Your child spent all afternoon building a cardboard bridge and painting it. Then the math homework came out, and the fun was gone. Now the school talks up STEAM, and you wonder what the art is for. Is it real learning, or a nice break from the hard stuff? You are not the only parent asking, and you are right to ask.
Common questions from parents
What is the difference between STEM and STEAM?
Will art classes make my child better at math?
My child loves art but avoids math. What should I do?
How do I know if a STEAM project is teaching anything?
STEAM brings art into math and science. Before you cheer, ask one question about any project: where is the real math? Art builds art. Math grows from math.
What is STEAM, and what does this infographic say?
STEAM stands for science, technology, engineering, art and math. The idea is to weave art into the other four. It is not an extra art class on the side. A child might design a bridge and draw it to scale. Then she tests how much weight it holds. The infographic above makes its case in four parts.
- New ways in. Art invites a child to come at a technical problem from a fresh angle.
- Linked subjects. One project ties science, math and design together.
- A reason to keep going. Making something real gives a child a reason to stay with the work.
- Schools and families act. Schools team up with arts groups, and parents back the work at home.
Those parts hold up as goals. A few lines on the image claim more than any source we hold. We leave those out and stick to what we stand behind.
Your child does not need a type. She needs the math taught, and a reason to stay with it. – Laura Lurns
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
Will art make my child better at math?
Here is the honest answer. Practice builds the thing you practice. Thorndike and Woodworth (1901) trained people to judge the size of rectangles. They got better at rectangles. Their skill with other shapes and with weights did not follow. Painting builds painting skill, and math grows from doing math.
So ask one question about any STEAM project: where is the math? Measuring and counting to build that bridge is real math practice. If the math is a sticker on the end, the project is mostly art. Both are worth doing. Only one of them is math. These four questions for any math class tell busy work from learning.
A good project has a second gift. What a child learns about a topic helps her when she meets it again. Kim and colleagues (2021) tested this in 38 classrooms of young children. Children taught a science unit on purpose learned more science. They also understood more of what they heard and read. Real science in a project gives your child more to bring next time.
Key takeaways
- Where is the math?: A STEAM project gives math practice only when the measuring and counting in it are real.
- Practice is specific: Art practice builds art skill and math grows from doing math, so do both.
- No type of learner: Show ideas more than one way for every child, and drop the art-kid label.
Is my child an art kid or a math kid?
Perhaps a teacher called your child “a visual learner” or “the creative one.” It sounds kind. It also sorts a child into a type. Teaching to learning styles has been checked twice, in 2008 and in 2024, and neither time did the evidence justify doing it. Those two reviews are Pashler and colleagues (2008) and Clinton-Lisell and Litzinger (2024). Science and math skills are built through practice too. See why there is no science brain.
Showing an idea more than one way is a different thing. A drawing, a model and the numbers all describe the same bridge. Our practice is to show ideas more than one way, for every child. Your child does not need a type. She needs the math taught, and a reason to stay with it. In our view, interest is that reason. That is where art earns its place. Here is what the motivation studies do and do not show.
Try this the next time a project comes home:
- Ask where the math is. Have your child show you the measuring or counting in it.
- Draw it, then do the numbers. Let your child sketch a word problem first. Then work the numbers together.
- Ask the teacher one question. “What math or science skill does this project teach?”
- Praise the thinking. Name what your child figured out, not how pretty it looks.
“At present, there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments into general educational practice.” – Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer & Bjork, 2008
A paintbrush is not a shortcut to math. A good project is math with a reason to care. – Laura Lurns
Laura Lurns · Learning Success expert
We believe no child is an art kid or a math kid. Every child is a learner. Sorting children into types is an old habit. It lets the hard teaching slide. You don’t need a credential to be your child’s first teacher. You already are one. Our free Growth Mindset Program gives you words for the moment work gets hard: start the free program.
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References
- Thorndike, E. L., & Woodworth, R. S. (1901). The influence of improvement in one mental function upon the efficiency of other functions. II. The estimation of magnitudes. Psychological Review, 8, 384-395.
- Kim, J. S., Burkhauser, M. A., Mesite, L. M., et al. (2021). Improving reading comprehension, science domain knowledge, and reading engagement through a first-grade content literacy intervention. Journal of Educational Psychology, 113(1), 3-26.
- Pashler, McDaniel, Rohrer & Bjork (2008). Learning styles: Concepts and evidence. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105-119.
- Clinton-Lisell & Litzinger (2024). Is it really a neuromyth? A meta-analysis of the learning styles matching hypothesis. Frontiers in Psychology, 15, 1428732.
