There’s a special kind of vibe coming from the classrooms at Dawes Elementary School. It’s the excitement of kids immersed in not just music or visual art, but a broad spectrum of the arts. Indeed, for this progressive community school on Chicago’s predominantly Hispanic Southwest Side, the arts are as integral to the curriculum as math and science and reading and gym.

During a visit to Dawes on a recent afternoon, the school’s principal, Mary Dixon, gave me a walking tour of the many kinds of arts learning experiences available to students, from second- to eighth-graders.

In one classroom, seventh- and eighth-graders were strumming guitars to prerecorded pop. In another, students were making and painting papier-mache masks. In another, an instructor was guiding younger special-needs kids through yoga exercises. In a dance class, a dozen boys and girls swirled and bounced to a Latin beat.

“You can see that when kids are engaged in the arts, they are happy,” she said. “We want to prioritize happiness and learning. The arts enhance all of our other subject areas in the curriculum.”

Read the full article by John von Rhein about arts education from the Chicago Tribune