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

Results: Items that received high uncertain responses or showed low discriminative
power were excluded from subsequent analysis. The remaining items reflected four key
dimensions connected with art production. Three out of the four key dimensions
identified in the present study, namely enjoyment, confidence, and usefulness were also
identified by other researchers when exploring pupils’ attitudes towards school or
towards various school subjects (Jones, 1988, Todman and Dick, 1993, Blake, 1994,
Keys et al, 1995, West et al, 1997).

A fourth dimension identified by the results of the exploratory questionnaire was defined
as support needed. This we believe is an essential dimension in the learning process
because it represents the teacher’s feedback to the pupil about how well they are coping
with the task and one that has been overlooked. In general when looking for factors that
may explain pupils’ attitudes towards schooling or subjects or aesthetic preferences,
researchers are more concerned with the role of pupils’ characteristics (age/
developmental stage and gender) and less with the role teachers’ feedback play in this
process. Only a few studies explore the relationship of pupils’ attitudes and teachers’
attitudes or teachers’ specialisation (Todman and Dick, 1993, Jeffers, 1997).

Study 2

Participants: the sample of study 2 included two groups of pupils. The first group
included 226 sixth graders (108 boys and 119 girls, mean age 11.4 years), and the second
group was comprised of 133 pupils (80 boys and 53 girls, mean age 11.6 years).

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