Mariko Nobori's How The Arts Unlock The Door Of Learning

Integrating the arts in the general education classrooms is important. According to Mariko Nobori author of How the Arts Unlock The Door of Learning, integrating the arts increases comprehension and long-term memory. Students are elaborating when they create stories, dramas, draw pictures. Students become occupied with the content they are learning when the arts are integrated. Teaching to contrasting modalities is vital because all students are unique and need to garner new knowledge in multiple ways. “Successful teachers, when planning a lesson, include all three learning modalities to ensure the highest learning occurs in the classroom. Examples include: Aural, visual, and kinesthetic” (Fallin 2011). Both teachers and students can benefit
Drama is vital because drama can help students Like English Language Learner’s (ELL’s) build language and character. Incorporating arts, such as music, drama and movement help students interpret and analyze stories and expand their vocabulary. For example, Linda Diamond, author of Teaching Vocabulary gives a couple examples of how to teach ELLs idioms such as teaching them the phrase ‘Hold your horses’ means to be patient The whole expression "to hold your horses" actually means "to slow down, wait a minute, or be more patient." For example, if you were impatiently waiting for your sister to get off the phone, your sister might say to you, "Hold your horses. I'll be off the phone in a minute!" To have someone act out being on the phone and another student to act as their sister, would be a great visual aid for struggling students.

Drama also develops empathy and allows students to see life from multiple perspectives. For instance, putting on a drama. Students can learn about immigrants and how they travel to get here, then they can put on a mini-drama or simulation that involves a group of students being immigrants and a group of students playing Human Resources, an activity like this can help students think globally about real-world problems and put themselves in others’
For example, one student may be more engaged when they get to do a drama, but may find music distracting and vice versa. Allowing students to have multiple experiences will help them grasp new content, for many kids will not comprehend the concept the first couple of times it has been indoctrinated.

Implementing drama, play, and movement are extremely important to kids, they enhance student learning. Realizing now that students need extra exposure to the arts in the classroom and should not be just left up to the ‘Specials’ teachers. Vision and creativity multiplies when young students are given more time to play which not only involves physical play, but pretend play as well, and using the arts can elevate that. According to psychological research, students from about ages 2- 7 need play in order to develop their social-emotional