Creativity Passage
Expectations
Creative Process and Final Product
Students will become actively involved in the creative process with a finished product as an outcome. Students will understand that creativity involves:
* Challenging assumptions, “making the familiar strange”
* Making new combinations of “old” knowledge
* Seeing in new ways
* Recognizing patterns and connections
* Taking risks
* Solving problems / Analyzing and making changes
* Taking advantage of chance
Bringing a Skill to a Level of Excellence
An essential component of this Passage is to extend skills and interests to a level of excellence in an area in which students have previous experience and expertise. Experience and expertise may have been acquired in a variety of ways, including classes, independent studies, or apprenticeships. Students will extend their previous skills through taking creative risks and seeking out inspiration and support. While producing a final product, students will be able to understand, explain, and document their unique creative process so as to be able to transfer that process into a variety of learning endeavors.
Writing the Proposal or Wrap-Up
How to Write the Proposal for a Creativity Passage
Describe your Passage in the opening paragraph. You could use the newspaper format of who, what, when, where, why and how. Try to make your statements as clear as possible – write them as if someone who knew nothing about the school were reading your proposal.
Tell why your Passage is a challenge to you and what risks (physical, financial, social, and intellectual) you expect to experience.
Describe your preparation for this Passage. Include your strengths, past experiences, and training you plan to pursue prior to beginning.
Select a book to read that is related to your Passage; why did you choose this book?
Explain which Graduation Expectation/s you expect to address?
Describe the resources you have (personal strengths – motivation, knowledge, skills, abilities; people; books; materials; etc.). Describe the resources you will need, and how you will obtain them.
What do you anticipate to be your greatest obstacles and how do you hope to overcome them?
Identify possible peripheral learning.
Describe your first step in beginning this Passage and list your steps, in order, toward completion. A timeline with checkpoints may be helpful.
Include the following in the proposal:
Cost estimate
List of materials and equipment, with possible sources
Estimated amount of time needed for completion
Work location
How will you document this Passage? How will you show changes in skills, attitudes, behaviors, and knowledge? Describe what your Final Product will be.
State how you will know when this Passage is complete and the proposed date of completion.
How to Write the Wrap-Up for a Creativity Passage
Describe your Passage as you proposed it. The description should be written clearly, with attention to main events and/or highlights, so a person unfamiliar with you and/or the school could understand this experience. Balance a need to “summarize” with the equal need to detail the process you used to successfully complete this Passage experience.
Tell what you accomplished and how you know you reached your goals.
Describe turning points or highlights within the experience. These can be documented with excerpts from your journal.
Describe what obstacles, challenges, and risks (perceived and real) you encountered in this Passage and how you dealt with them. Describe unexpected events, setbacks, and opportunities. Explain whether or not your initial expectations were realistic.
List all the resources you utilized (personal strengths – motivation, knowledge, skills, abilities; people; books; materials; etc). Be specific.
Describe the book you read and how it applied to your Passage.
Which Graduation Expectation/s did you successfully address?
Describe peripheral learning or unexpected learning that occurred in this Passage.
Describe how you have documented this Passage.
The closing statement could include the following: how you feel about yourself and the completion of this Passage, why this Passage has made a difference in your life, where you will go from here with further exploration or experiences.
The document is written, now what?
Give the rough draft to your Advisor, Triad, and Consultant and ask for FEEDBACK. This will need to be at least two weeks prior to the planned meeting.
Make revisions and write a FINAL DRAFT of the document. This process usually occurs more than once. It often takes more than two weeks for the rewriting process.
Ask people to be on your PASSAGE COMMITTEE. The committee needs to include the following people:
Advisor, Passage Consultant, and Triad members. You may also invite other students, parents/guardians, or community mentors as appropriate.
Schedule a PASSAGE MEETING time. Inform all members of the committee of the time and place for the meeting.
Give a copy of the FINAL polished draft of the document to each member of your Passage committee at least one week prior to the meeting time.
At the PASSAGE MEETING, seek approval and suggestions from the committee; take notes to use in making further revisions.
Examples
The World of Ire
Ire is a vast world with much to see. There is The Vale, home to humans, a brave and resilient people. Tir Orail, home to the elves, beings of magic and order. The Eldre Mountains, home to the dwarves, a hearty and unchanging folk. The Desert, home to the Nathair, a rough and mysterious folk rooted in tradition. Ashgaurd, a southern continent with Bullks, a savage people who live in deserts of black sands and dense jungles. Five lands who seem divided, but are more connected than they realize.
Becoming Ambidextrous
For my Creativity Passage, I tried to become ambidextrous. I did so by improving and building the usefulness of my right hand. Through this, I primarily focused on penmanship, but also practiced eating with different utensils, brushing my teeth, throwing, among other things. I worked to improve these skills so that they would become a natural part of my everyday life.
The Documentary
Length: 43 minutes
Final Film 2023.mp4Capturing Nostalgia
My Creativity Passage centered around documenting my entire high school career. I first began with a GoPro Hero 7 White and later moved on to a camera more suited to what I wanted to accomplish creatively, which was the Lumix Gh2. This Passage has been so rewarding, first because of the nostalgia I was able to capture and later to show to students in the Walkabout program, but also because of the satisfaction I have gotten from learning how to use my camera to its fullest potential. In contribution to documenting, I also attended Warren Tech South's Video Production program, which taught me a whole bunch in the ways of shot composition, lighting, camera settings, as well as how to write screenplays. To the left is my final film, condensing all of the footage I have into a 43 minute film that I screened on April 8th, 2023.