Embedding digital media and tools in the School Subjects Art and Music – Creative processes and competences in Upper Secondary Schools.

The project will study creative processes and productions in the subjects of Art and Music in upper secondary schools where digital media and tools are embedded in the subjects, i.e. digital technology is used to a significant extent. The focus will be on studying how digital competences are used and how they are assessed. Key factors to embed digital media and tools in Art and Music will be studied. Advantages and disadvantages by using digital media in Art and Music productions in the creative process will be addressed. How assessments are performed of digital competences when creating art and composing music, and gender and power relations connected to digital creative work in Art and Music is studied.

Theories that will be applied are media ecology, sociocultural theory and cultural semiotics. In the analysis, the concepts of reproductive and creative process as well as mastery and appropriation will be applied. The concept of mastery implies that the actor uses mediation on the mediation’s conditions, while appropriation implies that the actor uses her/his competence in mediation on her/his own intentions and conditions. By appropriation means an individual’s ability to develop skills and competences in her/his own way and apply it for own purposes. In order to be able to apply digital media with such a focus, pupils must have reached beyond the immediate reproduction of technical ability, but also have the potential to use the tools for widening, boundary crossing and new creation out of personal reasons. Mastery does not always have to be attained for such an investigative attitude to be established. The concepts enhances, reverses into, retrieves and obsolesces will be used in a pedagogical context to distinguish changes that digital media is providing.

The project runs for two years and involves researchers who collect and analyse data, and researchers who provide critical comments on the project's progress and results. Specially selected classes in Sweden will be followed during parts of a school year. Participant observations, interviews and “stimulated recalls” will be made to monitor the creative processes from the introduction through out to the final presentation. In the process, critical moments will be studied with focus on both technological and aesthetic aspects. Democratic as well as gender perspectives in relation to digital competences in art and music are also of interest.

The researchers will visit the upper secondary schools on numerous occasions, including observations, interviews and stimulated recall focusing on creating Art, and composing Music with digital and traditional tools. The comparisons will also be made between the upper secondary program Aesthetic Media, where the course “Digital creation” is compulsory, whereas it is optional in Art and Music programs.

Results from earlier research projects clearly indicate a need for advanced knowledge about what digital competences are needed and how these competences will be assessed in school. In this project focus is on the use of digital media and tools, both separately and in interaction with traditional media, in the creative processes in the school subjects of Art and Music.

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