Do schools kill creativity? You betcha! I remember having to write a letter that included a map and explained how I found a buried treasure. I was in the third or fourth grade. In the movies, the maps were old, crinkled, and torn. So, I balled up my letter to wrinkle it and tore the edges a bit. The teacher did not like it at all. The worst part was that she was of the school that used shame to motivate students. My work was posted on the “Dummy Board.” I do not remember her name --- I do not even remember what she looked like --- but I do remember that she was mean. One of the only positive things about moving around so much as a kid was that I did not stay in that school for long.

Robinson says that “all kids have talents. And we squander them rather ruthlessly” (2006). A cynic might hear this and think it to be just another attempt to celebrate false achievement and promote mediocrity. But, you have to listen to Robinson, you have to study and to consider his theses in light of personal experience. Lucky the one who does not have the types of experience for which his critique is true.

Students need to be allowed to make creative mistakes and to create mistakes. Indeed, it might be a good thing for teachers to lead students down the primrose path right into them, if it would help that particular student to learn.

Creativity requires lots of mistakes; it is something that we grow out of, not into. When I look into childhood and consider the outrageous things that I did, and compare it with rather bland high school and college years, I am even more convinced that we do, by and large, educate students out of creativity. Who knew that you were not “supposed” to go trick-or-treating in July? I went when I found the last year’s clown costume and orange, plastic pumpkin in a toy box. Our neighbors had a good laugh, but Mom was not pleased. Still, I did get an apple and a can of soup. No candy.

Robinson describes intelligence as diverse, dynamic, and distinct (2006). Diverse, in that individuals think in characteristic ways, some are verbal, others visual; some think in practical terms, others are more comfortable in the ether of the abstract. Human intelligence is also dynamic because ideas come through the rich interaction of different learning styles, and different disciplinary ways of defining some reality, not to mention the non-linear processes of the brain. Intelligence is also distinct. It is unique and inescapably subjective from person to person.

These ideas set up deep resonances with Gardner’s claims about the “five minds.” Here I will discuss the disciplined and creative minds. To help students develop disciplined minds requires teaching strategies that offer students with diverse learning styles a variety of “entry points” into subject matter. Genuine assessment is based upon an authentic evaluation of the various “performances of understanding” based upon points of entry (Gardner, p. 34).

The creative mind emerges, blends with, builds upon the disciplined mind, which has begun to master a discipline such that one’s knowledge, “exerts a genuine, detectable influence on subsequent work in that domain” (p. 81). I would argue that “detectable influence” does not need to revolutionize a discipline from within, or to be accepted by a wide audience. Genius is first experienced locally, and it may stay there, and that is fine. For example, a teacher might have found a particularly effective way to teach a certain topic. It is not necessary that the teacher’s contribution be recognized outside of the four walls of her classroom. Creativity is, after all, singular, or what Robinson would call “distinct.”

Gardner argues that, “the ability to knit together information from disparate sources into a coherent whole is vital today” (p. 46). Cultivating and nourishing a genuine and vital creativity among our students is one way to gather the garment.

A robust creativity can then bloom from happiness. Csikszentmihalyi asks, “where --- in everyday life, in our normal experience --- do we feel really happy” (2004)? Happiness emerges when one is in a state of ecstasy, “when you are involved in [a] completely engaging process of creating something new.”

Csikszentmihalyi describes a subjective experience of time suspended. He does not use this term, but I think that he is describing those moments in our lives when the awareness of change ceases, when the eternal becomes an amuse bouche. This transtemporal experience the Greek’s called “kairos.” Happiness leads to ecstasy (and, kairos?) which turns into “flow,” those moments of complete absorption, when one’s highly developed talents are challenged by most challenging tasks.

Digital media and technology provide needed tools to bring our students’ innate creativity, no matter how bruised, to life. In a 2010 TED talk, Robinson says that education “dislocates very many people from their natural talents.” To overcome this dislocation requires that we abandon the notion of linearity, which says that true learning proceeds in step-by-step fashion. It also demands that we not only embrace, but also learn to respect an undeniable reality: “human talent is tremendously diverse. People have very different aptitudes” (Robinson, 2010).

Linearity is not too difficult to avoid using digital / social media and technology. Discovering (unfortunately) hidden talents might be a bit more of a challenge, given their early burial.

An art teacher might teach a unit on ancient Greek architecture and music. Here are the characteristics of Corinthian columns. Here are photos of Corinthian columns in the architecture of Oak Park, IL. Design a column using, e.g., Paper53, that accomplishes the same engineering and aesthetic principles.

A music teacher might teach a unit about some of the characteristic modes of ancient Greek music, e.g., Ionian, Doric, and Phrygian. Listen to these recordings / experience these performances of the aulos, lyre, and kithara. Are there any musicians in the classroom? Can you find examples of these modes in the music that you listen to? What "modes" do we typically use today? Could you mount a performance using Greek modes and today's instruments that address some need in contemporary American culture, and record it as an .mp3, or .mp4?

Teachers need and should not completely abandon linearity --- basic content delivery demands a systematic, first presentation of ideas, concepts, etc. [N.B.: Robinson does not suggest that we do]. In fact, the very structure of human life is narrative, it is story --- first this happened, then this, then this. But, within the limits of linearity, one experiences the nonlinear, which opens up vast possibilities for transcendence.

Education strategies, curricula, and teachers have historically, however unwittingly, damaged students’ innate capacity for creativity. Diagnosing the damage helps us develop a digital prescription for a cure.

Sources

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2004, February). Flow, the secret of happiness [Video file]. Retrieved from http://linkyy.com/okW.

Gardner, H. (2009, January 6). Five minds for the future [Kindle version]. Retrieved from http://amazon.com.

Robinson, K. (2006, February). How schools kill creativity [Video file]. Retrieved from http://linkyy.com/okU.

Robinson, K. (2010, February). Bring on the learning revolution! [Video file]. Retrieved from http://linkyy.com/okV.

Image

Stomp, Google Image: http://linkyy.com/okT

Flow, Google Image: http://linkyy.com/okX