Creativity with a capital "C": Society and Creativity

November 2, 2020

From reading, “The can and cannot do attitude,” from Ivcevic et al.(2013), I have chosen to focus on the idea of intelligence in ability. My goal is to promote the idea that intelligence is fluid in creativity. Ivcevic et al.(2013) says that, “fluid intelligence is the ability to solve a wide variety of novel problems through reasoning.” This allows for ideas to be adaptable and flexible. This goal will allow me to challenge the ability of how my students and I think. For example, when deciding on how to solve a difficult math problem I may think of only one strategy to get to the answer, however, there are multiple ways of arriving at that one answer.

In order to curate this goal, I have three objectives to move forward. My first objective is to take away the stigma of the dreaded, “I can’t attitude.” This will allow the idea of thinking in multiple mindsets. A few days ago I connected with one of my second grade students. He was having a tough time in his mindfulness special as they were drawing something that makes them feel at ease. However, he told the mindfulness teacher, “ I am not an artist, I just want to rip this paper up,” which was completely unlike him. He made me think back to times in art class or math class where I was asked to solve or create something. During these classes, I struggled to come up with one concrete answer and had that same, “I can’t do it,” attitude. My student made me realize that there are a multitude of factors that can create this mindset such as environment or ability. With this attitude mindset, it is important to have, “self concept of ability as it may reflect one’s life history, including socialization in the family, experiences of successes and failures, and messages in culture” (Ivcevic et al.2013). My students come from low economic backgrounds, live in urban environments, and do not have accessibility to basic necessities they need to be successful. Despite their environment, they show up willing to learn with the ability to think creatively. If they can take away the, “I can’t do it” attitude, so can I.

One resource I will use are these task cards from my professional learning network. These task cards will slowly take away the “I can’t” attitude in my classroom and turn it into something positive. Each day in our morning meeting, I will put one of these task cards on the screen and students will have five minutes to talk about the quote and describe ways in which they may already do this. I want my students to know that no matter how hard they try they will always be able to achieve their goals.

My second objective is to differentiate the way I teach and the way I think. Everyday I run into simple problems such as finding directions, how to save money, and ways to eat healthier. With each of these concepts, I usually consider one way of thinking in how to do each of these such as portion fix containers, using my phone’s gps, or putting money into my savings account. However, I wonder how I can differentiate these concepts. Before I started teaching, I learned that students need more than one way to learn. Some students learn visually and some learn through touch. When coming into lesson planning, I consider how my students will learn best whether through sound, touch, or sight. Although, in a virtual classroom, differentiation is difficult as the tactile component is missing. To teach to all means virtually, I have considered Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK), the how you teach, what you teach and what technology tool you use (Robertson, 2013). Coming back to the situations I posed, some directions are innate where I may not need directions, there are a multitude of nutritional diets to try, and ways to save money. After reading the article, and thinking about life, I believe that if I can differentiate how I think and come up with multiple ways to solve novel problems such as finding directions, that I can achieve a mindset of fluid intelligence.

In order to consider differentiating my thinking, I found a great motivational poster. It says to begin with the end in mind. I think this is important when differentiating as it will allow me to backwards plan in teaching and everyday problems that I run into. Sometimes I may solve a problem one way and then solve it another way. It will also allow my students and I to keep the end goal in mind when I differentiate.

My third objective is to give myself a self evaluation every other month. This will allow me to see how I am reaching my goals. These evaluations will help predict performance of creativity (Ivcevic et al., 2013). For students, self evaluations will allow them to make informed decisions about attending college and in after school activities. For myself, using a self evaluation will allow me to track and rate my progress of gaining flexibility and become adaptable in novel problems that I face.

In order to self evaluate my progress, I have created a Google Form. In this self evaluation, I can turn to this form at any time to reflect upon problems that I get into whether career or self related. This form will allow me to look back at my answers and reflect upon what has changed in my thinking from beginning to end with creative solutions. .

Within my space, it may be hard to teach the concept of fluid intelligence. My students have this idea of, “self concept of ability,” yet they are only shaping their minds to one idea when ideally they learn most learning concepts in a multitude of ways. Students learn through many modes of presentation, but I still question how that affects their mindset in how they process the information. While reflecting on this, I wonder what changes my students and I will make to become more flexible and adaptable to problems we have to solve.