As children, expressing ourselves through art helped develop fine motor skills and language development, according to PBS. As teenagers on the verge of adulthood, art continues to help us develop our minds and further expand our knowledge of our culture.
Visual arts and performing arts help students better visualize their thoughts and creates a deeper understanding of content. The Journal of Aesthetic Education found that students who took an art course all four years in high school tended to do better on the SAT. Specifically, those in performing arts did the best of all artists in the study, but in general, the math and verbal scores were higher for artists than other students.
Art programs help students find their way and make commitments to learning. Research collected by Media Planet, a site that provides news on education, found that students involved in the arts had higher academic performance than their peers and a lower dropout rate.
Low-income students are especially affected by art programs, as research from Media Planet shows they are twice as likely to graduate than students from low income families who did not enroll in an art program.
Arts programs offer students a chance to invest themselves in something, create and express themselves more than a regular classroom does. Schools have many rules, and some subjects are very straightforward, but art has a depth that allows teens to find what matters to them and pursue it. The freedom to be who they are allows them to relieve the stress of trying to hide it and opens students up to a greater world of knowledge.
