Amid the happy excited voices and hugs for old friends, kids return to some schools this week without any sort of art program. It's tough times for Los Angeles public schools. Although teachers are under even more pressure, it's still possible to create a classroom atmosphere conducive to creative thought and expression.
The atmosphere needed to promote creative growth is not the same as that required to memorizing math facts or spelling words. To learn math or spelling, the child has to concentrate and get past any feelings of dislike. He's dependent on the teacher for direction, and validity as to doing it right. Art is the opposite. It's about emotion, taking initiative. It's not memorization that's needed, but inventiveness, and independent thinking. The teacher can't be looking for the one right answer.
Teachers should be able to switch gears. It's more nebulous to nurture the creative spirit, but it's done through accepting and rewarding it. Children are usually good about pursuing self-directed activity, they just need the opportunity. The key behavior for the adult is being warm and friendly -- gee, those are the qualities we want expressed around kids anyway!
Even a teacher who doesn't feel like he/she has any artistic ability can't use that as an excuse for not providing opportunity for her students to develop their own (but everyone has creativity just like anything else that needs practice). The fear for such a teacher is that she thinks she has to teach her kids how to draw. But kids will figure that out. All the teacher has to do is let them draw part of the curriculum instead of filling out a worksheet. Providing a "right brain" activity during the school day gives the kids some balance -- and even some relief -- from the totally left brain environment of school.
Showing posts with label how to teach creativity at school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label how to teach creativity at school. Show all posts
Friday, September 4, 2009
Sunday, March 15, 2009
How the Creative Classroom Differs From the Traditional
When the goal is to create students who self-initiate their learning and are excited by it, they have to have a teacher who provides that kind of atmosphere. First of all, the teacher has to believe in it and support these kind of activities. The classroom must be a warm and friendly place. As much as I'm in and out of various classrooms, I see this attitude less and less. Believe me, there's so much intense pressure to drive kids through a very prescribed curriculum that I understand it to a degree.
I think that what's happening in education is destroying teachers and kids alike. For creative thinking to take place, teachers must be able to provide the kinds of activities that stimulate it. Not much time for that, I'm afraid. They also have to train kids not to be dependent on them as the authority for all right answers. But in "left-brain"subjects, correct answers are all there are. The teacher either knows them, or the book that has them is right on her desk. The solution is already worked out. Of course, that's how it is when kids have to learn multiplication or spelling.
But if we want kids to be good problem-solvers, they need a different kind of approach entirely somewhere in their school day. In this case, the teacher is not the final authority, as the focus is not on finding the one right answer. Instead, an encouraging atmosphere conducive to exploration in depth and experimentation is needed. This is the opposite of memorization. Kids and teachers have less and less experience with this type of classroom activity. And yet, this kind of thinking is what society will need.
I was rather sad to read about studies that show the naturally creative child is not always liked by his/he teacher. If good behavior is considered to be polite and quiet, the child who is full of curiosity, questions the teacher, and has plenty of original ideas himself can be a handful. But once engaged in a meaningful activity, the student is no longer out of his seat and distracted, but actively learning independently. This is actually the habit we want to cultivate -- taking individual initiative and making meaning of their learning. But since school has become almost entirely "left brain" -- focused on the subjects that can easily be measured by through testing -- students have become extremely dependent upon the teacher for every aspect of their learning. Kids either sit waiting to be told what to do, look constantly for her approval, or must follow formulaic procedures rather than explore their own inventiveness.
I see the result of this in art classes, even down to the youngest students in kindergarten. They are so conditioned to work sheets, and being spoon fed instructions each step of the way, that they have a hard time knowing what to do when presented with an open-ended project to figure out on their own. It's hard to witness this happening, but it's really accelerated in the last decade under No Child Left Behind. I'd say, No Imagination Left!
I think that what's happening in education is destroying teachers and kids alike. For creative thinking to take place, teachers must be able to provide the kinds of activities that stimulate it. Not much time for that, I'm afraid. They also have to train kids not to be dependent on them as the authority for all right answers. But in "left-brain"subjects, correct answers are all there are. The teacher either knows them, or the book that has them is right on her desk. The solution is already worked out. Of course, that's how it is when kids have to learn multiplication or spelling.
But if we want kids to be good problem-solvers, they need a different kind of approach entirely somewhere in their school day. In this case, the teacher is not the final authority, as the focus is not on finding the one right answer. Instead, an encouraging atmosphere conducive to exploration in depth and experimentation is needed. This is the opposite of memorization. Kids and teachers have less and less experience with this type of classroom activity. And yet, this kind of thinking is what society will need.
I was rather sad to read about studies that show the naturally creative child is not always liked by his/he teacher. If good behavior is considered to be polite and quiet, the child who is full of curiosity, questions the teacher, and has plenty of original ideas himself can be a handful. But once engaged in a meaningful activity, the student is no longer out of his seat and distracted, but actively learning independently. This is actually the habit we want to cultivate -- taking individual initiative and making meaning of their learning. But since school has become almost entirely "left brain" -- focused on the subjects that can easily be measured by through testing -- students have become extremely dependent upon the teacher for every aspect of their learning. Kids either sit waiting to be told what to do, look constantly for her approval, or must follow formulaic procedures rather than explore their own inventiveness.
I see the result of this in art classes, even down to the youngest students in kindergarten. They are so conditioned to work sheets, and being spoon fed instructions each step of the way, that they have a hard time knowing what to do when presented with an open-ended project to figure out on their own. It's hard to witness this happening, but it's really accelerated in the last decade under No Child Left Behind. I'd say, No Imagination Left!
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