Overview : Visual art remains one of the most popular subjects in New Zealand schools, particularly at year 4. Children report enjoying art, wanting to do more of it in school, having positive self-images with regard to their artistic ability and doing a lot of art on their own at home. At year 4, students report engaging in a wide variety of art activities in school to a greater degree than in 2003 or 1999; otherwise, responses are quite similar to previous surveys. At year 8, a gradual decline in enthusiasm and perception is seen on a number of questions compared to previous years, although the absolute levels are still quite high.

Attitudes and Motivation
Students’ attitudes, interests and liking for a subject have a strong bearing on their achievement. The Art Survey sought information from students about their curriculum preferences and their perceptions of their own achievement. The survey included items that asked students to pick the school subjects they liked best, along with a variety of questions about art instruction, art making and art viewing. The questions were the same for year 4 and year 8 students. The survey was administered to the students in an independent session [four students working individually on tasks supported by a teacher]. The questions were read to year 4 students, and also to individual year 8 students who requested this help. Writing help was available if requested.

Visual Arts Surveys
Students first were asked to select their three favourite school subjects from a list of 14 subjects. The results are presented in the table below. Among year 4 students, physical education was by far the most popular subject, being listed as first, second, or third by 54% of the students. Visual arts comes second at 38%, followed closely by maths at 37%, science at 30% and so on. It is interesting to note how popular the arts as a whole are among year 4 students, with music (26%), dance (20%), and drama (17%) also high on the list of preferences. Social studies (1%), health (2%), and speaking (4%) are least preferred at year 4. This rank ordering is little changed from the 2003 results.

At year 8, physical education again is easily the winner at 68%. Then we see some changes from year 4 to year 8. Technology (46%) comes second with year 8 students, followed by visual art (30%), music (24%), maths (23%), and science (20%). The least favoured subjects at year 8 are health (3%), speaking (4%) and Mäori (6%). In the 2003 results, drama received higher marks than in 2007 (25% compared to 17%); otherwise, the rankings are fairly similar for the two years.

Art remains hugely popular with year 4 students, with over three quarters of students saying they like art “heaps”, and 71% saying they would like to do more of it at school. Students like doing art at home, think that they are good at art and want to keep learning about art when they grow up. Students report that they mostly get to see art in school (39%), followed much less often by galleries and exhibitions (18%), museums (16%) and at home (15%). In terms of making art on their own, they mostly engage in drawing or sketching, although a good number also paint or make things such as models. The results from the 2007 survey are remarkably consistent with the 2003 and even 1999 results at year 4. The biggest changes may lie in what children say they do in school with regard to art. Compared to the 2003 and 1999 adminstrations, students report doing more drawing, painting, collage and computer art, but less group work. The areas of model-making, working with clay, and working with fabrics show more students at the extreme ends of the scale, meaning some students are doing this more, but others less.

Art is not quite as popular at year 8 as it is in year 4, but it is still quite popular with 44% saying they like art “heaps” and 50% saying they would like to do more art in school. Students’ self-perceptions of their artistic abilities drop fairly dramatically from year 4 to year 8 with the most positive category dropping from 49% at year 4 to 13% at year 8. Similar drops are seen in how students think their parents and teacher see them as artists. Students report that school is by far the place where they are most likely to see art (57%), followed by galleries/exhibitions (13%), museums (9%) and the home (9%). Students engage in drawing and sketching (73%) in their own time more than any other form of art. Painting (29%) and making models and things (22%) are the next most popular activities. Although the results from the 2007 survey are quite similar to 2003 and 1999, there is a slight decline in the enthusiasm and self-perception of ability seen throughout the survey compared to 2003, which in turn was typically not quite as high as 1999.