Training for Teaching Art at Upper Secondary/Grammar Schools

To be admitted to the study programme, students are required to pass an entrance examination

In upper secondary/grammar school teacher training (L3), you study art as your first or second subject.

You study art at the Kunsthochschule Kassel, which is part of the University of Kassel. This means that you mostly attend classes together with students of other teacher training programmes (L1, L2) and students of Visual Arts, Visual Communication and Art History and Theory.

The study programme is module-based. Modules usually comprise several classes in each of which credits need to be achieved if they are to count towards the module. Each module is concluded by means of a module examination.

Syllabus

The study programme is divided into two phases:

  • The 2-semester foundation studies and
  • the 4-semester main studies.

It is sub-divided into three major areas, which are integrated and studied in parallel:

  • Aesthetic practice: artistic work in the studios and creative/technological training in the study workshops
  • Subject content studies: art history/theory/psychology/sociology/philosophy
  • Subject didactics: history and theory of art tuition, methods of artistic and creative working, methods of conveying art and everyday culture in teaching.

In addition to the specialist study programme, provision is made for two placements in a school, one in the 3rd or 4th semester specializing in education sciences and a second in the 5th or 6th semester specializing in subject didactics. Both placements are accompanied by a preparatory and evaluative seminar.

Aesthetic practice focuses on the student's own artistic projects. In this area, appropriate media technology and design knowledge and skills are developed and creative behaviour that should lead to wide artistic productivity practised. In relation to the student's own artistic practice and beyond, specific presentation forms and techniques relevant to teaching in school are developed.

Subject content studies aim to enable students to practise, and obtain a theoretical basis for, their interaction with art and phenomena of everyday visual culture and to acquire autonomy and security of judgement.

The study of art didactics aims to provide an introduction to theories and methods of art tuition and to the history of the subject, as well as enabling students to develop their own specialism-based art-pedagogic approach. It deals, in particular, with children's, adolescents' and young adults' aesthetic practice.

Basic cours

The basic course takes place with the students from the basic liberal arts class during the 1st and 2nd semesters. The course finishes with the presentation of your own artistic work. Two courses in subject-specific teaching and the curriculum as well as introductory courses in the workshops are compulsory, in addition to the work in the basic class.

Main studies

In the main studies (3rd to 8th semester), students are individually responsible for compiling their programme in line with the nature of the subject by selecting classes in all three subject areas from the available study contents (in accordance with the academic regulations) and determining selection, weighting and sequence in accordance with aspects related to school form.