Evaluating the Arts in Education: A Responsive Approach ed. by Robert Stake (review)

84 Books UnbuiltAmerica:ForgottenArchitecture inthe UnitedStatesfrom Thomas Jefferson to the Space Age. Alison Sky and Michelle Stone. McGraw-Hill, New York, 1976. 308 pp.. illus. $14.95. Reviewed by Peter Lipman-Wulf * This is a compilation of architectural projects in the U.S.A. for buildingsthat were not constructedduring the past 200 years. It is an outstanding result of two years of painstaking research under unfavorable circumstances, since in architecture there is generallylittle interest in unachieved plans and architects tend to hide them away. The authors’ decision to concentrate mainly on projects that were realizable rather than in the realm of fantasy was, I am sure, a sound one. Some futuristic projects have been included, for example Buckminster Fuller’s floating geodesic spheres(1967)and Oscar Newman’sunderground city (1935).In the past, some highly imaginative, if impractical, architectural designs materialized in the form of theatrical scenery. Piranese’s drawings and engravings of unbuilt structures are still admired. George R. Collinshas contributed a lucid Introduction, which isthe only running text in the book. The various projects are not arranged chronologically but alphabetically by architects’names and each has a descriptive text provided either by the project’s originator or by a historian or a critic.Collinspoints out that there is one precedent for this type of book-Arrhitektur. die nirht gebaur (ArchitectureThat Was Not Built) by Joseph Ponten. It was published in 1925, and treats primarily German projects. The renderings of the proposed buildings, some not executed by the architects themselves, are not meant to be viewed as pictorial works of art, howeverI found many of them entrancing. I was also struck by the dominant role played by ‘freeform’ or sculptural architectural design chosen by many of the architects to avoid the more economical linear geometrical straightjacket so prevalent in recent times. Perhaps for this reason the structures remained unbuilt. Although there is a tendency in the contemporary fine arts to regard works from the point of view of art for arts sake, architecture must satisfyutilitarian or functional ends. However, the book reveals much freer and ingenious architectural proposals during the past severaldecades than one might expect, considering the buildings that have been built. It also shows clearly the abandonment of classical and Renaissance styles in the 19thcentury upon the introduction of new types of building materials and construction methods. The proposed mile-high skyscraper of Frank Lloyd Wright and the private habitation ‘Eagle’s Nest’ of Joseph Whyte are in stark contrast to the unimaginative classicalstyle imposed on the public buildings in Washington, D.C., as illustrated by Franklin Smith’s‘Acropolis of the United States’. The scholarly book by Sky and Stone provides an excellent background for the evaluation of architectural possibilitiesin the future. I highly recommend it to the readers of Leonardo. Evaluating the Artsin Education:A ResponsiveApproach. Robert Stake, ed. Charles E. Merrill, Columbus, Ohio, 1975. 122 pp.. illus. Reviewed by A 1 Hurwitz** The problem ofart evaluation has, for the past decade, been very much on the mind of educators in the U.S.A. The need to describe with better precision evidence of success or failure of stated goals has forced teachers to rethink the complex assessment of the changes that may or may not occur in children as a result of instruction. At its best, the new evaluation movement has benefited from a more intensive examination of subject content; at its worst it has often boxed the learning process into arbitrary and fragmented segments often at odds with particular disciplines. New terms have come into use, such as ‘behavioral goals’, ‘competencies’and ‘accountability’. These terms reflect the pressure to formulate categories of learning in manageable fragments. The idea is that anything that exists can not only be observed, but measured; that behavior can be described by overt acts demonstrating some kind of change in the learner. *Whitney Rd., Sag Harbor, NY 11963, U.S.A. **Div.of Instruction, PublicSchoolsof Newton, 100Walnut St.. Newton, MA 02160, U.S.A. School committees. taxpayers. indeed anyone concerned with the rising cost of education and the declining results of national testing of competence, are applying pressure to school administrators to supply hard evidence that stated goals are...