We all want our kids to realize their intellectual potential. But is this enough? Do we also teach them to be caring, honest, responsible people?

Einstein said that the student must acquire a vivid sense of the beautiful and the morally good, "otherwise he, with his specialized knowledge, will more closely resemble a well-trained dog than a harmoniously developed person." Einstein had a strong sense of what makes us civilized human beings. With the elimination of the arts as an essential part of the curriculum, I believe we are marching inevitably down the road of the well-trained dog and away from the path to the well-rounded human being.

Einstein saw the importance of developing an esthetic as well as a moral awareness. He also recognized that while knowledge is important, there is nothing more important than the imagination. It is in the imagination that pursuit of the arts and character-building can come together. Children who have been asked to imagine they are a caterpillar, pretend they are a prince or a pauper, or to draw a building from a bird's vantage point, have honed their ability to feel what it would be like to be in someone else's shoes - to see things from a different perspective. When they act, they become another character and live and breathe the life of that character. When they draw, they observe the detail in an object from many perspectives and then bring it to life in their own individual way. This is how they discover the beautiful uniqueness of their own inner being and the beauty in the being of others.

Artists are trained to think with imagination. Without imagination we can separate ourselves from the needs of others because we don't think about what they must be feeling. We can become isolated and insensitive, not because we are mean spirited people, but because we don't go through the imaginative experiment of putting ourselves in the shoes of another. We don't even bother to notice the details of anyone else's life. We simply compartmentalize our lives, and our sense of responsibility gets put into our "community service" box.

Do we want our children to understand that being caring, empathetic people is part of everyday life? If so, we need to consider educating their imagination. If we do, we will certainly increase the chance that they will eventually be interested in what they can give back to the society. I believe there is an important link between creativity and human responsibility that we need to look at carefully.

Lola Rasminsky, Director

Summer Programs 1999
We offer a great variety of Summer programs
for kids, teens and adults.
Check them out!

Once again, you can join the Avenue Road Arts School in Port Carling, Ontario for its Muskoka Arts Program. Jenny Soden will be back to teach art classes for toddlers and children 3-12 yrs. For a brochure, e-mail us or call us at (416) 961-1502.