Pupils’ attitudes towards art teaching in primary school: an evaluation tool

immediate and potentially life-long effects on how they perceive, enjoy and value art. It
is common to observe pupils who say ‘I can’t do it’ to be indifferent during art lessons
and avoid making art because of fear of failure. On the other hand promoting positive
attitudes towards art is likely to enable pupils to engage meaningfully with art in school
and allow them to express themselves through this medium .Assessing pupils’ attitudes at
this age (which is the top grade) offers an indirect evaluation of the overall effects of art
education at the primary school level. This study focuses in particular on pupils’ attitudes
towards art as taught at the top grade of primary school in Cyprus.

Literature in the field of pupils’ attitudes towards art is very limited. There are theoretical
models about art teaching emphasising the central role of learners (e.g., Chapman, 1978,
Gentle, 1990, Houser, 1991, Stankiewicz, 2000) and good knowledge of pupils’ abilities
is considered necessary for a teacher’s effective teaching, but it would appear that pupils’
attitudes are not considered part of this knowledge, unlike other important factors (e.g.,
children’s artistic development). It is this gap in the literature that the present paper aims
to respond to by presenting the development of an attitude scale for evaluating pupils’
attitudes towards art experienced in school, the ASAES (Attitude Scale for Art
Experienced in School).

Method

The ASAES was constructed, refined and administrated in primary schools in the district
of Nicosia, Cyprus. The scale was developed over three studies. The first explored

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