MAXINE GREENE’S AESTHETIC EDUCATION 1

Michala Zembas

EDTHP 115 Section 001

For many years, different philosophers of education have enlightened others to their ideas

of what education should be. As an educator, having your own core beliefs about education can

help you be more effective in the classroom. My core beliefs and philosophy of education have

been influenced by existentialist, Maxine Greene, and her idea of aesthetic education which uses

art to enhance lessons.

Greene firmly believed that students had to take control of their own education, along

with support from an educator. She believed that the role of the teacher in the classroom was to

be present for support and to challenge the learner, but the learner must take it upon themselves

to actually learn. The phrase that Maxine Greene used to describe teachers is “wide-awake”

(ColombiaLearn, 2014). Teachers and educators must live a life that is not mechanical or

habitual. They need to challenge themselves and their students to take control of what is

happening and create opportunities through education, this can be done using the arts and

humanities in the classroom. According to Amanda Nicole Gulla (2018), Greene believed the

purpose of schooling is to allow students to form deep connections between themselves and other

people that cohesively share the world.

Greene believed that students learn these deep connections to others through artworks.

Using art in education to create opportunities and learn through experience is called “aesthetic

education” (Gulla, 2018). Greene was a proponent of the arts because she believed that the arts

can help one live a life that is wide awake. Her reasoning is that art is created with purpose.

Artists create in order to get a specific message across, thus teaching students about society and

the way other people live and think in the world. In living a life that is wide-awake, learning
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from experiences and making connections, one can learn from the arts because they have so

much to offer.

Despite living in a society where teacher accountability heavily relies on student

performance on standardized tests, teachers can and do still manage to implement parts of

Maxine Greene’s educational philosophies into their classrooms. An experience that I had with

Maxine Greene’s idea of aesthetic education was in a Shakespeare and Dramatic Literature class.

Literature itself is a form of art from the author that created the piece, then other artists create

their own rendition of what the literature is saying in the form of a movie, a song, a musical, or a

painting. Our teacher used a lot of different methods and tools in this class that are considered

aesthetic education. We spent a lot of time in this class studying not only the words of

Shakespeare, but also plays, movies, and other works of art that were inspired by his words. In

doing this, especially for a Shakespeare class which is rich, complicated material, the material

became easier to understand; it was challenging and fun. The role that our teacher played in the

classroom was also very similar to Maxine Greene’s philosophy; she was there to challenge us,

but we had to think and create connections through pieces of art on our own.

Seeing different people’s perspectives on a subject matter can enhance your own ideas.

Art opens up your mind to other ideas and perspectives, and it opens the door for thoughtful

discussion. Not only did we look at other artist’s work in this class, we also were given the

opportunity to create our own work and our own perspectives. We made posters, drawings, we

acted out plays, we wrote our own stage directions, poems and alternate endings to stories.

Ultimately, my experience with aesthetic education was positive, and I was able to learn more

about the material than by just reading the text and taking an exam.
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In the classroom, I will strive to be a wide awake educator, and I will strive to use

aesthetic education to enhance lessons. In an elementary school classroom, learning should be

fun and it should help students gain a deeper understanding of subject matter. Critical thinking

skills are an important part of education, but there are ways, aside from exams that students can

think more deeply. For elementary students, I can see myself implementing this philosophy in

the classroom through the creation and analyzation of artworks that pertain to stories and history

lessons that are covered. For younger students, doing art projects allows students to create their

own ideas without them even realizing that they are thinking deeply.

Contrary to what some people believe, art, creativity and imagination are not a waste of

time, or an easy project to grade. Art can help students form their own opinions and their own

thoughts to develop deep thinking. Aesthetic education is a great addition to any classroom, and

it will be an essential part of my classroom in a few years.

References

Gulla, A. N. (2018). Aesthetic inquiry: Teaching under the influence of maxine greene. The High

School Journal, 101(2), 108-115. doi:10.1353/hsj.2018.0004

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ColumbiaLearn. (2014, Oct. 7). Maxine Greene – To New Teachers. [Video File]. Retrieved

from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_raVMnP57w