Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Collaboration, creativity, and innovation, oh my!
I think for many teachers, collaboration, creativity, and innovation are just as scary as lions, tigers, and bears. I get so frustrated when my own children come home from school with assigned projects that are specifically outlined and there is no room for being creative or coming up with an idea that deviates from what the teacher expects. My son worked on various projects in 6th grade this year that were solid projects, but pretty much used the computer for researching information and word processing. There are so many web tools available, I just wish that some teachers would trust the process and trust that students do learn when they are allowed to think out of the box and be creative. Their resulting project may be what they expected, but may far exceed their expectations. Why are so many teachers unwilling to let go and give students permission to give input, modify, and innovate to show their learning in a different way? Unfortunately, if our students are not encouraged to be creative and innovate, they are going to be left behind in the 21st century.
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I agree; and, of course, the more creative the assignment, the more plagiarism proof it is, too. I hope that we are thinking far enough outside the box to help them get to the creative, assignments with synthesis and analysis -- but it is so easy to do things the way they have always been done.
ReplyDeleteI think we need to find a few teachers to work with on model projects so that others can see what is possible -- and that it will work.
The more we can encourage ourselves and our colleagues to work with lesson plans that 'begin with the end in mind' and truly describe what the student will be able to do as the result of the project, the better off we'll be.
That said, I know I didn't succeed last year because the teachers were comfortable with the way they'd been doing it for 10 years. . .
Many teachers are concerned that if they don't teach EXACTLY to the curriculum there students will not do well on the standardized tests.
ReplyDeleteWhen I look through my teacher manuals, I try to figure out how to modify the lesson so that it still teaches content, but also expects creativity from my students. This past school year was my first at this school and I noticed that at the beginning of the year the students were "over-structured". They were worried about doing an assignment "wrong". They wanted to know exactly what the requirements were for each assignment; even in their journals. To try and ease their anxiety, I told them that their journals were meant just for them to be creative. They could tell me about their weekend, write a play, summarize a book, or whatever came to their minds. Also, at the end of every school day, I would give the students "Creation Time". They could mold playdoh, paint, read, build, relax, write, whatever they chose to be creative. This past year 2 different groups decided to create plays to present. They thought of the main idea, wrote scripts, chose actors, designed costumes, and practiced. None of this was provoked by me. I sat back and watched their creativity soar.
I have to say that your comments mirror my feelings on rubrics exactly. It drives me crazy both in the classes that I am taking and the classes that I assist teachers with when there is a rubric that outlines every possible detail. Where is the creative and out of the box thinking. Or even the common sense? It is one of my pet peeves. I am finishing up one of my very last doctoral classes now and am amazed at how many learners have a hard time writing a paper if every nuance isn't laid out for them. I had one instructor who went through the paper and created a rubric that included how many paragraphs should be in the paper and what each should be about!
ReplyDeleteI would love to see some of the learning projects that your students did. I think sometimes it's the students who want everything down in black and white so they know what they are expected to produce. I think there has to be a happy medium where the teacher says that he/she wants to see evidence of this or that, but then leaves the how it is shown up to the student.
ReplyDelete@Heather -- I LOVE that end of the day creativity time! I hear the anxiety from students, too, and I know that is one part of some people's learning style -- and, I admit, I want to know what's expected, too. However, a good rubric gives you an outline of expectations, not step by step directions.
ReplyDeleteThe fear of standardized tests is a very real one -- but how many people take a standardized test to get a job, or to do a job? Wouldn't you like to see the multiple choice test that adequately predicted who could be a good parent, for example? The most difficult jobs in our society are those that work with people and require constant and quick decision making.
Not that we don't need standards, and accountability, and not that we haven't brought some of the horrors of high stakes tests on ourselves by not providing those things in a way people can understand.
There are people who think that if we follow good teaching practices good test scores will follow; I hope that's true.
"Good teaching practices lead to good test scores"...If only that were true! I have a few students that suffer from test anxiety. So, it was a goal for me this past school year to help those students with study skills. I had really bad test anxiety growing-up and test taking was my nemesis. The main skill that students strived from was sittng and studying in the exact location that they would be taking the test. Many teachers tell their students to go home and study,but people are able to recollect pages from reading and notes better with this skill.
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