe (2005a;2005b) reviews a number of research studies that reveal the multifarious ways declarative knowledge outcomes are inappropriately subsumed within procedural knowledge outcomes in policy documents in the UK and instances of practice where processes for developing declarative knowledge are non-existent.…”

Using assessment to nurture knowledge‐rich creativity

“…The latter example is a cognitive resource for a declarative form of knowledge, the former a cognitive resource for a procedural form of knowledge (Cunliffe, 2005). Ryle (1949) clarified understanding of these forms of knowledge when he critiqued the dualistic representation of someone's thinking as mind and body, with the former dealing with declarative knowledge and the latter procedural knowledge.…”

Before and after Lightfoot/León. Using rich pictures to illustrate an educational journey through the world of opera and ballet

“…The relevance of sociocultural approaches to art education has been illustrated in their contribution in clarifying the difference between the assessment evidence for "knowing how" and the assessment evidence for "knowing that" in art education (Cunliffe, 2005). Much of the literature on the use of collaborative learning in art education focuses on early childhood (e.g.…”