Construction and Research of Formative Evaluation System in Fine Arts Classroom Teaching in Rural Primary Schools

Haishan ZHU, Ziye WANG

College of Fine Arts, Jiangxi Normal University, Nanchang 330022, China

Abstract With the popularization of quality education, the teaching evaluation of fine arts class in rural primary schools has become an important part of the new curriculum reform, which tests whether the teaching goals are effectively achieved. This paper takes the formative evaluation system of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools as the research object, analyzes the research status of the formative evaluation system in rural primary schools, and expounds the theoretical basis and construction principles of the formative evaluation system. This paper constructs a formative evaluation system of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools from the aspects of teachers and students inside and outside the classroom, teaching process and teaching effect, in order to effectively stimulate students’ interest in learning and improve their aesthetic literacy.

Key words Formative evaluation, Rural primary school fine arts, Evaluation system

1 Introduction

With the popularization of quality education, teaching evaluation, as an important means to improve the teaching level, also plays an important role in fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools. Proper classroom teaching evaluation can stimulate students’ interest in learning and affect the healthy growth of students’ personality. The main evaluation methods of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools are mostly based on the final achievement to measure the quality of students’ learning. This kind of result evaluation method ignores the behavior and habits of students in the process of fine arts learning, and ignores students’ immediate knowledge mastery and ability development, which is not conducive to the growth of students. Therefore, fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools pays more and more attention to formative evaluation, which is a kind of developmental evaluation. It strengthens the incentive of evaluation, pays attention to the difference of evaluation, enhances the pertinence of evaluation, and pays attention to the performance of evaluation. The establishment of formative evaluation system can not only enable us to comprehensively and accurately describe the ability, progress and achievements of students, but also improve the teaching level and aesthetic accomplishment of fine arts teachers, and promote the better development of fine arts classroom teaching in primary schools in China.

2 Present situation of the research on the formative evaluation system of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools

After the formulation and implementation ofFineArtsCurriculumStandardforCompulsoryEducation(2011Edition), formative evaluation has received widespread attention in the fine arts classroom teaching of primary schools in China.FineArtCurriculumStandardforCompulsoryEducation(2011Edition) clearly points out: "Fine art curriculum evaluation should be based on students’ objective facts in fine arts learning, pay attention to the coordination and unity of evaluation and teaching, especially strengthen formative evaluation and self-evaluation."[1]In the past ten years, many scholars have studied the relationship between primary school fine arts teaching and formative evaluation as well as the implementation of formative evaluation under the fine arts curriculum standards from the aspects of the content, implementation mode and object performance of formative evaluation. We use "formative evaluation of fine arts" as the key word to search on China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and a total of 11 research articles are found. After analysis, the research contents of these articles have the following characteristics. First of all, the research time of scholars on the formative evaluation of fine arts is not long.

From the first paper on formative evaluation of fine arts published by Xi Xiuyun in 2005—StrengtheningFormativeEvaluationwiththeProcessofFineArtsLearningastheCarrier,toAnalysisofFormativeEvaluationStrategyofFineArtsTeachinginJuniorMiddleSchoolpublished by Zhu Mei in 2018, the research on formative evaluation of fine arts in China has been for only more than ten years. Secondly, scholars do a lot of research on the fine arts classroom of junior and senior high school, but seldom dabble in the formative evaluation of the fine arts classroom of primary school, and only a few articles explain the point of view. The research on rural primary schools is even rarer. At present, there is not systematic construction for the formative evaluation system, and the evaluation subject, evaluation process and evaluation criteria have not been studied comprehensively. Therefore, there is still much room for improvement in the research on formative evaluation of fine arts in China.

Today, with the implementation of the core literacy of the fine arts discipline, the construction and practice of the teaching evaluation system has become an urgent research topic, and formative evaluation occupies an important position in the teaching evaluation. Therefore, starting from our own understanding of fine arts teaching in primary school, we discuss how to establish a complete system for formative evaluation in primary school fine arts class, so as to effectively improve the effect of classroom teaching.

3 Theoretical basis and construction principles of the formative evaluation system of fine arts in rural primary schools

3.1 Theoretical basisTeaching evaluation is the measurement, analysis and evaluation of teaching quality according to teaching objectives. It takes the process and results of the organic combination of teachers, students, teaching objectives, contents, methods, teaching equipment, venue and time as the evaluation object, and is the evaluation of the overall function of teaching activities. It mainly includes the evaluation of students’ academic achievement, the evaluation of teachers’ teaching quality and the evaluation of the curriculum itself, covering all aspects of teaching.

China advocates the concept of developmental evaluation and attaches importance to formative evaluation in the new curriculum reform. The fine arts teaching in rural primary schools is no exception. Formative evaluation refers to process evaluation, which is intended to enable teachers and students to keep abreast of the phased progress of teaching and learning, so that both teachers and students can get feedback in time, so as to better improve the teaching process and improve the quality of education. For fine arts, which is a highly practical and visual course, formative evaluation exists in the whole process of teaching. The main methods of formative evaluation include daily observation and timely examination. The method of daily observation is for teachers to observe students’ classroom performance, which is the most direct formative evaluation. The rule of timely examination is to regularly check the students’ learning process and conduct students’ self-examination, such as whether to achieve the teaching goals. Therefore, formative evaluation is more humane, easy to be accepted by students, and the learning effect is more ideal.

3.2 Construction principle

3.2.1Principle of scientificity. The main disadvantage of the traditional evaluation method of fine arts in rural primary schools is that it is evaluated for the result of the evaluation, and overemphasizes the subject knowledge system but neglects the scientific nature, which limits the physical and mental development of the students[2]. The formative evaluation is based on students, respects people’s cognitive ability, pays more attention to the all-round development of students’ emotion, will, methods and strategies in the process of learning, and puts the overall development and personality development in the same position.

3.2.2Principle of comprehensiveness. Through formative evaluation, we not only examine the mastery of fine arts skills and fine arts knowledge of rural primary school students, but also comprehensively evaluate each student’s learning strategies, emotional attitude and cultural awareness of fine arts learning. Only through comprehensive evaluation can we effectively detect students’ learning status and development trend, and show students’ individual strategies and emotional attitudes in learning.

3.2.3Principle of diversification. The formative evaluation of fine arts in rural primary schools is mainly reflected in the contents, subjects, standards, methods and other aspects of the evaluation, which requires the diversification of all aspects of teaching evaluation. The content of evaluation pays attention not only to knowledge and skills, but also to emotion and attitude. The evaluation subjects adopt multiple standards, such as teacher evaluation, student self-evaluation, mutual evaluation and so on. The evaluation method is flexible and changeable, and does not rigidly adhere to the oral evaluation, and the incentive or heuristic evaluation method is feasible.

3.2.4Principle of feasibility. The construction of formative evaluation system of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools requires a lot of work, but it is not completely reconstructed. It should be combined with the existing successful experience of others and the actual situation of fine arts learning of rural primary school students, and the evaluation strategies that are easy to be realized must be considered on the basis of parallelism between teachers and students.

4 Specific construction of formative evaluation system in fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools

4.1 Teacher and student factors

4.1.1Teacher factor. Under the trend of the rapid development of fine arts education reform in rural areas, the evaluation of teachers can be subdivided into the evaluation of teachers’ teaching ability, teaching attitude, professional accomplishment and teaching quality[3]. From the perspective of teaching ability and teaching attitude, fine arts teachers should first adapt to the integration of modern science and technology and basic classroom. The ability to use modern teaching technology needs to be skillfully wielded in micro-classes, flipped classes, and divided classes should be used flexibly in fine arts classes. Take the micro-class as an example, when teachers offer the folk paper-cut art class, because the demonstration of paper-cut is complex, it is not easy to practice in the classroom. Therefore, according to the teaching goal of this class, teachers can make micro-lessons by recording folk paper-cut in the course of preparing lessons. In the demonstration link of teachers in the classroom, the use of multimedia to broadcast micro-lessons and explain the characteristics and production methods of paper-cut synchronously can stimulate students’ interest in learning.

The formative evaluation of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools also pays attention to teachers’ professional accomplishment. The fine arts teachers are mainly engaged in daily teaching work, fine arts subject development and research. However, in practical work, most fine arts teachers are limited to the field of teaching and do not pay attention to the research of fine arts topics and the development of fine arts curriculum resources. Therefore, fine arts teachers should attach importance to research-based teaching, pay attention to the current situation and problems in the field of fine arts education and write papers, actively develop local fine arts curriculum resources, and make full use of local cultural resources to compile fine arts teaching materials, to promote the teacher profession to change from technical to academic, and make teachers strive to be research-based fine arts teachers.

4.1.2Student factor. Students are the most important subject in teaching evaluation, effective teaching evaluation can effectively correct students’ learning attitude and stimulate interest in learning, so as to ensure the high quality of fine arts classroom teaching. The standard of formative evaluation has always been relatively simple. Teachers should evaluate students’ academic achievements in fine artss from many aspects, such as students’ learning attitude, interest, ability, method, and professional quality, so as to realize the all-round development of quality education. For example, rural primary school students will have wild speech and painting intention because of the differences in age, character, emotion and so on. Teachers should treat students’ learning state rationally and use encouraging language to guide students’ individual thinking to burst out in different teaching situations so as to improve their innovative consciousness and perception ability.

Because the inhibitory effect of the second signal system of primary school students is very weak, rural primary school students are easily distracted by sports or new things. Although the conscious attention of primary school students is constantly developing, unconscious attention still plays a major role in primary school. In accordance with the actual situation of rural primary school students, we should focus on including hands-on production and innovation into the formative evaluation system. Teachers should timely impart the fine arts knowledge they have learned, and play relevant videos such as works of fine arts through multimedia technology, and enrich the teaching content and establish the relationship between students’ new and old knowledge, so as to help students achieve meaningful learning.

4.2 Teaching process

4.2.1Teaching preparation. Formative evaluation appeared before fine arts teachers in rural primary schools entered the classroom. The evaluation criteria revolve around all aspects of teaching preparation, including the selection of teaching materials, the design of lesson plans, teaching contents, evaluation criteria, the teaching of fine arts knowledge and skills and the ability to solve practical problems. Only by ensuring the scientific and ideological nature of teaching, can teachers enter into teaching activities.

4.2.2Teaching activities. The influence of formative evaluation on rural primary school students is immediate. Similarly, it plays a certain role in the process of fine arts teachers’ leading teaching activities[4]. Based on the psychological characteristics of rural primary school students, teachers are students’ trusters and admirers. Teachers can appropriately consider the regulatory, supervisory and guiding nature of formative evaluation to express commendation for students’ classroom performance and fine arts works, such as "the shape of the fruit you draw is really beautiful, and you must be able to decorate it with beautiful colors." Then the student will meet the teacher’s expectation, and the student will try his or her best to complete this work of fine arts in order to avoid the teacher’s disappointment.

4.3 Teaching effect

4.3.1Teaching objectives. Teaching evaluation is an indispensable part of the fine arts class in rural primary schools, and the teaching goal is the central point of teaching evaluation. In the traditional fine arts classroom teaching, teachers’ evaluation often revolves around the knowledge and skills in the teaching objectives, whether students have completed the important and difficult points that students need to learn in this class, and pays too much attention to the results.

According to the age and psychological characteristics of primary school students in rural areas, teachers should pay attention to shaping their learning ability and attitude, emotion and demand for fine arts class in primary schools. The fine arts is different from general disciplines, each student’s perception of fine arts theory and fine arts practice are full of their own emotions, and it is a very valuable creative activity, with distinct individual differences. Therefore, teachers should treat them rationally, allow students to develop freely and open up fertile soil for the cultivation of students’ comprehensive ability.

4.3.2Teachers’ evaluation of teaching. The fine arts teachers should closely focus on the guidance from the key points of the teaching suggestions of the new curriculum standard, combined with the actual situation of rural primary schools, to actively explore effective teaching methods, and emphasize whether their own teaching work is in place[5]. After finishing a fine arts class, the teacher should first macroscopically evaluate the understanding of the course standard, whether the grasp of the teaching material is reasonable, whether the use of teaching strategies is appropriate, whether the learning situation is analyzed, whether the three-dimensional goal is in line with the students of this age, and so on. Then the teacher should make the micro-systematic evaluation of whether the teaching objectives have been achieved, the implementation of key and difficult points in teaching, as well as their own satisfaction with the class.

4.3.3Students’ evaluation of teaching. Students should also make some comments on the teaching activities related to them. Teachers should pay close attention to students’ acceptance of teachers’ teaching content and students’ satisfaction when teaching activities are carried out. Each student has different learning experience, knowledge background, living environment and talent. There are also differences in perception of fine arts, a subject full of sensibility and creativity. Teachers should pay attention to whether students master the knowledge and skills they have learned, and whether they accept teachers’ teaching methods and classroom situations, so that students can evaluate teachers’ activities or educational situations in time, to make teachers adjust teaching methods, teaching tools and teaching strategies in a timely manner, and get closer to the teaching goal.

5 Conclusion

The construction of formative evaluation system of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools is scientific and practical, it can improve students’ learning efficiency and teachers’ teaching level, and its development will promote the scientific and humanized teaching evaluation. Under the new situation, based on with the actual situation of fine arts classroom teaching in rural primary schools, this paper evaluates the three core factors of teacher and student factors, teaching process and teaching effect from the perspective of teachers and students, and reshapes the formative evaluation system, to provide valuable reference and lessons for the reform of formative evaluation system of fine arts class in other schools.