Education Innovation

Tales from the Wonder Emporium: Visual and Creative Thinking

Why is visual and creative thinking such an accepted business strategy? Why not education. Take a look at this sllideshare. Don't you wish your school or district thought this way?

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Teach Students to be Pirates and Plagiarists?

So, what do you get when you combine a book on youth culture, a futurist, Thomas Edision, Disco, pharmaceuticals, Hollywood, the iPod, and school research reports? Let put in them in the Education Innovation Blender a take a look.

Is it piracy and plagiarism, or is it creativity and innovation?  Which do you suppose we should be teaching our students to do? My two previous posts have inspired this discussion.

Plagiarism and Pirates

Plagiarism Is A Good Thing?

We live in an age where anybody can produce, mix, or repurpose information and ideas.

When we pirate information and ideas, we may just be innovating new ideas and creating new ways of doing things.

Thomas Edison invented the phonograph and musicians viewed it as piracy. He was pirating their music, recording it, and selling it. They feared the end of live performances, instead an entire industry was born, the music industry.

MP3 players existed prior to the iPod, but the iPod pirated that technology and created it’s own phenomena. Music lovers, wanting to share music with each other without paying, created digital music sites like Napster. They were pirating their way around and outside of what the music industry existed to do. Steve Jobs figured out that to beat the pirates he had to compete with them and built iTunes. The pirates ideas had become mainstream and put old music sellers out of business. It is piracy or innovation? Is it plagiarism or creativity?

The iPod itself is just a combination of pre-existing ideas; the battery, operating system, hard drive, screen, MP3 technology, etc.

Reggae, Disco, and Hip-hop music demonstrate that we can repurpose music into something new. The pirate old songs and create new and innovative versions. These versions become so popular that they create entirely new music genres. It is piracy or creativity?

Moviemakers, not wanting to pay high fees in New York pirates their way around the system by setting up studios in California. Today we call it Hollywood.

India reverse engineers drugs for the poor pirating what they themselves could not afford to do. Drug companies, sensing the good public relations they can benefit from, begin selling their drugs at huge discounts an in some cases giving them away. They respond to the pirates by creating an entirely new approach of serving the poor of the world. Piracy or creativity?

So, is piracy and plagiarism just another way of being creative and innovative? Are they are source of new ideas, methods, and models. Are there links to each other or are they mutually exclusive? 

A senior business executive needing the most current research on a company or economic trend asks his junior executive to find the best and most current information. The junior executive doesn’t start his or her own research project, rather he or she Googles the information looking for the most current research on the topic that has already been done by the most respected and knowledgeable experts. He or she copies it, rips it, digitizes it, scans it, re-purposes it, integrates it, synthesizes it, and puts into a usable document to give the senior executive. This is what we call good research.

In the classroom we call plagiarism.  So, it is plagiarism or creativity?

Most of the examples I shared, which come from Matt Mason, would be examples of plagiarism and cheating if they happened inside a classroom.

Doesn't there seem to be a disconnect from what we do in the classroom and what the real world expects of them? I know most of you are saying it's about the process. But if that is true, then why do we spend so much time evaluating and grading the result?

If it really is about process then Pat Dixon has an idea;

• Give the students a question they know nothing about.
• Give them 30 minutes to put together a 3000 word report on that question.
• Grade for Correctness in the answer
• Authoritativeness of sources used
• Uniqueness of of the pieced together report. 

Catalytic Questions:

In what ways could you re-purpose your research report assignments to develop real world skills that focus on the process, the correctness, the authoritativeness, and uniqueness of synthesis?

What might that look like in your classroom or school?

How does your current understanding of technology, business, and innovation impact your thoughts?

How might your students be better served with the assignments they work on?

In what ways have you been successful in the past in adjusting assignments to meet the changing needs of the students and the world they live in? How might you draw upon that experience?

In what ways does the discussion of plagiarism and pirating vs. creativity and innovation force you to think in new ways?

What are the underlying principles at work in this discussion and how does it/they impact your approach to education?

What if you were to reverse the process and have students examine existing reports and determine how well they meet the criteria for a good research report?

Which assignments could you substitute with these new ideas?

Recommended Reading: 

Where's the Respect? A 21st Century Learning Question

Professional Learning Communities on the Rocks- Part 2

 Professional Learning Communities on the rocks! Part 2

Professional Learning Communities should be put on I.C.E. Education Innovation’s definition of on the rocks actually means on I.C.E. cubes.  An I.C.E cube is an acronym for Innovation, Imagination, Creativity, Collaboration, Experimentation, and Exploration. The six traits form the cube, the I.C.E. cube.

In his book Group Genius, Keith Sawyer describes 10 conditions that must exist for group flow to emerge. Today we will look at conditions 6-10.

6. Equal Participation
Group Flow won’t happen if everyone isn’t participating.

“Group flow is more likely to occur when all participants play an equal role in the collective creation of the final performance. Group flow is blocked if anyone’s skill level is below that of the rest of the group’s members; all must have comparable skills.”

Now this presents an interesting question. Do all teachers in your grade level or department PLC’s have comparable skills?  Yes, they all have credentials (or we hope), but there could be varying levels of years of experiences, staff development training, and technology knowledge. Is this a factor?  Maybe, but maybe not.

Group Flow is also blocked when one person dominates the group, believes he or she doesn’t need the group, of looks down on the process.

Another potential block to PLC flow, is the principal sitting in the meeting. If the principal does sit in the meeting it is important to, “…participate in the same way as everyone else by listening closely and granting autonomy and authority to the group’s emergent decision process.”

7. Familiarity
PLC members need to learn to the styles of each of the members because familiarity increases productivity, decision-making effectiveness, and the ability to understand what is happening in classrooms.

“When members of a group have been together for a while, they share a common language and a common set of unspoken understandings. Psychologists call these shared understandings tacit knowledge—and because it’s unspoken, people often don’t even realize why they are able to communicate effectively.”

However, here is an interesting paradox to the point above. Tacit knowledge is a part of group flow, but we don’t want PLC’s made up of people who think so exactly alike that nothing new can come out of the meeting.

This begs the question, how long should a grade level be kept together? Obviously, departments are dependent on credential, but at the elementary level, this isn’t so. Teachers can move grade levels easily. So, how long do you keep your current grade levels together before they become too stagnant?  Principals need to balance the need for familiarity, which allows for good decision-making and creativity, with the need to avoid over familiarity and stagnation.

Another interesting fact is this, familiar groups are great for problem-solving creativity, but unfamiliar groups are better for problem-finding creativity. So PLC’s and the need to examine student work, data, and teaching benefit from familiarity, but school wide problem solving that requires new ideas and innovation might benefit by being made up of teachers and staff from various grade levels and departments.

8. Communication
“Group flow requires constant communication.” 

Principals should be talking with their groups frequently. Feedback on how the PLC is doing and fact finding on what the PLC has discovered or decided on is key.

But, group flow can happen outside of the meeting too. Spontaneous conversations allows for group flow. Not every conversation has to take place around the conference table.

9. Moving It Forward
“Yes, and…”

This is a powerful sentence stem for your PLC’s to use in their meeting. When teacher are sharing ideas, members should listen closely, accept it, and build on the idea by using, “Yes, and…” Members validate the ideas of others, while simultaneously building on the idea with other ideas. This is a great way to generate powerful plans for improving student learning.

10. The Potential for Failure
Before lifting weights or going for a run, we should all warm our muscles up. The same could be said for our minds.

“Many groups require a preliminary warm-up period to move into group flow.”

Also, some ideas to improve student learning won’t. It’s just that simple. The principal and the PLC member need to understand that creativity is often accompanied with failure. We must allow our PLC’s to come up with ideas that fail. If we don’t, the quality of ideas and instruction will suffer because they won’t feel the trust they need to innovate.

Creative Tension is the just the right environment. “Group flow happens when many tensions are in perfect balance: the tension between convention and novelty; between structure and improvisation; between the critical, analytic mind and the freewheeling, outside-the-box mind; between listening to the rest of the group and speaking out in individual voices.”

Catalytic Questions:

Is the timing right at your school in develop and inculcate these conditions in your PLC’s?

What patterns have you detected in your PLC’s that might prevent or allow for these conditions to flourish in your PLC’s?

In what ways might you loosen your control of PLC’s to give them autonomy in decision making and planning?

How might you challenge the prevailing conditions your PLC’s operate under?

In what ways might you connect what you know about group dynamics and creativity to your PLC’s?

What alternatives might you employ to create the 10 conditions of group flow?

How might these 10 conditions for group flow change the way your teachers think about PLCs?

In what ways might your view of PLC’s change if you viewed it from the perspective of a visiting teacher or visiting administrator?

In what ways might new a new idea for your PLC’s make a positive impact? What might that idea be?

Recommended Reading:

Professional Learning Communities on the Rocks- Part 1

Keith Sawyer's blog

Defining Professional Learning Communities (PLC)

All Things PLC blog

Education Innovation Is A Stop On The Post2Post Virtual Book Tour

On Monday, July 14th, Education Innovation will be the first stop on the Idea Sandbox Post2Post Tour for the book Jack's Notebook  a business novel about creative problem solving by Greg Fraley.

Please make sure you come back to read Greg's interview on Monday, July 14th. 

July 2008

Jack's Notebook

by Gregg Fraley
Author Site | Amazon US | Amazon UK

Site	Date
Education Innovation by Rob Jacobs	Mon, July 14
The Naked Idea by John Lepp	Tue, July 15
Marketing Fresh Peel by Chris Wilson	Wed, July 16
InnoBlog	Thur, July 17
The Brand Chef by Andrew Clark	Fri, July 18

See you on Monday!

Killing In The Name of Education: An Analysis Of Creativity- Part 1

I found this video to be very insightful and interesting. It blends several popular videos on the issue into a comprehensive exploration of creativity in education.

Linking on Thinking & Creativity

Education Innovation loves thinking about thinking. I also love linking about thinking.
Here are a few links on Creativity and Thinking that I found interesting.

Becoming an Outstanding Critical Thinker | Study Matrix

Do You Recognize These 10 Mental Blocks to Creative Thinking? Copyblogger

A Writer? Who, Me? Write on Wednesday blog

Direct Your Mind: How Can I Look At This As a Good Thing? PantsKicker blog

Group Flow- Characteristics of Creative and Innovative PLC's

I have been reading the book Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration by Keith Sawyer. Of course, Education Innovation is all about taking ideas outside of education and looking for application in education. I thought of how Keith’s ideas would benefit Professional Learning Communities, grade level teams, or subject matter departments.

Keith describes something he calls Group Flow. It is inspired by the work of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who now works at the Claremont University's Drucker School in California. The term “flow” is a word used to describe, “… a particular state of heightened consciousness. He discovered that extremely creative people are at their peak when they experience ‘a unified flowing from one moment to the next, in which we feel in control of our actions, and in which there is little distinction between self and environment; between stimulus and response; or between past, present, and future.’”

I sat in a lot of grade level meeting and PLC’s and I can say for sure that I never saw any teachers experience heightened consciousness, but I would love to see it. However, we can hope that grade level teams would reach a point where they are focused, creative, collaborative, and effective.

Keith describes four characteristics found by Csikszentmihalyi that will help get teams into the “flow.”

“First, and most important, they’re doing something where there skills match the challenge of the task. If the challenge is to great for their skills, they become frustrated; but if the task isn’t challenging enough, they simply grow bored.”

So, if you teachers have the ability, knowledge, and training to complete what you are asking of them, then you can expect good results. However, much like our students, if they don’t have the skills or knowledge to complete the task they are going to get very frustrated with the task, with you, and not produce anything very useful. If, on the other hand, the task is so simple, do they really need to meet to do it?  It is worth having them do, or is it just paperwork?

“Second, flow occurs when the goal is clear.”

We will take a closer look at goals in the next post.

“…third, when there’s constant and immediate feedback about how close you are to achieving that goal.”

If the goal is crystal clear, they will have a better time determining this on their own. A clear goal provides obvious feedback. But, principals should spend the time to immediately review the tasks you have asked your groups to perform to give feedback if necessary.

“Fourth, flow occurs when you’re free to concentrate fully on the task.”

In other words, don’t interrupt them. Eliminate sources of silly and wasteful interruptions. Value their time if you value the results.

Here is the beauty of flow. When teachers complain that meetings don’t produce much, you can share this with them.

“ Csikszentmihalyi found that the most common place people experienced flow was in conversation with others. At work, conversation with colleagues in one of the most flow inducing activities…”

So grade level, PLC’s, and department meetings are important for the opportunities they provide for conversation with their peers.

Catalytic Questions:

How might you create conditions for your teams to experience “flow?”

In what ways might you ensure that goals are matched to the skills of your teachers?

What shape might your grade levels, PLC’s, or department meetings take to ensure that “flow” is possible?

In what ways are you ensuring that goals are clear?

How might you ensure immediate feedback?

In what ways could you prevent interruptions of meetings?

Recommended Reading:

Creativity & Innovation blog

Businessmodel Innovation_design blog

New Questions = New Answers = New Ideas

What happens when you ask, "Why are we doing it that way?" 

What happens when you question your assumptions about what is possible?

What happens when looking for answers to new questions you produce new ideas?

Take a look at what happens!

Early Innovation and Creativity Education

Gordon MacKenzie is sort or a personal hero of mine. Though he has now passed away, I still turn to his book In Orbit Around the Giant Hairball for inspiration. In his book he relates a famous and oft repeated story about a trip to visit an elementary school.

As he meet with each grade level, he related to them that he is an artist. He would look around the room and notice all the student work and then wonder aloud who had created all the wonderful artwork.

He would then ask, “How many artists are there in the room.”  “Please raise your hands.”
The responses were very telling. In kindergarten and first grade class rooms, every student threw their hand up in the air. In second grade classrooms, about three-fourths raised their hands in response. In third grade, only a few students help up their hands, some very timidly. So it went, each grade a little worse than the one before it until he finally reached sixth grade. In response to Gordon’s question, most students looked around to see if anyone would admit to being an artist, as if such an admission was a violation of group norms.

In the span of Kindergarten to sixth grade, students had un-learned their naturally tendency to be an “artist.” Why?

Sir Ken Robinson has been the rage lately on the web. He gave a talk at the T.E.D conference several years ago about how schools systematically kill student creativity. I posted a clip of his talk several months back. You can find it here (Is Creativity As Important As Literacy). I am hoping to finally get to his book one of these days.

But there are so many people who seem to get it. I was very interested in what Doreen Lorenzo had to say at frogblog in his post Innovation Needs to be Nurtured Early.

He says…

“I believe that the emphasis on this frantic search for innovation is a result of our inability to foster this concept starting at the elementary school level. Shouldn’t we all be innovators? Part of what makes us human is our ability to think and reason. With that in mind, innovation should be part of our fiber. Why can’t children maintain their creative innovation past the 2nd grade? At some point the concept of innovation is ripped out of their souls. They are told to follow the rules, prepare for the standardized tests and think about getting a good job that pays well.”

In an age where standardized tests are the measuring stick by which schools and students are measured, we are creating an environment where we can’t afford to spend the time necessary to allow children to be as creative as they can be. We focus on getting the one right answer for each question because this is what the system has forced us into.  Politicians do not brag about the quality of educational programming, or how school X has made growth over time. Newspapers can’t print growth over or quality teaching. They can print a test score. The can print it next to the scores of other schools. It is very neat and orderly. Who is good and who is bad is a matter of running your finger up and down a column of scores.

Doreen goes on to say…

“Finding great creative talent continues to be the biggest issue in our world where in reality it should be the easy part. However, since schools begin to dismiss the notion of creativity once a child leaves kindergarten, the pool of applicants gets very small by the time they actually enter the workforce. How can we shift the focus to allow kids to explore, think bigger, reward their drive and ambition as not just an anomaly but a must-have in today’s world? Instead, creative kids are often labeled ‘creative,’ which means ‘different.’ And different is too often not a good word for a child.”

Education is beginning to have the conversation, but with much in education, the wheels turn very slow. Doreen’s voice is another to add to the growing call for change. I for one believe in Tom Peters call for NO INCREMENTALISM. But that is the prerogative of the idealist. I hate to wait.

Also check out these posts.

Free Your Mind

Color Within The Lines

Do We Limit Our Children's Creativity?

How You Think Is Everything: Think Creative

From Busayo Akanro

"Why do people hate intentional creativity? Why must things be done in one particular way or another? Who makes the rules? Who sets the boundaries? Life itself imposes no limitations on us. After all, even though the law of gravity is fundamental, it can be broken through once one understands the principles of aerodynamics. Even then, the law of gravity doesn’t have as much relevance as it does on earth outside the earth.

"Who says everything that goes up must come down?  Someone who lives in space would give you a strong argument because what he knows is that you can throw something up and it will never come down in your life time. It would keep going on and on since the force of gravity is six times weaker there than on earth. So I guess that will help someone like me who has always wanted to be superman. You can be superman once you are on the moon.

"Take a look at this: A survey was done to discover the creativity level of individuals at various ages. After all the testing, the statistics indicated that 2 percent of the men and women who were in their forties were highly creative. As they looked at younger people, the results emerged that 2% of the 35-yr-olds were highly creative; 2% of the 30-yr-olds were highly creative. This went on down to each age group until they reached the 7-yr-old children. 10% of them were highly creative. However, further study showed that 90% of the 5-yr-olds were highly creative.  

"Between the ages of 5 and 7, 80% of us who are highly creative develop an image, a picture, an attitude that we are not creative, and we begin to deny that particular part of our God-given equipment. Pablo Picasso the great artist said “Every Child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.”

I agree. Those of is in education need to keep the "artist" alive. We need to be intentional about helping our students be innovative and creative.