About the Arts
Through the Arts, people share stories, ideas, knowledge and understanding. The Arts engage our senses and give us ways to imagine, celebrate, communicate and challenge ways of knowing, being, doing and becoming. Participating in quality arts experiences and practices enriches our social and emotional wellbeing. It fosters development of our imagination and enables us to reach our creative and intellectual potential.
The distinctive languages, knowledge and practices of each Arts discipline in the Victorian Curriculum F–10 enable learners to play, explore, question, challenge and imagine new possibilities as they create, embody, design, represent, collaborate and communicate ideas, emotions, observations and experiences. The Arts foster rich cross-curriculum opportunities for learners as they grow in their understanding of self and others, and as they make sense of, interpret and respond to their real and imagined worlds.
In the Victorian Curriculum F–10, the Arts include Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music, Visual Arts and Visual Communication Design. Through making and responding, students learn as artists and audiences in 4 interrelated strands: Exploring, Developing Practices, Creating and Presenting.
Dance
In Dance, students use the body to communicate and express meaning through purposeful movement. Dance practice integrates choreography, performance, and responding to dance and dance making. Students experience and explore dance created and performed across diverse contexts, dance styles and dance forms. Through embodied learning, students develop an understanding of how they can use their body to communicate ideas and meaning.
Drama
In Drama, students create, perform and respond to drama as artists and audiences. They learn to use, manage and manipulate the elements and conventions of drama across a range of dramatic forms and styles. As artists, students create drama works that communicate story, action and meaning. As audiences, students develop an appreciation of the art form and consider how the works of others may influence their own practice.
Media Arts
In Media Arts, students use images, sound, text, interactive elements and technologies to explore, produce and interpret stories about people, ideas and the world around them. They explore the diverse cultural, social and organisational influences on media practices, and they draw on this understanding when producing and responding to media arts works.
Music
In Music, students listen to, compose and perform music from a diverse range of styles, cultures, traditions and contexts. They create, organise, manipulate and share sounds in time and space. Students critically analyse their own music making and music works of others, developing an appreciation for the art form. Music practices are aurally based and focus on developing and applying knowledge and skills through sustained musical engagement and experiences.
Visual Arts
In Visual Arts, students learn in, through and about visual arts practices, including the fields of art and craft. They experience and explore visual artworks created by artists working in diverse contexts, styles and forms, and they build understanding of the significance and impact of visual arts practice and culture.
Visual Communication Design
In Visual Communication Design, students learn in, through and about the practices of visual communication design and audience or user experiences. They use design thinking and problem-solving to design, generate, produce and evaluate visual communication solutions. Students investigate the drawing conventions, visual language and styles used to represent concepts and they investigate the work and practices of Australian and international designers from different times, places and cultures.
Learn more
Learn more about the Arts disciplines, their structure and how to strengthen learning in the Arts by reading the introduction to the Arts.
See how the 6 Arts disciplines align by viewing the Arts alignment documents:
Watch now
To find out more about the Arts in Foundation to Level 6, watch ‘Understanding the Victorian Curriculum F–10 Version 2.0, The Arts Foundation to Level 6’, below.
To find out about the individual Arts disciplines in Levels 7–10, watch the videos on their Resources pages.
