Question
What is the difference between a creative art experience and a craft?
Answer
An art experience is considered open-ended, so there's not an end product that the teacher is looking for or that it has to look like, whereas a craft is goal-oriented. A lot of times when teachers are doing craft projects, the main purpose behind a craft is actually direction-following, which is a great skill. We want children to be able to follow directions, but we just don't want to call that a creative art activity because it's not, it's a direction-following activity.
A lot of times, creative art is unstructured, so there's not someone saying, "Okay, now mix that red and mix that yellow" and “Oh look, now you have orange." It's just kind of allowed to flow, whereas a craft is definitely more structured in that way. Creative art tends to be more process-oriented, versus the craft which tends to have the product as the main goal. What's that end result?
Creative art uses basic materials, and a lot of times, it's depending upon what the child likes or what the child wants to use. A craft uses specific materials, and a lot of times, those specific materials are set up and created by the teacher. An example might be a sunflower, where the teacher has cut out the middle, the petals, and the stem, then the children glue it all together. That's not considered creative art, but that's considered a craft, or a direction-following activity.
Art tends to have open-ended instruction where the teacher's more like the facilitator, using open-ended questions and asking questions like, "Hmm, I wonder what would happen if you did this?" Or, "Hmm, what do you think if we tried x, y, or z?" Whereas the craft is very close-ended. You put the middle of the sunflower here, you put petals around the middle of the sunflower, the stem goes at the bottom, the stem has to be green, the leaf has to go on this side, it's very close-ended. That's not a bad thing, it's just not considered creative art.
Creative art develops feelings skills, including self-expression. Sometimes with my teachers, I'll say, "If the child can't pinpoint his own art, that's a craft." Creative art develops coordination skills, like manipulating materials. Crafts are really great for giving a specific process of how we're going to do this. Again, like I said, very good for developing those direction-following skills.
The goal of creative art is the process of discovery, along with the opportunity to check out new stuff, try new materials, feel new media, see what it looks like on the paper, and see what it feels like when I squish it between my toes. On the other hand, the goal of the craft is really that end product. "Do I have a sunflower to show my mom when she comes to pick me up today?"
Creative art outcomes will look different. A lot of times with creative art, as an outside person you can't even tell what it's "supposed to be." That's why we really want to be careful about saying things like, "Oh, what is it?" or, "Oh, it looks like a cow, right?" Whereas with a craft, the outcomes will basically look the same. If I've got up a bulletin board of snowmen pictures, and they all have three white circles and they all have an orange triangle on them somewhere and they all have two black eyes somewhere, it really doesn't matter that the orange triangle is coming out of the midsection. What matters is that it all pretty much looks the same, and that dictates that it's a craft or a direction-following activity.
Creative art is often individualized. The individualized process leads to an individual product. That's why you don't have a whole lot of sunflowers that look the same or a whole lot of snowmen that have three circles and two black eyes and a carrot nose. A craft or a direction-following activity is more of a cookie-cutter process, so it leads to a cookie-cutter product.
This Ask the Expert is an edited excerpt from the course entitled Baby Picasso: Art with Infants and Toddlers, by Natasha Crosby Kile, MS.
