A Qualitative Case Study on Secondary Art Teachers’ Instructional Imagination: Focused on Experiences with Art Materials

Abstract

This study aims to explore how secondary school art teachers imagine instructional possibilities through their experiences with art materials and how these practical experiences relate to the formation of their professional expertise. To this end, in-depth individual interviews were conducted with three secondary school art teachers who had experience teaching in both school and out-of-school art education settings. The data were analyzed using a qualitative case study approach. The findings revealed that instructional imagination was not merely a matter of generating creative ideas. Rather, the participants continuously engaged in three interconnected processes: weighing, in which they formed educational judgments by balancing the possibilities of new materials against practical constraints; adjusting, in which they refined instruction by coordinating learners, materials, and educational contexts; and extending, in which they reinterpreted previous practical experiences within new educational contexts and carried them forward into subsequent teaching practices. These findings suggest that instructional imagination can be understood as a process through which professional expertise is formed and enacted through the continuous interaction between educational judgment and practical experience, mediated by art materials. Furthermore, art materials functioned not merely as tools for artistic expression but as important educational conditions that enabled teachers to envision instruction while considering students' experiences and educational contexts. This study contributes to art education by extending the meaning of art materials beyond educational resources for students' creative experiences and demonstrating their significance in the formation and enactment of art teachers' educational judgment and professional expertise.