Latest Module Specifications
Current Academic Year 2025 - 2026
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Description This module recognises the central role of the arts in supporting children’s creativity, imagination, and overall wellbeing. It engages students with the three Arts subjects—Visual Arts, Drama, and Music—as distinct yet interconnected disciplines. Through practical and theoretical exploration, students will deepen their confidence, competence, and understanding of how children make meaning through the arts. In Visual Arts Education, students are introduced to key strands such as drawing, paint and colour, and working with form, while also exploring digital and material processes for creative expression. In Music Education, students engage with listening and responding, composing, and performing through practical exploration of rhythm, melody, and other musical elements. In Drama Education, students participate in imaginative play, improvisation, and performance, developing skills in role, story, and embodiment to support children’s creative and social development. Across all three subjects, students will engage with the key curriculum competencies outlined in the Draft Arts Education Specification (NCCA, 2024): • Being Creative • Being Personally Effective • Being an Active Citizen • Communicating and Using Language • Being Mathematical • Being Digital Through this integrated approach, students will explore how the arts can nurture creativity and meaning-making, while also gaining insight into the practical and theoretical dimensions of teaching the arts at primary level. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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All module information is indicative and subject to change. For further information,students are advised to refer to the University's Marks and Standards and Programme Specific Regulations at: http://www.dcu.ie/registry/examinations/index.shtml |
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Indicative Content and Learning Activities
Overview of Indicative Content and Learning Activities. Visual Art, Music, and Drama provide distinctive yet interconnected ways of engaging with the world and making meaning. Each discipline supports children’s aesthetic, imaginative, and creative development through visual, auditory, and embodied forms of expression. While each art form has discrete practices, they collectively foster children’s capacity to create, perform, and respond to artworks and performances in ways that are inclusive, multimodal, and culturally responsive. Within this module, student teachers will experience and reflect on practical art-making, music-making, and drama activities that develop their subject knowledge, skills, and pedagogical competence. Through exploration of drawing, form, colour, sound, rhythm, voice, movement, role, and story, students will acquire a repertoire of creative strategies to support children’s expression, collaboration, and critical engagement with the arts. Indicative content will include: Developing foundational skills in visual art, music, and drama across selected strands of the new Primary Arts curricula. Looking at, listening to, and responding to artworks, music, and performances from diverse cultural, historical, and contemporary contexts. Exploring the creative process in each art form, with attention to children’s developmental stages, diverse needs, and inclusive pedagogical approaches. Planning and teaching integrated and discrete arts activities for small groups and whole classes. Using digital tools (e.g., photography, animation, recording, editing) to support creative processes and reflection. Considering approaches to display, performance, and sharing of children’s creative work in both physical and digital environments. Visual Arts Education Development of Visual Awareness and Art-Making Skills Focus on three strands of the new Primary Visual Arts Curriculum, supporting student teachers in developing visual literacy, creativity, and pedagogical competence. Drawing and Visual Expression Looking at and responding to drawings and visual artworks by artists from diverse cultural and historical contexts. Observing and photographing the visual elements of line, tone, colour, shape, texture, space, and pattern in the environment. Experimentation with mark-making using a variety of media (graphite, ink, digital drawing apps, etc.). Drawing from observation, memory, and imagination, with attention to the visual elements and to children’s creative development. Creating Form and 3D Construction Looking at and responding to examples of form in natural and built environments, and in the work of artists. Constructing forms using clay, fabric and fibre, recycled materials. Emphasis on visual elements such as shape, balance, proportion, texture, and line. Exploring tactile and sensory aspects of making, with attention to inclusive strategies for children with diverse needs. Paint, Colour, and Mixed Media Looking at and responding to colour in the environment and in artworks. Experimenting with colour mixing and matching using paint and digital tools. Exploring tone, contrast, and harmony through observation and imaginative work. Developing expressive responses through painting, collage, and digital layering. Looking at and Responding Engagement with artworks, artefacts, and natural forms to develop visual literacy and critical response. Exploration of Irish and international artists, including contemporary, diverse, and digital practitioners. Use of specialist vocabulary to discuss visual elements, media, and artistic intention. Understanding Curriculum Art in Primary Education The Creative Process Observing and interacting with children’s art-making to understand developmental stages and creative behaviours. Reflecting on how children use visual elements to express meaning. Planning and Teaching Designing inclusive visual art activities for small group and whole-class settings. Adapting lessons to meet diverse learning needs, including differentiation and Universal Design for Learning (UDL). Integrating digital tools (photography, animation, stop-motion, and digital drawing). Children’s Artistic Development Examining examples of children’s artwork to understand progression in skill, expression, and concept development. Considering how play, imagination, and collaboration shape children’s creativity. Digital and Contemporary Practices Using photography, stop-motion animation, and digital imagery to support creative expression. Exploring online resources and tools for art-making and integration across the arts. Presentation and Reflection Exploring effective methods for displaying 2D and 3D work in physical and digital spaces. Encouraging reflection and dialogue around the creative process, outcome, and audience. Music Education: The course is provided through two main components 1. Developing a practical understanding of the Strands and Concepts of the Music Curriculum Through 12 hours of mixed workshops/lectures students gain an understanding of the principles underpinning the primary music curriculum and how the strands and concepts can be used as a framework for planning. They critically engage with the idea of music expressed in the curriculum and the understanding of a spiral curriculum in music that it contains. They further their understanding of embodied learning and knowing and of recognising and observing children’s tacit knowledge in music through practical work with the eight music concepts. They develop an understanding of how they can use a range of music materials to develop children’s ‘sense’ of these music concepts. 2. Child Centred methods of teaching and working with notation This set of workshops introduces students to an expanded concept of music notation and of using musical representation in gesture and graphic and other symbols to develop children’s music understanding while listening, performing and composing. They further develop their own skill in using standard notation. 3. Planning the Music Lesson As they gain a more thorough understanding of the strands and concepts of the Primary Music Curriculum, students explore the components of a successful music lesson. Through a suite of practical exercises built around the three strands of Listening and Responding, Composing and Performing, they develop an understanding of how they can use a range of music materials to develop children’s ‘sense’ of the nine music concepts. Drama Education: This module introduces students to the principles, practices, and pedagogical approaches of Drama Education in the primary classroom. Module content and learning activities include: Exploration of the Arts Education Curriculum strands: creating, performing and presenting; responding and connecting. Introduction to Drama Education: establishing a safe and inclusive environment; the teacher’s role in fostering creativity, confidence, and participation. Drama Concepts: plot, role, place, time, tension, movement, and sound, explored through theory and practice. Drama Pedagogies and Strategies: experiential process drama; Teacher-in-Role; socio-dramatic play; drama-making in the early years; storytelling, communication, and presence in the classroom. Drama-Makers: exploring how dramatic forms and conventions enable participants to symbolise, improvise, role-play, enact, and reflect. Storytelling: examining storytelling as both an art form and a teaching strategy; considering its cultural significance and its role in shaping identity, empathy, and imagination. Active Citizenship: exploring drama’s role in fostering empathy, intercultural understanding, and global awareness; reflecting on how drama enables students to engage critically with the world and to see themselves - and the children they will teach - as agents of positive change. Curriculum Planning: lesson planning and assessment for Primary School (Junior Infants–2nd Class); integrating drama across curriculum subjects in creative and responsive ways. Learning activities will include lectures, interactive workshops, group discussions, lesson planning tasks, and reflective engagement. Books Eisner, E.W. (2002), The Arts and the Creation of Mind. Yale University Press. Reggio Children(2004). Children, Art, Artists The expressive languages of children, the artistic language of Alberto Burri. Reggio Children srl. Peter Clough. (2007), Clay in the Primary School, A&C Black, p.112, [ISBN: 071368819X]. Gloria Callaway,Abigail Leach,Mary Kear. (2016), Teaching Art and Design in the Primary School, Routledge, p.221, [ISBN: 1138177695]. Nigel Meager. (2006), Creativity and Culture, Collins Educational, p.155, [ISBN: 9780904684308]. Hetland,L.,Winner,E.,Veenema,S., Sheridan,K.M.(2013).Studio Thinking2. Teachers College Press. ISBN 978-0-8077-5435-1 Kavanagh,A.M., Waldron,F., Mallon,B. (Eds). (2021). Teaching for Social Justice and Sustainable Development Across the Primary Curriculum. Routledge. ISBN: 9780367434151 Articles Government of Ireland. (2023). Primary Curriculum Framework. Dublin: National Council for Curriculum and Assessment. National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA). (2023). Primary Visual Arts Draft Curriculum Specification. Dublin: NCCA. National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA). (2023). Primary Music Draft Curriculum Specification. Dublin: NCCA. National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA). (2023). Primary Drama Draft Curriculum Specification. Dublin: NCCA. Hickman, R., & Gormley, A. (2010). Why we make art: And why it is taught. Hall, C., & Thomson, P. (2017). Inspiring school change: Transforming education through the creative arts. Routledge. Gude, O. (2013). New school art styles: The project of art education. Art Education, 66(1), 6-15. Marshall, J. (2014) Transforming Education through art-centred integrated learning. Visual Inquiry: 3 (3), 361-376. Murphy, R. & Espeland, M.. (2007), Upbeat, Carroll Heinemann. Purcell, A. & Flynn, P.. (2006), The Right Note 1st & 2nd Class, Folens. Umansky, K. & Pierce, M.. (2016), Three Tapping Teddies: Musical Stories and Chants for the Very Young, A&C Black. Cox, Sue.. (2007), Teaching Art and Design 3-11, Continuum. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Indicative Reading List Books: None Articles: None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Other Resources None | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||