Project Dementia knowledge, Art, Research and Education (DARE)

Details of the Impact

The project utilised a mixed-methods approach to gain an understanding of children’s knowledge and perceptions of dementia. Prior to exposure to the intervention, children’s knowledge of dementia was measured using a previously developed tool from the Kids4Dementia Project (Baker, Goodenough, & Low, 2015). The children then completed an art work representing a personal memory with the help of local artists. Photography was used to capture the artwork at this stage.

A week later, a short education intervention occurred, which explained dementia, the signs and symptoms, the reasons people get dementia, what people with dementia might do, and how we can help people with dementia in our communities. A week after the educational intervention the children were given a colour photocopy and a black and white photocopy of their initial artwork and an art board. The children then asked to add to their initial artwork based on what they had learnt about memory and dementia. At the completion of the project, the children were asked to complete the knowledge survey for a second time.

The people involved in the research included an interdisciplinary group of academics from UOW, a teacher from the local public school and a local artist. The group grew to include the local public school community, including the administrative and teaching staff of the school, parents, community members, and other local artists

The teachers at the school commented on the benefit of this project (see video) and suggested this could be delivered to other schools. We have also been contacted by other international institutions and hope to work together to deliver similar projects in their regions.

There is much research that looks at the best way that we can teach our children in schools and a recent trend is "short, cyclical programming" where students are taught in short spurts of time with outcomes that relate to other subject matter. Project DARE successfully utilised this pedagogy in the one hour, six part lesson on dementia. As educators discuss and struggle to meet the outcomes of the "crowded curriculum" it is often the fine arts that begin to suffer in our school systems. This project harnessed the exquisite skills of experts in the community to share their passion of visual arts with the children and helped them to explore their creative talents without added stress, work, time, or clean up for the teachers themselves. In this way, each expert, whether researcher, artist or teacher, was able to impact the children.

Project DARE opens the doors to future university/school/community partnerships where all three groups work together. We believe that a global Project DARE is on the horizon where we share the vision, expand the purpose, include more health related issues and create a global impact of working together to strengthen our communities.