While learning in other disciplines may often focus on a single skill or talent, the arts regularly engage multiple skills and abilities.

A remarkable consensus exists among teams of leading educational researchers nationwide:
       •   The arts reach students who are not otherwise being reached.
       •   The arts reach students in ways that they are not otherwise being reached.
       •   The arts connect students to themselves and each other.
       •   The arts transform the environment for learning.
       •   The arts provide learning opportunities for the adults in the lives of young people.
       •   The arts provide new challenges for those students already considered successful.
       •   The arts connect learning experiences to the world of real work.
Edward B. Fiske, Ed., Champions of Change: The Impact of the Arts on Learning, The President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities and the Arts Education Partnership, 1999



"When we teach a child to sing or play the flute, we teach her how to listen. When we teach her to draw, we teach her to see. When we teach a child to dance, we teach him about his body and about space and when he acts on stage, he learns about character and motivation. When we teach a child design, we reveal the geometry of the world. When we teach children about the folk and traditional arts and the great masterpiecesof the world, we teach them to celebrate their roots and to find their own place in society.”   Jane Alexander, actress and former chairman, National Endowment for the Arts, 1993-1997, in Command Performance: An Actress in the Theater of Politics,  2000

Among preschoolers ages 3–5, evaluation at the Wolf Trap Institute for Early Learning through the Arts documented a range of program impacts:
       •  Cognitive growth, especially in memory.
       •  Capacity for social participation and learning in group settings
       •  Growth in self-esteem.
       •  Early understanding of diverse cultural traditions.
Bruce Torff, Evaluation of the Wolf Trap Institute for Early Learning in the Arts, Harvard Project Zero, cited in An Arts and Education Research Compendium, California Arts Council, 2001

© 2007-2008 Woodruff Arts Center, All Rights Reserved
Funding for Woodruff 's Education Initiative was generously provided by The Goizueta Foundation, Robert W. Woodruff Foundation, Inc., The Kendeda Fund & an Anonymous Donor.

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