By STACEY BODGER
Dance and drama will be compulsory school subjects from 2003 under a new arts curriculum.
The subjects have been loosely taught in some schools within physical education and English programmes.
But under the Arts in New Zealand curriculum, developed over the past five years, visual arts, music, dance and drama
will become compulsory for students up to Year 8 (form two).
After Year 8, all students will have to study at least two of the arts until they reach Year 11 (fifth form).
Education Minster Trevor Mallard yesterday unveiled the 110-page curriculum at Island Bay School in Wellington, where students persuaded him to join in a "flipper dance."
Mr Mallard said the curriculum recognised for the first time that dance and drama contributed significantly to students' learning.
Maori and Pacific arts are also included in the document, which completes a review of arts in schools begun in 1993 after the launch of the New Zealand Curriculum Framework.
Around $10 million will be spent over the next two years to produce teaching material and videos on the new curriculum and prepare school art coordinators.
Alastair Fletcher, the principal of Chaucer Primary School in Blockhouse Bay, praised the new curriculum for recognising the importance of "creative" subjects.
Students at his school already take part in dance as part of their studies, and Mr Fletcher believes it is as valuable to them as maths and science.
"I don't believe in second-class subjects because classes such as dance, drama and visual arts give children a vital chance to express themselves and improve their self-confidence.
"There's plenty of time to concentrate on subjects like maths once they're older and have had a broad early education."
The head of the Auckland College of Education centre for arts, Lola Mackinnon, said the curriculum was exciting because it would give students a broad arts base.
It would also give teachers a clear arts curriculum for the first time.
But Ted Bracey, head of fine arts at Canterbury University, said imposing a national curriculum on arts would be a "calamity."
"It's an ill-conceived rationale to arbitrarily pick four arts and decide that is what will be assessed," Mr Bracey said.
"Teachers should have the freedom to decide how they teach art, according to the abilities and needs of their students - not be confined to four areas lumped together for convenience."
