| Review of the literature concerning discipline-based art education (DBAE) theory and practice shows that art criticism is a recommended discipline for study at all grade levels, beginning with kindergarten. Although DBAE theorists agree that crucial to engagement in art criticism is an understanding of the vocabulary of art scholars and artists, young children's abilities to learn art terms and concepts is a neglected area of study. Therefore, an empirical study was conducted with two groups of children; pre-kindergarten children ages 4-5, and kindergarten children ages 5-6. The purpose of this study was to determine if young children who engage in art criticism as well as art production activities, exhibit greater art vocabulary in art critical discussions than children who engage in art production activities alone. Using a pre-test-posttest design and the t test for independent samples, it was found that the pre-kindergarten students, ages 4-5 (N = 8) who engaged in art critical discussions achieved significantly higher (p =.05) scores on the art vocabulary posttest than the pre-kindergarten students (N = 5) who engaged only in art production activities (calculated t = 2.625 > 2.201 table t at .05 probability). However, it was also found that the kindergarten students (N = 9) who engaged in art critical discussions did not achieve significantly higher ( p = .05) scores on the posttest for art vocabulary than kindergarten students (N = 8) who engaged in production activities alone (calculated t = .2295 < 2.131 table t at .05 probability]. It was concluded that the smaller sizes of the pre-kindergarten classes (7-10 students less than the kindergarten classes) was instrumental to the promoting of art vocabulary during the art critical discussions, due to the active nature of participation in the smaller groups.;Sample lessons for the control and experimental groups, student verbal transcript samples, art vocabulary scoring sheets, raw data sheets and painting reproductions used for the pretest and posttest are appended.;Lesson plans, pretest and posttest instruments, and appropriate criteria for evaluation of students' verbal art critical responses were designed. Instructional methods were based on L. Chapman (1989) and M. Erickson, E. Katter, and M. Stewart (1988). Evaluative methods were based on A. Rosenstiel, P. Morison, J. Silverman, and H. Gardner (1978). |
