For Your Listening Pleasure. While I don't listen to a ton of classical music, I've listened to this CD over and over, to the point I recognize the sound of the applause at the beginning. "Mikhail Pletnev Carnegie Hall" is the search term I used on YouTube. Alas, no Mozart on this recording.
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"To me, truth is not some vague, foggy notion. Truth is real. And, at the same time, unreal. Fiction and fact and everything in between, plus some things I can't remember, all rolled into one big "Thing." This is truth, to me."
---Deep Thoughts, by Jack Handey
Creative "Truth" Resonates
This idea crystallized for me in the section about "Creativity and Computers," which was in the section on "Creativity, Intelligence, and Cognition,"beginning on page 63. Starko describes computers that have "discovered" scientific laws and developed original music. The music part has always fascinated me--how do we recognize music from noise? It just sounds good, or in the case of rhythm, it feels good. It literally resonates with us, as ideas sometimes do. So how come I don't appreciate Mozart as much as my step-father? Expertise for one--he is a Doctor of Music. But the chicken and the egg starts there--does he appreciate classical music only because he is a doctor of music, or is he a doctor of music because he inherently understands and has always understood it better?
But the same with science--we recognize a scientific theory because it is "true." Sometime's it is harder than others, and it depends on our background knowledge, but in general, it seems like when we understand something new, we go "ahh…I get it now." That sound you make when you say Ahh may literally be the idea "resonating" in your brain. I can tell my seven-year old son over and over that if he will take a risk and try riding the bigger bike, he'll find that the addition of different gear-ratios will make his ride to school much easier. Eventually he'll discover that for himself. But until he creates something himself using gears, some device, I'm not sure if it will resonate with him. For now, it will be simply because 7th gear is bigger than 1st.
But back to computers--how do we (or they, for that matter) know the difference between something new that is creative and something that is merely chaos? I think of the old monkey and the typewriter story: given enough time, a monkey at a typewriter will eventually (and randomly) type out the Compleat Works of William Shakespeare. And every other book every written--and also unfathomable amounts of meaningless drivel. Meaningless to we English reading humans, of course. At other times the random typings might make sense in other languages that use the same alphabet. In this monkey analogy, I think we are meant to assume that the typing really is totally random, and that the monkey wouldn't start to learn to see, and then create, patterns out of letters and then groups of letters. We assume that the monkey isn't learning these patterns, but now I think "learning" is the essence of life. This immortal monkey would learn, or it wouldn't be alive. Patterns within patterns--isn't that music, and scientific laws?
I was about to say that as teachers and students, all too often we are just monkeys at typewriters, handing in papers and waiting to be told whether it is good and (maybe) creative or not. But maybe what we need is more time with the typewriter, not randomly hitting keys so much as playing around. Making many mistakes, yes, and generating reams of illegible drivel along the way. But wow, when we create the meaning for ourselves, when we see and discover the pattern…create it for ourselves...that is true understanding.
My sons went to a preschool that is utilizes a play-based curriculum, which unfortunately and counter-intuitively is not the accepted, standard curriculum. The director of the school routinely has to advocate for the curriculum's appropriateness--as if it is somehow not appropriate for 3 and 4 year-olds to spend their days playing (with gentle guidance, of course.) The Newsweek article talked about how children of this age ask hundreds of questions a day--they are finding problems and searching for solutions--through play. I think of the guy sitting quietly with a guitar, riffing out some amazing music. "What are you doing?"
"Just playing around." If the classical music isn't working for you, here is a selection from some other guys just playing around. I find the first line of lyrics particularly appropriate for this topic.
Classroom Application
So how do I explain to Principal Burns that my students are working on Masterpiece's of Theatre, rather than hammering away mindlessly while spewing out a;sldkjfpoei kvlnvnvnma;sdlkjgsej9tgosaijg;kl?Here's an idea on how I could have done it last Friday. I got a last minute substitute job with some fifth-graders.
The teacher was there when I arrived and gave me a quick rundown of the afternoon's assignments. One of them was a vocabulary assignment where they take the eight words on the board and write a definition, sentence, and draw a picture. Standard stuff. But I blew it from the get go, because the idea was to fold your paper in such a fashion as to render 12 boxes--4 columns of 3 boxes, 1 column for each word. I didn't explain how to do that--I assumed they knew how, until it occurred to me it was the second week of school. Doh!
So the vocabulary assignment was off to a bad start--most students had 16 squares. A lot of them seemed distraught, as if not knowing how to do the folding meant they'd failed before the assignment had even begun. Since I was fixated on completing my assignment, which was to get them to do their assignment, I missed this opportunity. How do you solve the problem of dividing a piece of paper into 12 equal squares? Set the monkeys to work figuring that out! What are the factors of 12? Dividing and multiplying fractions. Do you use a pen and ruler? Or fold it? (Think about it--if the task was presented as a measure and draw job, wouldn't we say it was a 'creative' solution to simply fold the paper?) Sure, we would have been doing math instead, but I wonder if having an "aha" moment when they figured it out would have created a new cognitive pathway in their brain, so that when they did write their definitions, they'd have a stronger memory of both the words and the math.
So what do you think? As far as little C creativity goes, I think it fits the bill. It might be all in how you present the assignment. I do know that at the time, I was thinking "how do I explain this in order to quickly and efficiently get all the students to conform to my desires?" when I could have approached it from an entirely different perspective. While the vocabulary itself had a creativity component--draw a picture--it was, in my humble opinion, lipstick on the proverbial pig of memorizing vocab lists. Although, I have to admit, it takes some pretty creative thinking to illustrate the word "capable."
(You can watch my take on how to present a vocabulary lesson here. This was for an assignment in a literacy class--I did not create the lesson, but I did use some creative license in interpreting it.)
And last, the irony of teaching children how to create little boxes within which they can then confine their thinking is not lost on me. Talk about digging your own grave...
A brief Interlude
One definition of creativity: When an individual, entirely of their own volition (though possibly/probably inspired by someone else) leaps from a known "scaffold" to another scaffold; perhaps previously known by themselves but not connected, perhaps known by others but not connected in the individual, or, the rarest form of creativity--leaping from a known scaffold to something previously unknown.
As anyone who has ever jumped (or ridden in a wagon) off of anything knows, leaping can be scary--but exhilarating.
*While searching for the Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, I ran across a blog titled "Thoughtful Learning." The author, whom I couldn't identify from the article, describes her writing process in C and H terms--the writing and revising process is Calvin like:
When I write the first draft of a novel, I'm Calvin from the classic comic series Calvin and Hobbes. Brimming with imagination and life, I don't care what may be sensible, realistic, and conventional. I'm full of passion, flying in many different directions. Sure, there'll be plenty of mistakes, but at least they'll be big.
When I revise and edit a novel, I'm Calvin's parents. I have to look dispassionately and critically at what the child mind has created. I have to analyze and evaluate. Patience, persistence, and a kind of longsuffering skepticism must prevail.
To put it another way, the parents' job is to make the child's life safe, and the child's job is to make the parents' life dangerous.
- See more at: https://k12.thoughtfullearning.com/blogpost/critical-and-creative-thinking-lessons-calvin-and-hobbes#sthash.6Jq6EH60.dpuf
Creative and Critical Thinking through the eyes of Calvin
The post is short but sweet, and geared towards teachers. I'd encourage a look. It has a handy chart that illustrates the interplay between creative and critical thinking.
Back to our Program: "Performance Creativity"
On page 79, Starko discusses our old friend "Multiple-Intelligence" Gardner, and his take on creative individuals. He discusses some widely varying domains in which people engage. One (or two, I guess, but I think they are similar) are "Giving a stylized performance" and "Performing for high stakes." If you are listening to Pletnev right now, as I am, you are listening to an example of both. He is performing the creative products (another domain), of Chopin, Bach, Tchaikovsky, and others, which is a stylized performance. He "interprets, improvises, and.or innovates," using those creative works. The "high stakes" is my interpretation--he is performing at Carnegie Hall, and his reputation and livelihood are ostensibly at stake.
Personally, it was interesting to learn these types of endeavors are considered creative. While Starko, and Gardner, describe the creative output of high stakes performance as the words and actions of the creator, and uses Gandhi as an example, I tried to think of how that can relate to me and my students. I really wondered, is an athletic performance creative--or at least a creative outlet? The person in GIF above is scouting a rapid, something with which I have intimate familiarity. He may be contemplating the spiritual aspects of mother earth and the metaphors of flowing water, or maybe he is analyzing the physical interplay of water, rock, and gravity. He may be considering prior knowledge of this or other rapids. He is likely taking into great consideration the words and experiences of others who have come before him. If he was like me, he may have visualized this moment months before, lying in bed, and rehearsed various experiences, reactions, and outcomes. All this sounds like aspects of the creative process to me.
He is also most certainly contemplating risking his life, and perhaps others. And why?
Unlike the Gandhi example, which insinuates a usefulness to society in risking one's life, this person, and many others, risk their life running whitewater for seemingly no productive reason. I did it for 21 years, and hundreds of people paid me to take them along---although, I should emphasize, rarely--if ever--anything as scary as the above rapid. So why? It is a thrill! Why is it a thrill??? Taken in the context that high stakes performance is a form of creativity, I am starting to have a new understanding.
Pletnev is taking his audience on a journey of creative interpretation, through the works of Bach and others. They are experiencing a shared creative vision that is a blend of both Bach and Pletnev--and importantly, themselves--their knowledge and experience.
River rafting may be no different, only the creation we are experiencing this time was not created by another person, it was created by _______, something that only the six-year old in all of us can draw.
(Actual drawing by my six-year old son.)
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Looked at another way, why is football so popular? Perhaps it is an attempt at creativity--a search for the order of a perfectly executed pass-and-catch between quarterback and receiver amidst the chaos of twenty other people running around and colliding?
And at the basic level, is not the game of "Tag" an example of performance creativity, only with developmentally appropriate stakes--you're it, not dead? I'm not talking about the product--the rules of the game of Tag. Creating a "new" version, like Freeze Tag or Lava Monster Tag is creative. But I'm talking about the act of avoiding the tag. Is it a creative solution to simply run in a straight line? Maybe at first, but your opponent will learn it too, so you learn to dodge, and eventually a 7 year-old has invented the Double-Start/Stop With A Half-Spin and Sideways Jump move, which is almost impossible to tag, until the tagger solves that problem by creating the…???
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This post been brought to you by divergent thinking, and is an example of the steps of my creative process. It is a practice attempt at something much better-something that diverges, but hopefully converges much better than it has. I may well have some innovative thoughts, but I haven't presented them appropriately--following the form or organization of crisp, intelligible writing. I've wandered, and often neglected to let the reader know what signposts (citations) have led me here.
Or, in Calvin and Hobbesian terms, I created a wonderfully colorful mess without enough adult supervision. Is that a right brain/left brain concept? Anyway...
Like Starko's husband, I am my own worst critic--and therein lies one of the biggest challenges I see for myself, both personally, and as a teacher. How do you go about living life like an inspirational coffee mug quote: "You'll never succeed if you don't try." (That is probably what the coffee cup says. I would have to add: "and fail, and get laughed at, ignored, scorned; bored, frustrated, distracted and distracted and, hey--squirrel!) Also, how do I reconcile that mantra with Yoda's tenet--"Do or do not-there is no try?"
I'll leave you with a parting shot of the coffee mug I used today:
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