Exploring how arts and culture benefit our health

Suitable for 14 to 19-year-olds (secondary and high schools, and college), this article and accompanying activity sheet can be used in the classroom or shared with students online.

This resource links to KS4 and KS5 Music, Art and Drama.

It can also be used as a careers resource and links to Gatsby Benchmarks:
Gatsby Benchmark 2: Learning from career and labour market information
Gatsby Benchmark 4: Linking curriculum learning to careers

• This teaching resource explains the work of Aaron Williamon, Rosie Perkins and Neta Spiro of the Centre for Performance Science, at the Royal College of Music in the UK, who are exploring the impacts of the arts and culture on health and well-being.
• This resource also contains interviews with Rosie and Neta, providing insights into careers in music and health research and performance science.
• The activity sheet provides ‘talking points’ (based on Bloom’s Taxonomy) to prompt students to reflect on the team’s research, and tasks them to design a survey to examine how their peers engage with the arts.

This resource was first published on Futurum Careers, a free online resource and magazine aimed at encouraging 14-19-year-olds worldwide to pursue careers in science, tech, engineering, maths, medicine (STEM) and social sciences, humanities and the arts for people and the economy (SHAPE).

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