You can make anything cute by "babyfying it". Make it soft and give it rounded edges, smaller than normal and, if it has facial features, it should have big smiling eyes.
You can make anything more creepy by bringing it close to the edge of really human like, but obviously not really behaving like a human should. ie. clowns, porcelain dolls, mannequins,etc. The more human like it is, but it's just a little "off" in the way it behaves, it gives you the creeps. Not grossed out, just makes you uncomfortable.
There is actually a psychological definition for this uncomfortable mental space. It's called the "Uncanny Valley". V Sauce (One of my favorite You Tube characters), makes a great video about it here.
One of the fun parts about being an artist and teaching kids how to make art, is to give them the tools to make the viewer feel and respond a certain way. The challenge for this creative problem was to encourage the viewer to either respond with "Awwww, it's soooo cute!" or "Ewww, that gives me the creeps!"
Ummm, ok, yuck.
Here are some of my students responses to this creative challenge. Many of them altered their own photographs digitally using free photo editing apps. Some made their dog cuter by enlarging his eyes or themselves or a baby sibling creepier by making it just a little "off" and then worked from there to create drawings. At the end of the challenge, they lined their work up and made a scale ranging from the creepiest to the cutest. It was a fun conversation. I bet they won't forget this project for a long time!
Don't look behind the curtain!
What is up with those eyes?
An undead baby sister, creepy!
Not sure where this fit on the scale, but it sure was interesting.
Last year, one of the marking period themes was "Humor". Inspired by remix artists my students and I have seen online, we scavenged up some large old framed prints for my students to "improve". Here are some of their works. I hope they make you giggle as much as my middle school artists did while they were painting them.
Warning! This beach has sea dragons!
If you can add a Lego knight and a castle, you probably should.
Lizard Lady. I actually prefer this version better than the original. :)
This work was made by one of my cognitively impaired students, he was soo proud!
So far, I've been writing about things that I've been trying in my classroom to encourage creative thinking and have posted some examples of lessons, book reviews and other rambling ideas that I have on the topic. One thing I haven't done yet is show some of the preliminary data I've been collecting.
Here is the data, in visual form from last (2nd) marking period. It shows the average amount of responses from 150 students on three separate testing dates over a nine week marking period. As I get new students every nine weeks, I am focusing on adding assessment for an additional component of creativity. Next marking periods data chart will also show assessment for elaboration.
Fluency: The number of ideas students can come up with in a defined amount of time. For this marking period, students were given 3 minutes to come up with a list of ideas of things you could do with the following objects on these dates: 11/1 a dollar bill, 12/1 a fork and on 1/13 a sheet of computer paper. The average of 150 students results are shown in blue.
For this test, I'm just looking for the number of ideas that the student can come up with. Creative or not, all ideas count!
Flexibility/Originality: The number of original ideas or ideas that show flexible thinking when thinking about what they could do with an object. In example, a flexible response for a use for a fork could be "using forks to link/weave together to make a screen door". An inflexible or unoriginal response might be "to eat with" or "to stab something with". The average of 150 students results are shown in red.
For this test, I spent a considerable amount of time reviewing all of the students fluency lists and made a master "common response list" of typical object use ideas. All ideas that showed flexible or original thinking made the cut to count for the students "flexibility/originality" score.
What I'm noticing: While it's great that both fluency and flexibility/originality numbers rise as the marking period goes on, it is interesting to notice some of the particulars. Most obvious is the rate of change from the first test date to the second test date. While the amount of original/flexible ideas dramatically rises, the overall fluency numbers rise just a little. My theory is that as students learn how to come up with more creative /flexible thinking, their internal veto system sets in and they start to cut out the less original ideas and accept only the more creative ideas that seem worthy to put to paper. By the end of the marking period, they finally "get" that "all ideas are good ideas" and know that the more ideas they generate, creative or not, the better.
This marking period, in addition to collecting data on fluency and flexibility/originality, I'm also collecting data on elaboration. I am collecting data in two ways for this skill. The first is through asking the students to complete a simple drawing such as a circle or "S" shape and the other method is through seeing how many twists and turns a student can add to a story starter (elaborating on a story). These results will be available in a few weeks when the last batch of data is collected.
I love action research! I am always looking for people to collaborate with and hope that this blog reaches more people with this interest! I would love learning about other ways to collect data. Please comment and pass along! Thanks!
A typical week in figuring
out how to teach FOR creativity
I decided to write about this week for the blog because it
was a pretty average week, and it was one of the first weeks we haven’t lost a
day of instruction due to snow or ice or professional development. This winter sure has been
crazy in Michigan. I plan on using this blog entry as
evidence for my teaching practice for my principal as well, so I have
highlighted lesson plan elements in green throughout.
The theme for this marking period is humor, so far this
marking period, we have been practicing our ideation fluency, flexibility,
originality and elaboration skills through developing illustrated jokes,
humorous juxtaposed magazine and digital collages and we “improved” some tacky
Goodwill paintings.
We started the week working on a mini project PLAYING with
toys.“Play” is an essential component
to building creative thinking in students. It builds flexibility and it is the
root skill of elaboration. I can: experiment with
ideas and combine ideas in ways to make new meaning.
Student experimenting with ideas, making new meaning
The students were given direction to play with donated
unloved or broken toys and just see what they could do with them for about ten
minutes.They had so much fun re-living
their earlier childhood, being silly and playing together collaborating. Next, I gave each of my students a
card from the game “Spot It”.
and gave them the instructions to pick out just one toy. The
cards are filled with pictures of all sorts of different things: anchors,
hearts, light bulbs, fish, etc. Students were to find a person with a matching
card and meet up with them to discuss and share ideas about different ways the
two new toys could be combined to make a new toy.
Think, Pair, Share
Super Duck by Elliot L.
After about five minutes, students shared out some of their
ideas and then were asked to trade toys with their partner and find a new
partner that also matched their card. This time, more rules were added to the
ideation game, not only did they need to combine toys, but also they had to
think about how one of the images on one of their cards could be worked into
the new toy design. Think, Pair, Share This
scaffolding process continued and new rules were added with each round. The
students were getting pretty excited about their ideas. The closing activity
included the last set of partners sharing out their plans for a new toy and
giving their new toy a name Exit Ticket.
Ultra mechanic by Jacob W.
Tuesday began
with an activity Bell Ringer that invited the
students to select a toy from the bins and spend a little time with it, do a
little observational drawing in their books and diagram the best features of
the toy in detail. Teaching for Observation We talked a
little about what made the Franken Toys we saw on Monday in class successful
and we reviewed the three expectations for the mini-lesson: To combine toys in
a humorous and interesting way, to make the connections seem manufactured
(stitches neat, glue hidden from view, paint applied with care), and to create
a slogan, jingle or sales pitch for their new invention. Rubric
I gave two quick whole class tutorial reviews Direct Instruction on how to sew (many students had
had my class before and have already learned this skill from different lessons
and so could teach each other. I also reviewed
the safety measures that we need to take when using tools as in some cases toys
may need to be disassembled using screwdrivers, exacto knives, pliers or small
saws. We practiced the skills together and I made sure every student had the
skill set they needed in order to complete their work with care. Guided Practice
After I felt confident that they had the safety measures
under control, the students were set free to play with and combine toys. You
could have heard a pin drop, they were so engaged in play and experimentation.
Moo-rice Rodriguez with sidekicks in backpack by Adrianna B.
Wednesday was a workday.
Students rushed into the room ready to explore what their toys could do. Many
had gone home and scavenged their own toy box and came in with new treasure
pieces they could add to their assemblage.Students were given the choice to work
independently or collaboratively.
Thursday students
were asked to document their work in their
books, to make quick sketches of what they had combined and to come up with a
name for their new creation. Reflection/Bell Ringer
They had the rest of the hour to work on assembling the final details, but were
asked this time to think about what their slogan or jingle might be that would
go with their new toy design as they played with their ideas.This was really fun; you could hear the hum
of silly jingles and rhymes echoing throughout the room. As an Exit Ticket, the students were asked to write down
their slogan/jingle and new toy name on a slip that also served as a display
tag for showing off their new creation in our media center.Our media center looks pretty lively now!
Friday was our
first experimentation in using improvisation to teach for creativity.I currently have a pre-intern student teacher
from Kendall College of Art and Design, Clair Pearl, who comes on most Fridays.
She designed and taught this lesson under my supervision. I can: collaborate, listen and become comfortable with
change.
Clair began with a PowerPoint presentation showing some of
Richard Avedon’s photographs of people with various expressive qualities. She
began using some VTS (Visual Thinking Strategies) questioning
to activate the students thinking. “How do they look?, How can you tell
how they are feeling?, What makes you think that?, How do you think they are
feeling?. Etc.”
The presentation also presented information like “60 – 90%
of human communication is non-verbal” and discussed the importance of body
language. She then asked the students about the connection they could guess
between body language and improvisation.
She followed the presentation with a TEDx talk on
improvisation. “Dave Morris – The way of improvisation” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUO-pWJ0riQ
In this talk, Morris talks about the importance of failure to success in life.
He emphasizes, “Failing does not make you a failure.” I love that the main
components of improv are all about collaboration,
listening and change.
Clair asked all of the students to stand up in a circle
around the room and we played a short improv game called “Zip, Zap, Zop”. The
goal of the game is to encourage listening skills and
to be collaborative. To play the game, a student would shout “ZIP!” and
point across the circle to another student who would then shout and point
“ZAP!” to another student, followed by a third who would shout and point “ZOP!”
and the cycle would repeat around the circle, trying to get as fast as we could
go.This simple sounding game really
pushed the kids to pay attention and helped develop some commitment to their
part as you have to be pretty direct with your pointing if the person across
from the circle from you is to know who’s turn is next.
Clair then introduced another improv game called Funny noises.She asked one student to develop a noise and
to basically play telephone by each person sending that noise around the
circle.Students had to pay attention and listen for when the sound came to
them.To up the game, a second noise was
introduced and it was sent in the opposite direction around the circle.Inevitably, students would be tasked to send
both noises in different directions around the circle at the same time.
The last game Clair played with them was called “The world’s
worst”. She reviewed with them the job of an EmCee (to be the rule maker and
moderator), what it meant to keep participation school appropriate (otherwise
she would call out “too blue” and you would be removed from the scene) and the
roles of a good audience.
Four volunteers stepped up and each used body language alone
or speech to demonstrate the world’s worst of some profession or skill
(suggestions offered by the audience)… World's worst cashier, world’s worst
waiter, world’s worst driver, etc.After
a group of four performed a new group of student volunteers joined in and tried
out a new “world’s worst theme”.It was
quite a lot of fun and I think that it will be a great one or two day addition
to this creativity curriculum as it teaches so many great skills.
Improvisation: Acting with little
or no practice, playing with ideas and actions, doing stuff on the fly…just
like life!
SteamPunk is a sub genre of science fiction that is primarily focused on the creation of an alternate history with Victorian era/ Western Themed / Mechanized gadgetry. The style features "retro-futurstic" works that are primarily steam powered.
Hanging out at the MAEA SteamPunk gala with
former student teacher and art ed buddy, Michelle
The 2013 Michigan Art Education Association conference held at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island's theme was the "Grand Vision" and decked out in SteamPunk finery.
There are lots of resources online about SteamPunk and even conventions where people can connect and celebrate their creativity in this theme.
Learning to step back:
As an art teacher, we find ourselves in a dilemma when we stumble across fun art styles that inspire us. We get "tunnel vision" and a grand idea in our heads about all of the cool things our kids could do with the theme that's inspired us. I think it's natural for us to do, we're creative people. In my early teaching days and not too distant past, I have been guilty of asking my students to make Impressionist or Aboriginal or Monochromatic "Blue Period" style paintings, Louise Nevelson boxes or Alexander Calder mobiles. And just like getting excited about Chuck Close's fingerprint portraits I used to have my high school kids make, learning about SteamPunk got me thinking of all of the cool gears and watchfaces I could get my hands on for students to incorporate into jewelry or something equally cool, like maybe they could all make SteamPunk glasses like my friend Michelle is wearing in this photo.
Looking at my practice critically however, it's important to ask myself, "Where is the line that is crossed when the art or creative thinking our students are making/doing is ours (or someone else's) and it becomes no longer the students?"
How do you encourage creative thinking and creative invention/discovery if we ask our students to create work in the theme of ___________ (whatever the teacher has become inspired by, in this case, in the theme of SteamPunk). How can I have my students learn about an art movement or art style and not have them be copiers of a style or of another artists' ideas? I posed this challenge to myself: How can I accomplish these two goals: A. Introduce students to this cool science fiction style of art making. B. How "hands off" can I be in designing a lesson so that my students maintain the role of being the most creative people in the classroom and not just following through with an idea I have?
This is what we did.
1. I showed them lots of examples of really cool SteamPunk Art work. We looked at videos, people making costumes, tons of sculptures and mechanized SteamPunk toys, jewelry, and we even watched a little of the Tim Burton animated movie "9". The lesson timing lined up with a field trip for all sixth graders to visit ArtPrize (an international art competition held annually in downtown Grand Rapids, MI) where many of the submitted works were SteamPunk in design. Every year there are more than a few works made by local artists who are skilled at welding and animatronics. The kids were excitedly pointing out to their non art class friends all of the SteamPunk features they could identify.
2. We gathered materials for mixed media assemblage sculptures. We asked for broken appliances, tech trash, broken down computers and printers, nuts and bolts and random scrap from garages and foundries. We got a lot of really bizarre stuff, which was cool.
Learning how to use tools properly.
Figuring out how to take stuff apart.
Sharing treasures.
Collaborating and building on each others creative ideas.
3. The students were given the following directions: Take some stuff apart. See what's on the inside, how does it work? Make something from what you've destroyed. Make sure it's interesting enough that you are proud of it. Make it with care. How can you put things together without showing how they are attached or the attachment is part of the design? Go.
I did not ask them to make something specifically SteamPunk inspired, on purpose. You can still see the SteamPunk influences showing up in some of their work.
Retro-futuristic fashion
Policeman in a warehouse
Hot Air Balloon
Jeremy
Headband of the future
SteamPunk spider (that actually crawls!)
The students had a few different gauges of wire, hot glue guns and dollar store tools at their disposal.
With laminate floor samples to cover/protect the tables, they got to work disassembling and exploring stuff. Some students chose to work alone, many chose to collaborate. Aside from the sound of destruction, you could have heard a pin drop they were so engaged.
Key to my heart
Robo turtle
Hypnotic Photographer
Harold
Robo butterfly
Super kitty
4. At the end of the week students named their work and wrote reflections on what they learned about the creation process and the Steam Punk movement. Note: they were not asked to write about how their work was "Steam Punk". They did happen to draw some parallels naturally though. The students set up a mini- gallery around the room and we talked about the ideas and experiences that each artist had during this discovery lesson.
Tiara with Laser
Reginald and Franklin, best friends
Time eternal
Roberto
PaintBot
Because I did not say to them "Make something that looks like SteamPunk." or "Make a robot" or "Make a sculpture that does ________", there was a very wide variety of student responses. Learning to step back and let go of your vision allows room for the students vision to develop.
It can happen. If you set up the culture of your classroom just right and if you make sure all of the kids needs are being met, you CAN keep a class full of 30+ middle schoolers with a variety of needs fully engaged and excited about learning and creating. A must see visual featuring five levels of engagement put out by educationaltechnology.com has been floating around facebook this week. If you haven't seen it yet, click on the link above. I thought I would spend a little time this week writing about the everyday little things I do that add up to create a creative HIGHLY ENGAGED culture in my middle level classroom.
Create and post everywhere a stress-free classroom motto like, "You are not here to prove yourself, you're here to improve yourself." Talk about it.
Tell your students, "Only you know the right answer". Make them discover their own solutions to problems. Have them use you as a coach and not the "end all be all" source of knowledge.
Have your students free write often to sort out ideas, but do not require them to show you everything that they write. Respect their confidentiality and soon they will feel safe to share on their own.
Model creative behaviors. Share the creative ideas of others. Tell your students when and how they have inspired you!
Don't sit behind your desk. Get up and circulate, talk about the weekend, tell a funny story, be a real person to your students.
Help your students find their own passion. Share your passions with them.
Offer lots of opportunities for students to work collaboratively or independently as they choose.
Say "Yes! How can I help you get started?" when students approach you about doing something different as an alternative to the assignment. If they are seeking alternatives, that means they are thinking! I have never been let down by a student who wanted to take something in their own direction. It's about letting go of some control.
Do your best to remove barriers to creativity. In the middle grades especially, the fear of not being able to make something look right can really deter some great ideas. Students (and adults) will often choose an easier or less creative idea if it means they don't have to struggle with making something look exactly right. Occasionally allow students to skip over technical skill development in order to achieve creative meaning in their work. (Collage is one method, I'll write about others in a future post.)
Encourage wierdness, silliness, play good music that everyone likes, dance and sing and make a fool of yourself from time to time. Creativity dies in a sterile environment.
Give your students "tools" to work with. Doing something without care is meaningless. Let them choose which tools they need for each job. Occasionally, pull a student aside and give them the "special" drawing pencil or "super expensive" :) drawing paper and see what they do with it.
Give them informal opportunities to become experts with a particular media and allow them to teach you or another student something they discovered.
Even if you don't feel the most confident with technology, offer technological options for your assignments. I learn so much from my students this way and they love showing me new things.
Don't ask or tell your students to do their work, invite them to experience.
Consider what personally engages and excites you as an artist or creative person. Think of ways this can translate into your classroom. Don't put your kids through those boring foundations lessons you suffered through in your undergrad program. Find better ways to teach boring things. If it's not enjoyable, why do it?
Require students to respond differently from each other.
Tie everything you can into their everyday experience and provide new experiences for them too. Ask them how their work relates to their life.
Everyone likes to learn, our brains are hardwired for it. The trick is to make sure that you are teaching something that is new. How many times do you think a middle school kid has made an artwork about "line" since they started school? They get it, "a line can be straight, jagged, curvy or implied". So what? What have you learned that's new to you? If it's new to you, you are likely to be inspired, share that with them instead. I bet they end up using "line" in their work.
Be funny, truly care for each child, look for opportunities for growth, put in the extra time whenever possible and most importantly, you must love your (work?).
Begin each class with a creative warm up that encourages off beat thinking and is not skill based. Offer opportunities to share the silly responses daily on the projector. It helps build class community. (watch for prompts in a future post)
Challenge your students to know more than you know. It's ok not to know everything. Consider yourself a student in the presence of many teachers.
Introduce your students to new ways of thinking by asking good questions, with starters like "What if..., When can..., How might...., Why doesn't..., Who does... ?"
Provide opportunities for students to share and respond to each others work constructively both formally and informally. You should model appropriate comments as a guide.
Keep working on an idea until you are excited about every part that you will teach. If you are not excited, how can you expect your students to be?
Have high expectations for yourself and your students, you will all rise to meet them.
Please share more ideas in the comments section of this post! Have a great week!
Ask any art teacher why they think their class is important
and I'd bet most of them would mention among other things that their class teaches students to be
more creative.But let’s look at
our practices critically.
As an art teacher, do you actually teach kids how to be more creative? Is painting a color wheel a creative act? Is painting a copy of a famous artwork creative? What if it's a monochromatic self portrait? Is making a coil pot a creative act? Our are students more creative after having done these exercises? How much of your curriculum do you devote to skill based lessons? How much do you devote to critical thinking and creative ideation?
If you know my history as an art teacher, and I'm guessing if you are reading this, you do, you know I've gone through some changes in the way I teach. I entered the profession in the usual way. I went to college and learned how to get good grades by by mimicing whatever style of art work my college teachers made. I was trained in DBAE (Discipline Based Art Education) and was well versed in all things a good art teacher should know about how to construct a solid lesson. I know how to make a lesson that could rival the content knowledge of any other subject area in school. It should be rigorous with Art Production, Art History, Art Criticism and Aesthetics. Lessons also are encouraged to be multi-disciplinary in nature, have a reading and writing component and include a "multi-cultural" angle.
Whew! But I could do it with the best of them. If there was a "right way" to do something, I was going to do it! Looking back at some of the things I had my students do (with all of the best intentions) I make myself cringe. My elementary students made very beautiful copies of Van Gogh's Starry Night in oil pastels, high school students made spectacular large scale fingerprint portrait of themselves ala Chuck Close and my middle schoolers made fantastic color wheel versions of famous paintings. And at the end of the marking period, semester or school year, I would have a decent handful of these masterpieces tossed into the trashcan by their creator without care as they walked out the door.
When I applied for a Masters in Art Education Degree at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), I was searching for something more. Frustrated with the numbers of students in my classes who only thought art was "Just OK", I wanted to learn what I could do as the teacher to affect the level of engagement for my middle school students. Part of my studies included conducting classroom research. I sought out to compare the levels of student engagement when students are challenged with a traditional, DBAE style, closed art problem with representational constraints Vs a more ill defined art problem without representational constraints. Problem 1: "Create a triptych of yourself with a realistic self portrait in the center panel, the left panel a drawing of a road with symbols that represent those events that have led you to where you are today and on the right panel, a road with symbols of what you predict will become your future." Vs. Problem 2: "Create a self portrait in a container form. On the outside, use those shapes, textures and colors that represent how you think others view you, and on the inside, use those shapes, textures and colors that express how you really are."
Without surprise, the more open art problem that did not require representational realism from my middle school kids elicited a higher engagement response. It was during this study that I became familiar with the work of Dr. Sandra Kay, an art educator with an extensive background in gifted education. She is one of the coauthors of a book called "Creating Meaning through Art: Teacher as Choice Maker". In it she discusses something called an "Elegant Problem". An elegant problem is one that invites fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration in it's responses. I also became familiar with the work of Sydney Walker and the "Big Idea". Big ideas are large and complex and can sustain an artists work over large swaths of time. I began thinking about how I could give my students the opportunity to think and behave as "real" artists do. I began to examine my own practice and explore teaching students about the art world through the development of elegant problems and big ideas. Instead of coil pots, my students began making plates that represented dreamscapes. Paintings of still life objects soon became paintings that revealed their biggest pet peeves. Things were getting better, my students were making art that held meaning for them. They were beginning to behave like artists.
Could there be anything more? Are my kids really engaged? YES!!! They are loving it! Way less art is making it to the trash can. They are behaving like artists, (but are they thinking that way?). Do they view themselves as creative? So, I asked them. There were still a handful that struggled with the "big idea". What did I do about it? To be honest, like I think most good teachers do, I rescued them. In all of my good intentions, I "helped" them brainstorm for ideas. I set the problems up so that they could think about them in certain ways. I provided brainstorming worksheets and had them search for ideas out of freewriting exercises. Most of my students could fly with the ill defined prompt with these aides, they would create very cool independent looking things and would begin to see themselves as real artists, but there were about 4 -5 in each hour that needed me to hold their hand through the ideation process. Sometimes the projects of neighboring students would end up looking eerily similar. I chalked it up to possible developmental delays, but I knew it deep down, I was not teaching them "how to think". These were the future adults who would someday say "I'm not creative", "I wish I could come up with ideas like that". Now what?
I did some more reading and scavenging. How do you teach creativity? What can I do as an art teacher to help my kids reach their full creative potential?
Things didn’t really start to change for me until I begun
to think of myself as a “creativity teacher that uses art as a vehicle to get
kids thinking differently” rather than “an art teacher”.
A creativity teacher teaches for creativity first, that means that a creativity teacher will be looking for different things when they are developing their units. It is not unlike my earlier work with "elegant problems". But this time, I will be searching for fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration in my students responses first, all other elements of a problem's outcome are secondary(instead of equal). Creativity is something that ALL students will need, regardless of what they choose to be when they grow up. I finally admit to myself that most of my students will not grow up to be artists, but they will all have a need to be able to think and behave creatively.
Imagine if all the subjects in school were taught with an emphasis on creativity first and subject secondary? For advocacy’s sake, speak to the benefits of
creative problem solving and critical thinking for your students. But first, examine your
actual practice, are you teaching the kids how to be more creative or are you
teaching them how to follow directions, or make art that looks like ______? Or
in the style of ____? Or to demonstrate the skill of ___? Or to show that they
understand the definition of a vocabulary word?” There is a difference between
being “an art teacher” and a “creativity teacher”. Which do you want to be? What do you think is
more important for kids? Can you be both? Let's talk!!
