Making Space for Creativity in the Trauma-Informed Classroom
Last year I started working in a high school, which was a great professional experience for me and a steep learning curve. Having previously worked with post-high school level students in college and universities, it was rewarding (and challenging!) to begin working with a younger cohort. Through this role, I met many new colleagues and […]
How to Create Your Own Makerspace in Any Classroom
Creating a culture in your classroom where students can feel free to tap into their creativity can be tricky. Sometimes you need to take a big first step. One of the easiest ways to do this is to create a Makerspace in your classroom. What is a Makerspace? Makerspaces came about during the STEM era, […]
20 Lessons to Weave Creative Thinking
into Your Curriculum
Ever since Sir Ken Robinson presented his highly regarded TED talk, “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” I have had countless teachers approach me inspired by the “why” we need creativity in the classroom but not knowing how to make it happen. Fortunately, the “how” is the central focus of my professional work and is anchored on […]
Look at it Another Way:
How to Use a Native American Lens to Explore Empathy in the Classroom
How to Use a Native American Lens to Explore Empathy in the Classroom If you want to weave creativity into your curriculum, creativity pioneer, E. Paul Torrance proposed eighteen creativity skills to explore.The skills are specific and yet can be interpreted in many different ways. Dr. Cyndi Burnett and Julia Figliotti explored these skills in […]
How to be Playful in the Classroom When You Think You Are Not a Playful Person
The photo above was provided by our contributor, Gisele Texiera, a 3rd-grade teacher. To follow her wonderful creative journey, check out her Twitter @Ms_GTeixeira 5 Ideas to Bring Playfulness into Your Classroom Play, creativity, and learning have a harmonious relationship. Sometimes as adults we don’t see ourselves as playful people, perhaps because we see play […]
College During the Pandemic:
How Students Create Success
The Skills of the Future The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2020 ranks resilience, stress tolerance, flexibility, and creativity among the top ten skills of 2025. The question for universities and employers then becomes how to train the next generation in these skills to set them up for success in today’s job market. Faced with […]
Silenzio, Bruno! Building Fearless Environments to Promote Creativity in Schools
It’s August. With the start of school approaching, some teachers have started thinking about how they will organize their classrooms. Others are already going back to school. Somehow, they are all thinking about how to create a great learning environment. If they asked for my advice, I would suggest including a “Silenzio, Bruno” poster in […]
How to Use Creativity to Get Out of a Rut
When I began teaching, I had lots of great role models: teachers who had been in the classroom for 30 years and still loved it and teachers who were taking on new challenges even late into their careers. Unfortunately, I also witnessed teachers who were the opposite. These teachers were so burnt out in the […]
Why Creating Imaginary Worlds During Play Is Beneficial
What do Emily Bronte, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart have in common apart from the fact that they were all highly distinguished in their chosen fields? One thing that ties them together is that they all engaged in building complex imaginary worlds, or paracosms when they were children. Emily Bronte along with her siblings […]
Mandatory Fun: How to Bring a Little Play Into the High School Classroom
I’m not sure where it says in the original teaching manual that you aren’t not supposed to have fun in school, especially high school. I suppose the original mission was to transform teenage students into adults who were serious and ready for the world. The fact is today’s high school students are more aware of […]
Let’s play! Ideas to Engage your Children in Creative Play
Play energizes us and enlivens us. It eases our burdens. It renews our natural sense of optimism and opens us up to new possibilities. – Stuart Brown, MD The following are excerpts from the book, My Sandwich is a Spaceship: Creative Thinking Activities for Parents with Young Children. You can learn more about the book […]
I Practice What I Teach
For 17 years, I’ve observed and taught children, ages six to nine, to appreciate the wonders of the world and to find their unique place within it. Maria Montessori calls this period in child development “The Age of Imagination.” To truly see my students and deepen the connection to each one of them requires immediate […]
Intentional Creative Thinking at Home: Lessons from a Visual Arts Teacher
As indicated in the 2018 Future of Jobs Report, creativity continues to be a desirable skill that is emerging as necessary in the workforce worldwide. Creative thinking, defined as intentionally using our minds to solve complex problems with new solutions, is at the heart of creativity. There are identifiable and teachable creative thinking skills that […]
Supporting Creative Confidence in the Art Room
It was such a treat to share some of my thoughts about Integrating Creativity into the Art Classroom with the dynamic team at Fueling Creativity. As I expressed in the podcast, teaching for creativity in any classroom is a transformative classroom practice. It has the potential to ignite engagement and foster a collaborative learning community. […]
Asking the “Why” in the Arts
When a student is working on a math problem, we always implore them to show their work. There are many reasons why we do this: To know what they were thinking To understand the process they were going through To know how they arrived at this product And yet, when a student creates a piece […]
Copying for Creativity
We are taught from a young age not to copy…don’t copy the test answers from your neighbor…don’t copy your best friend’s homework…all valid instructions, and yet in the world of creativity, copying is a great place to start in building confidence and expanding boundaries. This is certainly true in art, but I think it can […]
Animal Crossing: The “New Horizon” in Distance Learning
What is Animal Crossing? Animal Crossing is a social simulation video game series developed by Nintendo and created by Katsuya Eguchi and Hisashi Nogami. This is an open map type game that doesn’t have an end goal. It is designed for continuous play; there is no way to “win” or “complete” it. You are a […]
A Catalyst for New Thinking: The Concert of Ideas
Thinking of Things as if They Could be Otherwise When my colleagues and I work with university faculty, business leaders, and other professionals, our goal is to help people think in new ways. Typically, they have a problem to solve or some big new idea to wrap their minds around, or maybe they’re confronting change […]
Today’s Pressing Question: What is Creativity?
The safest answer to the question above might be: “It depends on who you are talking to.” Whether we self-identify as creative or not, creativity is part of being human, and we each have personal understandings of it. I am a word lover, but even after practicing “creativity” professionally for decades, I made the assumption […]
Using the Creative Operating System (COS) for Classroom Creativity Integration
“Creativity does not have to be sacrificed to meet educational standards.” ~Frazier/ Walker The importance of helping students discover their creativity and providing them with the skills to become creative problem solvers is evident in the Future of Jobs Report presented by the World Economic Forum. The report states that in 2020, the top three […]
Creativity is Everywhere, You Just Have to Look for It
When people hear the term creativity, they typically associate it with artistic ability. As my younger daughter tells me, “Daddy, you are not creative because you cannot paint pictures like Mommy and me.” I plead with her (I know. Pleading with a middle schooler is a sure sign of insanity.) that I have written over […]
The Real Reason You Should Invest in Your Creativity
Your Investment in Creative Thinking Have you ever invested in a creative thinking course? What was your primary reason for investing in this course? When I started to invest in creativity, my motivation originated from my wish to improve my mental well-being. Although I felt that creativity was what I needed, I did not, at […]
Cultivating an Environment for Well-Being in Schools
Staff well-being and creativity require structural and cultural change When I hear concerns about teacher well-being, I am often frustrated by the short-term tokenistic measures that are suggested. I have nothing against buying cakes for the staffroom, but no amount of cakes will make a difference if my daily work is distrusted and undervalued. The […]
Creativity and the Well-Being of Educators
As we approach the tail end of the winter months, cooped up in our houses, and feeling a general sense of isolation and fatigue, our resourcefulness to maintain our well-being is key. Right now, there is really nothing more important than care for our well-being and the well-being of others, because, of course, the two […]