The earliest known illustrations
Interpreting the Language of Symbols
The Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc Cave
Ardèche, France
Paleolithic
Ardèche, France
Paleolithic
Imagine, 30,000-32,000 years ago a nomadic group of ancient people maneuvered themselves through narrow and claustrophobic passage ways to meet in the large, open cave of Chauvet to illustrate. Did they gather here in ritual? Was this space once sacred? Is there some message among the moving herds of animals drawn on he walls? While it may be impossible to actually imagine these ancient people, since our lives and societies may bear little resemblance to those of pre-history, there is a common thread that links the "us" today, to the "us" that existed so very, very long ago.
How can we test this? Hand a small child a piece of chalk before an empty slate of sidewalk, and before they are even able to sing their ABC's they will begin documenting what they know. An abstracted blob of circles may be "mommy", a line with some others connected to it, a "doggie". Place a child in a sandbox, and without even being told what to do, they will begin building.
Art Historians' believe the ancient people that colored the walls of the Chauvet cave very likely had a precise narrative to tell. It might have been that they used the animals specific to their place of origin as a kind of "we were here", or that the cave was a site of significance in itself and that many nomadic tribes, over the course of thousands of years, visited and added their stories to the walls of Chauvet. Now, does any of this apply to educators and education today? I would argue it does.
How can we test this? Hand a small child a piece of chalk before an empty slate of sidewalk, and before they are even able to sing their ABC's they will begin documenting what they know. An abstracted blob of circles may be "mommy", a line with some others connected to it, a "doggie". Place a child in a sandbox, and without even being told what to do, they will begin building.
Art Historians' believe the ancient people that colored the walls of the Chauvet cave very likely had a precise narrative to tell. It might have been that they used the animals specific to their place of origin as a kind of "we were here", or that the cave was a site of significance in itself and that many nomadic tribes, over the course of thousands of years, visited and added their stories to the walls of Chauvet. Now, does any of this apply to educators and education today? I would argue it does.
In any kindergarten classroom you will find teachers encouraging the young child's independent investigation through the medium of illustration. While students may not be able to write down a story yet themselves, they are able to use drawing as a way of telling stories. Students are encouraged to tell their own stories as a means of exploring their identities. Before they are literate, students are often asked to draw a picture that tells a story. These pictures are filled with symbols only the child can identify which are explained to the teacher and then word for word the teacher will write down their meaning. When teachers write down the student's exact phrasing it is called the Language Experience Approach (LEA) and is one of the earliest techniques used in the classroom to connect oral language to written language.
Unfortunately Art Historians do not have this liberty - they cannot ask the ancient people of the Chauvet cave to transcribe the meaning. But what they have done is similar to the LEA approach in essence. By considering each drawing and utilizing tools of science and dating, they can make educated guesses at what the drawings mean and who might have made them. What the Elementary Educator can take away from this is that the yearning for narrative and to leave one's own mark is in our nature and as old as human history.
Unfortunately Art Historians do not have this liberty - they cannot ask the ancient people of the Chauvet cave to transcribe the meaning. But what they have done is similar to the LEA approach in essence. By considering each drawing and utilizing tools of science and dating, they can make educated guesses at what the drawings mean and who might have made them. What the Elementary Educator can take away from this is that the yearning for narrative and to leave one's own mark is in our nature and as old as human history.
The Chauvet-Pont-d'Arc Cave, Ardèche, France, Paleolithic