In my opinion, creativity and discipline are skills
that can be developed with practice.
Schools could potentially provide the appropriate environment to which
creative and disciplined minds are formed. For example, educators can teach students how to use the
following six required resources that foster creativity: intelligence,
knowledge, intellectual style, personality, motivation, and environmental
context. Additionally, I believe
that teachers can and should cultivate disciplined minds by teaching students how to develop the following : understanding the purpose of
disciplinary expertise, understanding an essential knowledge base,
understanding inquiry methods, and understanding forms of communication.
However, even though it is possible
for schools to produce and foster creative and disciplined minds, Orenstein
believes that the required environment to allow this to occur still has yet to be
developed (2011, p. 139). In fact,
he believes that curriculum structure
has created obstacles that prevent this type of a setting to be created. For
example, we still have educators who
insist upon teaching students how to solve problems as
opposed to letting them come up with their own problems to solve (p. 140). Thus, students cannot develop their skills in defining and
redefining problems, two components of the first resource “intelligence” ( p.
140). Short-term homework
assignments as opposed to long-term ones are still routinely assigned in some
schools (p. 143). Additionally, it
is still acceptable in many schools to teach students the facts in a history
class instead of allowing them to be “deeply acquainted with a discipline’s
fundamental perspectives on the world ( p. 192).” Do you agree with Orenstein’s
concerns? Do his concerns
hold merit for you? Why or
why not? Do you believe that the problems posed by Orenstein do indeed, impact upon the desired goals I have stated in the first paragraph? Or do you feel that they are in no way connected? Do you have
recommendations that might possibly address the issues posed here?
I think a paradigm shift must occur before creativity in the academic setting can be fully appreciated and valued as part of the academic structure. “We hold that developing creativity in children-and in adults-involves teaching them to utilize six resources: intelligence, knowledge, intellectual style, personality, motivation, and environmental context.”(Ornstein, p. 140) Of these six resources the best teacher is certain that they can teach students how to utilize and apply knowledge. Teacher as the disseminator of knowledge is the easiest part of being an educator in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteThe question then becomes, “How do we empower students to develop, and refine the remaining five resources?” In order for this to occur I believe we must give students the leeway to think outside of the “proverbial box”. I will be honest; this is hard for me to do as it requires a relinquishing of control that teachers traditionally have always held in the classroom. Control of the learning environment traditionally has been what distinguishes educators from students. By affording students the opportunity to define and redefine problems we foster a sense of autonomy in education that leads to true intrinsic motivation and learning based on the premise that there is true academic value in making mistakes. For this reason children in my classroom are encouraged to write in pencil as mistakes are an appreciated and valued part of the learning process. I believe this offers students a sense of relief, knowing that I am not always concerned with the correct answer.
In efforts to increase reading comprehension I have begun to utilize The Reciprocal Teaching Model during my literacy block. Over the last few weeks I have watched student faces contort, struggling with the concept of articulating gaps in their understandings. One student asked, “Why don’t you just give us the questions so that we can just answer them? That’s what all the other teachers do!” As I began to offer a rationale, I realized I could no longer view reading comprehension as children simply demonstrating what they remember from a passage or just their ability to answer a few questions of my choosing.
Today, as the children read in small groups and began to articulate and expound upon the text, I witnessed rich, meaningful, student generated conversations regarding vocabulary, comprehension strategies, and literary elements. Students were able to not only articulate what they understood but they could readily articulate what they didn’t understand about the text. In addition, they even discussed and problem solved using available resources to increase comprehension. When the groups felt they were ready to summarize the text my heart was glad! The learning was theirs…they knew it! A sense of accomplishment radiated from the children. Just a week ago they were content with me generating all the questions. Today, they spoke in depth as emerging literary experts about A. E. Housman’s poem, When I was One-and-Twenty.
During the reflection period at the end of class, students stated that the poem was difficult to understand but I had provided them with the tools necessary to make comprehension possible. Students were required to generate a journal prompt related to the theme as an assessment of their understanding of the poem’s theme. They came up with the following: Write about a time when someone older and wiser than you offered you advice but you refused to listen. What happened as a result? Do you regret not listening? While this isn’t the journal prompt I planned within my lesson, I couldn’t imagine a more successful student outcome.
I do agree with Orenstein that our current educational paradigm is in need of a considerable shift in order to create an environment to which creative and disciplined minds are fostered. A perfect illustration of this concept can be found in the video “Changing Education Paradigms” by Sir Ken Robinson http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U. I’m sure we have all seen it, but if you haven’t, take a look. (I don't think my hyperlink worked here…)
ReplyDeleteI think Orenstein hits the nail on the head on page 144 of our text. In the section “Willingness to Take Risks” he addresses one of the main reasons why I think that the idea of changing the model of how we approach teaching and learning is not quite at the stage where it can truthfully transform. I agree with Orenstein that schools are not generally environments that are conducive to risk-taking. In fact, here in New Jersey, I feel that teachers are almost looking to the opposite, more safe, forms of instruction. Our teacher evaluation procedures are changing and our students are now going to be subjected to more standardized testing than they were before. Over the past decade, we ended up spending much of our time teaching to the HSPA test. If you were to ask any teacher that I know if they agree with “teaching to a test” as an acceptable practice, they would surely say that they do not agree with it and that it stifles creativity and intellectual exploration. However, it became necessary for schools to do just that. If they didn’t meet the benchmarks, they were "in need of improvement"; and that brought a host of negative turmoil with it.
The confusing aspect for me is that we are now changing our standards to foster more creative and independent thinking in our students at the very same time when we are instituting new forms of standardized testing. My fear is that because teacher evaluations will now begin to include student’s performance scores as part of the evaluation, that we will, yet again, begin “teaching to a test.” We do not know the details of these tests yet, and I fear that teachers will not want to take risks and step out of the “safe zone” to explore a change in paradigm. I would love to teach in an environment like the one that Orenstein believes needs to be developed in order to help our students redefine their concept of education and foster their ability to think insightfully. I think it can happen, over time, however the pitfalls of standardized testing will get in the way every time. I have yet to see a standardized test that truly measures insightful thought and creative ability. Standardized testing usually only addresses “skill – based” tasks and, in my opinion, leads our schools to focus on these types of tasks.
Kachan addresses the issue of short-term verses long-term homework. I think that this is the result of teachers needing to make sure that there are a sufficient number of grades “in the system.” As most schools have, we moved to an on-line grading program approximately six years ago that parents and administration have access to. Parents want to see as many grades posted as possible and the philosophy is that the students need to have enough opportunity to bring up their grade; the more grades, the more opportunity to raise their grade. So, teachers tend to assign more short-term homework assignments to “fill up” their grade books. My solution is to this would be to assign long-term assignments and grade them on the stages of the assignment along the way. It is just a small change that could make a big difference in working towards a change in our teaching philosophy.
Overall, I think that teachers need to be confident in taking risks and that can only come from an overall shift in our philosophy of education in this country. When teachers feel safe to take the risks, things can begin to change. Schools would have to adopt a vision that fosters change, then change can begin.
Our public education system is designed after a sort of factory model, where children are expected to move through a set curriculum in a finite amount of time, all at the same pace. It's pretty hard to reconcile that with the kind of "think tank" environment we associate with creative problem solving. I guess the challenge is how to teach within those structured parameters in a way that encourages student creativity and freedom to think, and like Orstein, I think we are failing at that right now.
ReplyDeleteI constantly encounter students who are shocked at what I will allow them to discuss in my classroom, both in terms of literature and current events. Just the other day we read an article by the sports writer Rick Reilly as a model text. In the article, Reilly sarcastically mentions "agents who sniff a lot" - clearly a reference to cocaine use - the kids knew it, but pretended they didn't, until one brave soul spoke up. Then the others said they knew but were afraid to tell me. If they feel they have to censor themselves to that extent at school, what else are they afraid to say?
Later in the year we write a research and write an argumentative essay - when I tell the kids they can write about any topic that they care about, it's amazing what they come up with. Last year I read about everything from pesticides on golf courses, to gay marriage, to medical marijuana, to Scientology (cult or religion?) - they really appreciated the option to choose any topic, read articles about it, formulate opinions, and then write their arguments. I also avoid formulaic approaches to such writing. I do teach what an essay is, and how it is organized - but I don't count sentences or details. 3 of my students won first, second, and third places in a tri-county young authors competition for these essays. The judge called to ensure they had written the essays themselves. Needless to say, these were some of my top writers - but the judge said they were in a different class than the others that were entered in the competition. I attribute that to allowing the students the freedom to explore an issue that interested them - WITHOUT RESTRICTION - and then develop an argument - WITHOUT RESTRICTION - that they could defend. I certainly did not agree with all of their conclusions, but I definitely saw the best writing of the year from all of my students on this assignment.
Still, there are these GENRES of writing that I'm supposed to emphasize - especially expository and argumentative. Where does the student who writes rap or songs or performance poetry get to show his voice? How about the film producer or speech writer? After this week's reading , I have to reexamine my own openness to allow students to show mastery of writing outside those lines that are, as Maureen notes, driven by the standardized testing requirements.
As I said in class last week, I think there is far too much emphasis placed on compliance in the classroom - and that this extends beyond behavioral expectations to work assignments - some of this certainly comes from teachers' discomfort with relinquishing the role of expert. But if we open ourselves up to learning about our content areas with and from our students, we can all experience the awe that comes with discovery. I share Maureen's concern that the new observation requirements may start moving toward this same kind of "compliance" mentality with teachers. But I am confident that many of us will continue to stay focused on the best practices in our field - changing as they change, but always having a rationale for what we do - and be ready to explain and defend what is working for our students, and to change what is not.
Another good set of readings this week - I actually created a rubric with the small boxes for both student and teacher assessments this week! I'm looking forward to using discrepancies in our scoring as a basis of conversation about their writing with individual students.
This is a tough one for me.. I teach in a creative classroom. I ask my students to bring in ideas for Art lessons, and I have them solving and posing their own questions all the time. I wouldn’t know another way to teach the class. I am amazed when a 1st grader comes up with a solution that I have never thought of and frequently tell them “you don’t have to do it my way, as long as you have a good result, do it your own way.” Ornstein brought up intrinsic motivation “People are much more likely to respond creatively to a task they that enjoy doing for it’s own sake, rather than a task that they carry out exclusively or even primarily for such extrinsic motivators as grades”. I see this every day and know it to be true, my students never seem to be motivated by grades, even the ones (unfortunately) that don’t like Art.
ReplyDeleteI have seen a major difference when the kids create their own knowledge as opposed to me just giving it to them as well… but I think this is all easier in Art and I have no idea how it would come into play in a regular classroom setting.
I do hear from the students from time to time the idea of right and wrong. They have trouble with the idea of a subject where the notion of right or wrong is blurred, this effects their willingness to take risks, even in Art. I try to break that habit as much as possible and try to give them a little conviction and reward them for taking risks.
Just a note on what Kate said before, I have a similar exercise in Art. When projects are finished by only half of the class, (and the other half needs time to catch up) we do what I call, a “free draw”. When I have first explained the idea of the students being able to draw whatever they want, they were really confused; they couldn’t believe what I said and kept asking me if this or that was ok to draw.. it takes a little time for them to accept the freedom but when they do the results are amazing an they come up with some truly interesting things. I have actually gotten some lesson ideas from some of their free draw work.
I feel and agree with the point that you brought up about the developing creativity in both
Deletechildren and adults which does encourage them to use the six resources of intelligence,
knowledge, intellectual style, personality, motivation, and environmental context. In order
for a student to redefine a problem they must first be able to define the problem. For
example when you are working on a Math problem the children will try to solve word
problem by restating it in terms that they can relate to. Examples Picasso, had redefined
things by the field of art and a cubist perspective. The idea of teachers giving their
students tests to see if they have understood the new concept that was being taught to
them. If the student does not give the instructor the correct answer in the correct way
they are often marked wrong. Which, I find by sometimes testing my students orally they
can express their answer to the teacher.
I really liked how Ornstein talked about the willingness to take risks. I believe that this
concept was really insightful. Most teachers are not usually risk takers, but you have some
teachers that decide to take a risk in the way that they present and teach a topics. In my
own classroom I do try to do things in different ways by using trial and error. I think that
this is very important. In my classroom we use an extra math both book to reinforce their
math skills. Which, I use in different ways and it helps my students to understand basic
concepts and more complex concepts.
The idea of short and long term assignments are important I feel even on younger
students level. Short term assignments are due the next day and are usually short term
assignments. Long term assignments are usually a project, book report, and writing
assignment. They are both graded on very different levels. Long term projects allow the
students to be much more creative. Which, is very important.
The idea of teaching students the subject matter that is most important to what they need
to learn. But, sometimes students just learn it from memorization and when you go back
and ask them the same thing a few months later they forget.
I agree with what Jenny said, in that students do indeed need to be given more freedom by their teachers on a regular basis. Projects don't all have to be done in Powerpoint. Assessments shouldn't always be with a pen and paper. I give Oral Tests, to assess my students' ability to speak French, which really is difficult for some of the shyer students, but language needs to be spoken.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it is possible for teachers to help their students become creative thinkers. It is a skill that may be over looked in schools today. I don’t know believe that it is because of the teachers, but because of the demands that is placed on them. In some districts the teacher is given the curriculum and they are told to follow it and that is it. There is also so much pressure on standardized testing that it sometimes does not allow a teacher to give their students the chance to find the problem and come with the solution on their own. Untill education is looked at as what it is and not a factory like Kate stated.
ReplyDelete