Creating a more coherent curriculum in performing arts education

Since the announcement of the University of the Arts in Singapore, the talking point of an arts education in Singapore has resurfaced. How do students find their way into those sectors? Does our education model allow for enough space to bring out the best in our local arts talents, or do we still have a long way to go? Indeed, below the postsecondary level, an arts education, especially in terms of theatre and drama, can be rather out of reach for most children and teenagers. I didn't hear about the School of the Arts until I was nearly twelve, and by then I was "too late" - the DSA season was already in full swing and I had nothing to my name except a small inkling that I loved the creative arts.

If someone had sat down and explained to me what acting and theatre was actually about, I'd have joined as many youth companies as I could the moment I entered Secondary School. Alas, that was not to be, so here we are at the age of 19, trying to make up for all that lost time. That said, I have to wonder, what if I had a well developed performing arts education as a child? What if the magic of live theatre had found me earlier in life? I had many more questions than answers, but ever since I started my six-week contract as a student care center teacher, I've had the privilege of facilitating speech and drama activities alongside other curricula such as dance, music, physical education and the visual arts. I learned a lot about what an arts education looked like from the administrative point of view, and I hope to reflect on some of it in this article.

Naturally, the first thing that occurred to me was that the educators themselves were neither trained nor equipped to teach the performing arts. My passion for musical theatre and my actor training was merely a happy accident for a job that paid US$6.70 per hour, and my prior knowledge of classroom management and pedagogy came from 19 years of watching my parents at their jobs (I come from a family of teachers). Student care centers were hiring just about anyone who looked like they could communicate and handle kids well, and I was expected to do menial and managerial tasks outside of my teaching duties, so clearly - the average student care teacher could not care less about the arts. What happens when young and impressionable students are taught by a teacher with no passion, we all know the answer.

The second thing was the curriculum. Clearly, the situation of people who neither care about nor truly understand the arts extended way up into the programming department. Speech and drama sessions were limited to objectives such as developing courage and projecting their voices. Limited by both a mediocre curriculum and untrained instructors, we have a solid recipe for disaster. Even as I tried to weave some of my theatre training into how I facilitate my lessons, I am nevertheless limited by an arts curriculum which does not even seek to understand what the arts is really about. Creativity is stifled as students are reprimanded for deviating in any form from the model deliverable - an issue that pervades much of Singapore's elementary school system. Although steps are being taken to promote creativity and individualized learning, from my observation on the ground, the arts are still left to low-paid workers who prioritize key performance indicators over the students' engagement with and interest in the art form.

As a theatre student, that is horrifying. Students are being exposed to a near-total misrepresentation of the arts without understanding what it really is where it might lead to, and not surprisingly, they develop a strange and unsettling lexicon for their perception of the arts:

Useless. Unrelatable. Foreign. Incomprehensible. Nonsensical. Unrealistic.

See what happens when the arts aren't normalized as part of a whole education? At every level, a true understanding of the arts are simply not achieved unless students had access to programs outside school which has actual trained professionals in its faculty. However, such programs are often expensive and difficult to find for the average student. There are co-curricular activities (CCAs) at the primary school level, but the restrictions in having to commit to a single CCA and to stick to it results in students not being able to pursue multiple interests freely due to a lack of time or simply due to structural constraints. Consequently, many children are denied the opportunity to be a part of the arts, and any aptitude or interest that they possess are left untrained for years. Now is a very good time to examine the way children are taught about the arts, and to review the kind of regulations that guide our arts framework.

The first step to solving a problem of unqualified workers is simply to raise the wage. A higher and livable wage attracts stronger and more competitive talent into the company simply by edging less competitive candidates out. Workers with specialized training in either education or the performing arts would be better prepared to engage with children and to nurture a real passion for the art form, and true talents may then be discovered and placed in a more specialized environment where they can develop their talent through the provision of proper training and resources.

The next step is to get actual arts educators onboard with the curriculum planning process. A clear and coherent curriculum must be planned across the entire academic year to ensure that both long term and short term learning objectives are met. While some may bemoan the practicality of creating a targeted arts curriculum, this would be a reality when job prospects are strong enough for professional artists and drama school graduates to consider the career as a legitimate option. A speech and drama curriculum must be better than getting an untrained worker to read a story off a page from the Internet on their phone screens. Students should be learning about how they can imagine that the story is happening in real life, how the written word can be made real, and how they can see what an actor sees. Those activities should represent building blocks that stack up to represent the Stanislavski system for instance, and an actual practitioner of the craft should preside over the curriculum design in order to ensure that children are truly progressing in their understanding of drama.

When students access the true joy of creating art, they develop soft skills such as the readiness to make bolder and more unconventional choices, the spontaneity of imagination and critical thinking, as well as empathy and collaboration. They learn to access emotions in a healthier manner and to communicate to others in a directed and clear manner. The advantages of an education in the arts is truly unlimited, but it must be done properly and with careful planning. Otherwise, the activity would merely be another chore that both instructors and students go through the motions with, becoming nothing more than a monotonous routine and a publicity gimmick.

To round up, an education in the performing arts begins from the moment a child is ready to understand and to learn. As educators, we have a duty to ensure that the next generation is learning from the best, and when it comes to building character and fostering an understanding of local and global cultures, there are few mediums as vibrant and as effective as the theatre and other art forms. Those subjects, of all the things we teach our children, deserve to be given greater weight and attention.