‘Lessons from the

Masters’

Bruce Hammonds

5 Main messagesWhy isn’t creativity central to all our lives? Is it just for the gifted?

Why is creativity important?

What blocks creativity?

What can we learn from the ‘masters’.

What is the creative process?

New thinking is urgent because we are leaving a failing Industrial Age

and entering an evolutionary world.

Of unpredictability

interconnections

and continual creation.

Darwin started all this!

What future attributes will we need?

Is our education system up to it? Short answer – no!

The big question for us all- what is the purpose of life?

Artist Peter Sidell

Today we still use rear vision thinking –looking to the past for security (National Standards)

Henry Ford still rules!

Measure, classify, graph and gather ‘best evidence’.

We can Blame Newton or Blake’s God for the mess we are in!

I have a good idea!

Time to leave age of science and rationality.

They only observe and measure only

what they are looking for.

(i.e. National Standards)

We have to change!!

Currently we still fail 20% of all learners

‘One size never fitted all’ :We need a new story

These are the citizens we need

‘little boxes’

National Standards will limit the creative experiences of our students.

New thinking breaks all the rules

The ‘Fosbury Flop’.

Not ‘best practice’ – which becomes ‘fixed’ practice

What we really need is new thinking

It is the end of an Era.

The captain and officers should go down with the ship.

A lot of current change is akin to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

This is not what we planned

We all need to be

‘Be prepared to abandon everything’ Peter Drucker

Are we ready for the future?

Are we ready for an ‘Age of creativity’ or what some are calling ‘The Second Renaissance?

Can we escape past thinking or structures?

Some say we are entering

An ‘Age Of Creativity’

or a ‘Second Renaissance’.

What will students need to thrive?

Attributes of a creative mind to thrive in an ambiguous

world?‘Knowing what to do when you don’t know what to do’? Piaget

‘How act when the world turns to custard’. ( David Lange)

How to make decisions and choices without enough data!

New Beliefs:

1.Everyone has creative capacities2.These capacities are our greatest resource3.Developing creative capacities requires the creation of a culture of innovation

Why do so many adults think they are not creative?What are your thoughts?

An ‘age of self invention’.

Perpetual 2yr olds , scientist, artists , explorers ..questioning everything!

Schools need to be about tapping and amplifying students creativity.

All progress depends on the ‘crazy ones’ – the ‘unreasonable ones’ – the ‘mavericks’.

We need the ‘beyonders’

Our society needs people who go beyond expectations

John Britain

Columbus

Darwin

And creative teachers most of all!!

Educations new task:

‘We have successfully domesticated our students ignoring their natural gifts’.

‘We have trained them to be fed without going on the hunt’.

Sit!Heel

!Fetch!

Lets ensure our students retain their birthright to be natural learners – ‘wolves of learning’.

‘By institutionalizing learning we have taken something precious from our learners.

Natural curiosity has been replaced by our curriculums.

Our agenda not theirs’

We need to create conditions to foster the thrill of learning

Our revised 2007 curriculum requires creative thinking.

‘All students confident life long learners’.

‘All students to be ‘seekers, user and creators’ of their own knowledge’.

‘Intellectual curiosity is at the heart of learning’.

Importance of ‘key competencies’.

Now ‘side-lined’ by National Standards

Software for the brain – we have the power to amplify or restrict our students learning.Humans are all born to learn – but

even before five some have lost the habit!

Unlimited potential our ‘plastic’ brains

First years vital – up

until 7

What are my unique gifts and talents?

Elwyn Richardson developed his school as a community of artists and scientists in the 50s.

Still an inspiration for creative teachers.

Elwyn knew…….

‘I reach a hand into the mind of the

child and bring out a handful of the stuff I find there

and use it.’

The first books should be ‘made’ out of the rich experiences of a child's life.

Another pioneer. Sylvia Ashton Warner. 1950s

Sylvia Knew!

Our rooms ought to be full of the students ‘voices’ – their questions, thoughts and ideas.

Our curriculum should ‘emerge’ from their concerns.

We now need to develop an image of a future learner …and then develop the conditions to ensure all learners develop their unique gifts and talents to be life long learners.

‘Kids with the future in their bones!’

We have to create the conditions ( or culture) to help all students develop their gifts and talents.

‘To be seekers, users and creators of their own knowledge’ NZC 2007

Discover the talents of all your students and ‘amplify’ them.

We are what we can do!

Base all learning on developing multiple intelligences and valuing uniqueness

‘Bits of these talented adults exist in your rooms? Name their

intelligences

Assess your strength out of ten for each and share with someone

Which ones do schools over emphasize to the detriment of the other talents?

The ‘da Vinci Code’ Observe

carefully –value the senses

Question everything

See connections

Experiment, draw, paint , inventLets’ get our children ready for the 2nd

Renaissance – an Age of Ideas and Creativity.

They wouldn’t let me go to school!

And Elliot Eisner who writes about exploring our world with ‘nets’, or frameworks, to capture and express meanings – similar to multiple intelligences or traditional disciplines.

As an artist

As a scientist

As a writer/poet

A a historian

As a mathematician

As a builder

Or whatever

Whatever your curriculum – ‘do fewer things well’ – to develop deep learning.

Put the really important things in the first bucket, important in the second and nice to do if time in the third – then throw away the last two buckets. ( from John Edwards)

The role of the ‘teacher’ :Good teachers have the ‘David Factor’.

I saw an angel in the marble and set it free!

Give students time explore their creativity.

Horses developed by a ‘delinquent’ over several months

17 year old

‘Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly’ Mae West

The best metaphor for a teacher is a creative coach or learning adviser

Are we are killing creativity by too greater emphasis on adult expectations and too heavy a feedback

Students work should reflect their personal styles.

Learning ‘how to learn’ is

important but so is

An appreciation of

the

power of personal mastery.

Goethe

Thinking is about seeing

patterns in ones

experience.

Do something.

What happened?

Why?

What will you do next

time.

We need to respect and value students questions, ideas and theories – our rooms should be full of their prior ideas before we start to help them.

What are they thinking or feeling?

Their questions are the beginning of our inquiry programmes.

Observation a key skill of all

masters

‘Draw’ on your prior knowledge so as to challenge it

Inquiry begins with observing something that capture our attention.

What do you know about constructivism?

Durer

Draw a spider?

After drawing check with those near you and amend your ideas.

( power of collaboration – or wisdom of crowds)

?

Assess your efforts –what criteria make a spider?

Most of you will aware of the various thinking models* around – I am focusing on : artistry, depth of thought and excellence

*To often Higher Order Thinking for ‘thin’ learning?

Lessons from the masters

1.Mastery takes time -10000 hours – a long apprenticeship

2.Lots of observation of details, practice , effort and frustration.

3.With time intuitive insight and personal style/ability/ideas develop..

We need to give students the opportunity to do something well so they understand the importance of ‘stickability’ effort, practice ‘grit’ – not first finished as best!

Creative process from novice to expert is somewhat messy -10000 hours!

1.Initial excitement

2.Being overwhelmed by task or frustrated by difficulty or lack of skill ( many give up at this point)

3.Often a need to stand back – solutions come unexpectedly

4.With time and success process becomes automatic/intuitive/ creative/ able to take advantage of serendipity

All masters have what poet John Keats called ‘negative capability’ - to be able to cope with uncertainty and doubt without rushing into premature judgment.

To be open and learn from any experience.

Darwin’s visual metaphor

We need to re-imagine everything.

‘Schools could not have been better designed to destroy the talents of students’.

We need to re-imagine schools as communities of Inquiry

‘Imagination is more important than knowledge. To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science.’

‘The liberation of genius and goodness of all children, the creation of new minds for the new millennium, and creating learning communities that invite and challenge the wonder and awe of the human spirit’.

Is this the work you want to do?

Stephanie –Pace Marshall America educator and astronaut

We could be the creative country if we developed all students’ imaginations

‘Who reaches a future down for us from the high shelf of spiritual daring’ Allan Curnow

We all do!Politicians are always wrong’ Michael Fullan

So we have a choice…..

Personalized creative teaching to develop all students gifts and talents or standardization of teaching ( National Standards)neglecting student creativity

No choice!!

Most of all to drive your own bus! Tell your own story!

Mike Smithers

Main messages again

1.Why isn’t creativity central?

2.Why is creativity important?

3.What blocks creativity?

4.What can we learn from the ‘masters’?

5.What is the creative process?