The purpose of the study is to understand the female learners who participate in the art education program as adult education and to explore the learners' motivation, thoughts, values, and life gained through the art education program applying qualita...
The purpose of the study is to understand the female learners who participate in the art education program as adult education and to explore the learners' motivation, thoughts, values, and life gained through the art education program applying qualitative research methods to examine phenomenological cases. In this study, prints were selected as an art education program, and among them, the study focused on silk screen. Unlike other painting class, prints are characterized by its reproducibility that can produce several pieces of work at once. In particular, silk screen is different from other printing methods in that the steps of work are simple and easy, and that they can be produced on any surface. For this reason, the fact that the silk screen makes things such as eco bags, pouches, calendars, and notebooks which people can directly use in their everyday life through their own works indicates that their lives and art education can be more closely related so that it can be the appropriate subject for this study.
The participants of the study were two females and the study conducted qualitative research through five art education programs, which was designed as a 4-hour program from October to November 2018. The study implemented a qualitative research on the phenomenological aspects of observing a phenomenon. The cultural and technological research method, which is one of the representative methods of qualitative research, was selected. And then, the data needed for the study were collected through the field observation and in-depth interview method which is the method of cultural and technological research. On-site participation observation was recorded during the course, and then it was transcribed after class. The emphasis was placed on the gestures, expressions, and words of the participants observed during the process of transcription. Besides, all data collected with the consent of the research participants were transferred at the stage of description, and used to interpret the research. The study followed Wolcott's "Technology", "Analysis" and "Interpretation" research process among qualitative analysis methods. After the collected data were analyzed by open coding. And then they were classified into subcategories and top categories to analyze and make conclusion.
In-depth interviews consisted of open interviews by desining semi-structured questions, and deducted top and bottom categories through repetitive comparative analysis. The derived upper and lower categories are as follows.
First, the upper category 'confidence' is classified into 'pursuit of knowledge for oneself' and 'existence as social value' as sub-category. Second, the upper category 'inside expression' classified into 'emotion release' and 'everyday story or issue' Third, in the upper category 'communication', 'social activity' and 'interaction with others' were shown as sub-category. Fourth, the upper category consisted of 'self reflection', subcategories of 'looking back through life' and 'future plans'. Fifth, the upper category 'satisfaction and achievement' was classified into subcategory of 'voluntary learning'. Through this categorization with repetitive comparative analysis method, 5 categories and 9 subcategories were derived in total.
Based on the results of the study, the conclusions of the qualitative research on female learners participating in art education as adult education are as follows.
For adult female learners who were the participants of the study, the meaning of learning can be associated with 'self'. The study participants responded that they engage in the education to 'pursue knowledge to do what they want' and 'to be a valuable person in society'. In addition, the participants are different from children and adolescents, in that they voluntarily participate in learning as it can be seen from their motivation. During the in-depth interview, the they mentioned words like 'enjoyable', 'fun', and 'satisfactory' a lot. In this way, since the participation of voluntary learning is a worthwhile education for them, it is identified that the learners' satisfaction of their current life as well as the satisfaction of the education increases. As a result of this study, it was demonstrated that only art production activities and appreciation activities of art education can genuinely fulfill the role of medium expressing inner emotions or assisting interaction with others. These results suggest that the meaning of participation in art education as adult education for female learners is ultimately for their self-realization by experiencing the work of making art pieces.
Currently, study on art education as adult education is mainly focused on researches on analyzing the status of institutions or developing programs, or research on middle-aged women or elderly people. The reason why the subject is an elderly woman in middle age is that the study of adult women in their 30s and 40s is not active, and adult education is a form of lifelong learning. Although it is important to understand the current situation and develop the program, it is also necessary to take into consideration the emotional and psychological aspects of the learners of various age groups and to conduct in-depth qualitative research considering the motivation for participating in adult education and their social and personal backgrounds. In this sense, the study has significance in that it suggests the necessity of the research on these fields which should be actively conducted as well.