Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Creative Thinking for the 21st Century
Session 7.6, 1:40-2:40 pmJanuary 9, 2015
AFACCT ‘15 Conference Carroll Community College, Westminster, MD
• This presentation examined how educators can embed 21st century skills into their teaching curriculum.
• The goal was to show that by using innovative teaching and learning processes students gain skills in collaboration and team building, enhanced communication through presentation, and applied analysis of information.
• Teaching and learning strategies to engage students to think differently about their own learning and to move beyond critical thinking to creative thinking was emphasized.
edtechreview.in
–Jerome Bruner
“The first objective of any act of learning, over and beyond the pleasure it may give,
is that it should serve us in the future.
Learning should not only take us somewhere; it should allow us later to go
further more easily.”
Critical thinking and problem solving have been components of human progress
throughout history, from the development of early tools to agricultural advancements
Global awareness and information literacy are not new, at least not among the elites
in different societies
The need for mastery of different kinds of knowledge, ranging from facts to complex
analysis, is also not new
In the Republic, Plato (380 BC) wrote about four distinct levels of intellect, these may have been the 3rd-century
BCE Skills
www.educatethewholechild.org
“We’ve progressed from a society of farmers (AGRICULTURAL AGE) to a society of factory workers (INDUSTRIAL AGE) to a society of knowledge workers (INFORMATION AGE). And now we’re progressing yet again – to a society of creators and empathizers, of pattern recognizers and meaning makers (CONCEPTUAL AGE).”- Daniel Pink
What is new? Changes in our global economy and how citizens interact with the
world……in the conceptual age
Then Now
Managers Leaders
Follow rules Think, solve problems, ambiguity
Punch time clock Get the job done
Compete Team/Collaborate
Communicate F2F, mostly with text
Communicate F2F and virtually,
using multimedia
Degree = career Degree = interview
World of Work
Creativity = Creating something original and usefulTo be creative requires divergent thinking
(generating many unique ideas) and then convergent thinking (combining those ideas into the
best result)
http://www.newsweek.com/creativity-crisis-74665
What does this mean for today’s educator?
A more deliberate approach to teaching critical thinking,
collaboration, and problem solving to all students …
vhsip.pbworks.com
… by incorporating big ideas and active strategies
Helping to develop skills in ….
collaboration and team building, enhanced communication through presentation,
and applied analysis of information
Can one be inhumane and civilized at the same time? (Explain your answer)
Making Meaning
interplay of lower- and higher-order thinking
This means that the design of curriculum and instruction needs to set up this interplay
The last few decades have belonged to a certain kind of person with a certain kind of mind—computer programmers who could crack code, lawyers who could craft contracts, MBAs who could crunch numbers. But the keys to the kingdom are changing hands. The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind—creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. These people—artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers—will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys. (p. 1)
The wealth of nations and the well-being of individuals now depend on having artists in the room. In a world enriched by abundance but disrupted by the automation and outsourcing of white-collar work, everyone, regardless of profession, must cultivate an artistic sensibility. . . . Today we must all be designers. (p. 69)
A Whole New Mind: Moving From the Information Age to the Conceptual Age (Pink, 2005)
personal construction of meaning. Creative thinking employs imagination and
playful tinkering with shapes, sounds, colors, words, and ideas. Creative thinking is the birthplace for unique and innovative
products, cultural expressions, and solutions to global problems
flexible; can examine situations, objects, and issues from multiple perspectives;
and can propose novel solutions to persistent problems
Creative Thinker
What does a Creative Mind look like?
How do you get a creative mind?
Ask big questionsTap into the power of collaboration
Be intensely curiousBe open to always learning
See failure as one step closer to successSeek out new experiences
Always be open to expressing yourself
collaboration and team building, enhanced communication through presentation, and applied analysis of information
Active Learning Strategies
The act of involving students
in doing things and thinking
about the things they are doing
(Bonwell & Eison, 1991).
www.me-and-us.co.uk
Our brain requires….
Building on prior knowledge and connecting to student inter-ests
Projects are important but…
http://www.kumiyamashita.com/portfolio/building-blocks/
Perspectives on Learning
Acquisition
(individual,
affective)
Participatory
(interactions, observation,
social)
Knowledge
Creation
(learning community)
Active(relationship, schema, connections, patterns)
Our practice must incorporate all of these perspectives
Critical and Creative Thinking means creating a Thinking Curriculum
Such as incorporating video into a lecture to highlight a point
then
stopping the video to have students do something,
such as work in groups to solve a problem
coming together as a whole group to discuss
thenthen
Creating thinking is not just about a good idea, it is
about having the skills to make good ideas happen
Paul Collard, Creative Partnerships
debate
simulations
interactive discussions
ice breakers
write-pair-share
student summaries
question and answer pairs
one minute paper
focused listeningproblem-based learning
shared brainstorminggenerating questions
note check
background knowledge probe
reciprocal questioning
corners
ice breakers
http://www.slideshare.net/shazza08/thematic-approach-to-teaching-chinese
m.newshunt.com
breaking it down
Embed 21st century skills into your curriculum
What can you do to offer opportunities for creativity and
how can you embed these opportunities into your everyday practice?
3 things come to mind:
• how you present content• how you model good practice
• how you encourage your students to be creativeYou must provide opportunities in your classrooms for your learners to feel
empowered to "think for themselves" and, as a result, become more
confident when tackling standard questions.
By building into your instruction room for your students to explore
and still covering everything that needs to be covered
Sharing • Communal Bookmarking• Photo/Video Sharing• Social Networking• Writers’ Workshops/Fanfiction
Thinking• Blogs• Podcasts• Online Discussion Forums
Co-Creating•Wikis/Collaborative File Creation•Mashups/Collective Media Creation•Collaborative Social Communities
Possib
ilities
with
tech
nol-
og
y
Innovative teaching and learning means teaching
students skills in collaboration and team
building, enhanced communication through presentation, and applied analysis of information
using real-world tools that are relevant to your discipline
classrooms need to be student-centered
learning must be socialemotions are integral
learners are different
students need to be stretched, but not too much
assessments should be for learning not of learning
learning should be connected across disciplines
Understanding that….
Understanding Flow
Flow
Frustration
Boredom
creativ
ity
Skill Build
ing
Task
Skill Level
MotivationCuriosityInterest
Engaged Learners
Deep Learning
Flow also called "Optimal experience" is a concept developed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, 1975.
Csikszentmihalyi (1993: 178-9) defined eight dimensions of the flow experience:
Element Details
challenge &curiosity
• an activity should trigger curiosity and allow the learner at the same time to formulate goals, while preserving some element of surprise regarding the outcome.
control • levels to play (in gaming), technical difficulties in project, some liberty to select goals strategies & tactics
fantasy • imagination and freedom (make believe + voluntary activity)
feedback • clear and immediate feedback should be provided if the goal or not has been reached.
self-esteem • tasks should be adapted (see above) and encouragement to learn & augment results should be provided.
Important constituent elements of the flow experience
flow experience = intrinsic motivation
flow – the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it (Csikzentmihalyi, 1991)
Intrinsically Engaged
Tactically Engaged
Withdrawn
DefiantCompliant
How can you change your teaching to incorporate more critical and creative
thinking experiences for your students?
