Tag: mindset

What Makes People Creative?

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When you start to explore the literature around the definition of creativity, or what it means to be creative, the lists and references go on and on. In this post I wanted to share a few key characteristics of what we might deam a creative approach or disposition. In my last post I shared the idea of developing a creative council in the classroom to learn about key role models and why they were/are so influential in their fields. With a better sense of the characteristics of creative people we can form better perspectives on our own work and speak more confidently about what makes up ‘being creative”.

What makes people creative?

  • Tenacity – grit, determination, resilience, call it what you like but some people don’t allow bumps in the road get in the way of the journey.
  • Courage – it is not just bumps in the road but sometimes the traffic is against you. Creative people are often risk takers and go against the common paradigm.
  • Inventiveness – to be able to explore new connections and combinations, to continually push what is possible.
  • Leadership – some people are moths others are flames.
  • Impact – some individuals either through their established position or their authority have had greater impact in their fields than others.
  • Vision – not just being able to project what is ahead in a field of study or development or art, but to bring that horizon closer much quicker than others.
  • Passion – an unquenchable fuel.

I am not saying that this is an exhaustive list in fact I would welcome your additions and amendments. The complexity of defining these characteristics means that many individuals would display some of these dispositions more strongly than others. Some were natural leaders whereas others showed greater courage as they worked alone. We each show these tendencies in different measure, making up the unique definitions of creative people and what creativity is.

Thomas Edison’s Creative Approach

I really enjoyed this piece by Wouter Boon who outlines the characteristics of Thomas Edison that contributed to his creative success:

Persistence / Conviction / Associations / Productivity / Trial and Error / Combinations / Imagination / Relaxation / Diligence / Collaboration / Knowledge and Skill / Value / Luck / Entrepreneurship / Curiosity

And this from the Centre of Excellence in teaching in Learning at Iowa University expands on some of these ideas when they suggest the following characteristics that researchers look at when measuring creative aptitude:

  • Fluency (number of ideas generated)
  • Originality and imagination (unusual, unique, novel ideas)
  • Elaboration (ability to explain ideas in detail)
  • Flexibility, curiosity, resistance to closure (ability to generate multiple solutions)
  • Complexity (detail and implications of ideas; recognition of patterns, similarities and differences)
  • Risk taking (willingness to be wrong and to admit it)

Creative Flow

One of my favourite concepts in the study of creativity and the creative process is that of Flow by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. In Creativity – Flow and the Psychology of Discovery and Invention he suggests the following characteristics of the creative personality:

  • Creative individuals have a great deal of energy, but they are also often quiet and at rest.
  • Creative individuals tend to be smart, yet also naive at the same time.
  • Creative individuals have a combination of playfulness and discipline, or responsibility and irresponsibility.
  • Creative individuals alternate between imagination and fantasy ant one end, and rooted sense of reality at the other.
  • Creative people seem to harbor opposite tendencies on the continuum between extroversion and introversion.
  • Creative individuals are also remarkable humble and proud at the same time.
  • Creative individuals to a certain extent escape rigid gender role stereotyping and have a tendency toward androgyny.
  • Generally, creative people are thought to be rebellious and independent.
  • Most creative persons are very passionate about their work, yet they can be extremely objective about it as well.
  • The openness and sensitivity of creative individuals often exposes them to suffering pain yet also a great deal of enjoyment.

Take your pick from all of those. One thing that you quickly realise is that even defining characteristic of creative people becomes divergent. However simply beginning conversations around the common themes or elements would be a great discussion with your colleagues or class. Take another look at my creative shortlist at the top and let me know what you think.

 

Learning in Perpetual Beta

28 Days of Writing, Learning, MindsetPublished onUpdated on1 Comment on Learning in Perpetual Beta

 

For today’s post I thought I would explore a little more deeply the themes and overlapping thinking surrounding my previous post about a Mindset of Failing. In particular I’d like to unpack this concept that learning is and always should remain in perpetual beta.

It is actually a considerable challenge to get perspective on the completeness of our work with students. I am not referring to when projects end or when we have finished that piece of artwork with them – the year long (sometimes much longer) development of learning relationships is often hard to wrap ourselves around. Since leaving the classroom I have experienced quite finite projects that have a short timeline and stuff you have to get done. I still find this refreshing.

Perpetual Beta = Prototyping Disposition

vIn an earlier post this month I referred to the mindset we need to take towards the things we create and the way we learn. It is not just about junk modelling or computer aided design or 3D printing or physical building – a disposition towards prototyping means we:

  • Are committed to the expertise and ideas we might gain from others and don’t just simply rely on our own perspective.
  • Believe in the value of feedback and how critique can move our ideas forward.
  • Engineer as many opportunities for feedback as we can as, early as we can.
  • Are willing to share what we create when it is extremely, painfully incomplete.

When a piece of software is being developed it has various stages it goes through, depending on the scale of the product of course. Beta is a time for testing, as defined below:

Beta, named after the second letter of the Greek alphabet, is the software development phase following alpha. It generally begins when the software is feature complete. Software in the beta phase will generally have many more bugs in it than completed software, as well as speed/performance issues and may still cause crashes or data loss. The focus of beta testing is reducing impacts to users, often incorporating usability testing. The process of delivering a beta version to the users is called beta release and this is typically the first time that the software is available outside of the organization that developed it.

Perpetual beta is when this state is extended, sometimes indefinitely, a web service or software product remains in constant development with feedback and testing driving new feature releases. A product remains in perpetual beta.

What does learning in perpetual beta mean?

The links here with the way we think about learning and feedback in particular are quite strong. In my post about the Mindset of Failing I pondered on the mental resilience of tennis players compared to other athletes. Losing points is regular and failing is part of the back and forth of a tennis match, very different to other sports. The post was commented on by Pam Hernandez who remarked that:

This made me think about how we traditionally provide feedback on student learning which is not unlike the analogy to football. I’m thinking American football in this case and getting an A on assignment is much like scoring a touchdown. It’s not uncommon to see teachers use sports analogies and comment “Homerun” or “Touchdown” on good work. I like the idea of rewarding effort along the way and making it okay to make mistakes along the way and be rewarded for the learning. It’s a different mindset for parents, teachers and students. (Pam Hernandez)

And it is here that we have the biggest opportunity to shift the way people are thinking about failure and failing. It is no small feat mind you. There are cultural and ethical stances people have that influence their perception of mistakes and failure in learning. We need to help the whole learning community appreciate this positive prototyping disposition. Learning in perpetual beta is all about continuous improvement with an emphasis on engineering as many opportunities for feedback as we can.

Take a look through some of these other posts from my this blog about assessment and feedback and plan to take some action:

Pic: failure is cool by Steffi Reichert

The Mindset of Failing

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Failing at tennis - ading to a growth mindset

Learning about sport when I was young mainly involved cricket and football, I never really experienced tennis. My son has been playing since he was about 4 and this season has been enjoying playing as part of a local team in a Junior Competition every Saturday. I think he is experiencing what failing feels like through his time playing tennis.

I have been getting to know what it is like being a tennis Dad this season and watching a lot of tennis, naturally. One thing you notice with this sport compared to football is the number of small victories and failures there are. It is much more about the cumulative effort, gradually building up points, overcoming the failures you experience.

If you play tennis you will know that failure and winning/losing points is an integral part of this sport. This is different to the experience of football I had growing up, where the end result was the only thing that mattered, there were not many measures of progress. Sure you could tell which team was dominating play, but it was not as clear as you win a point or you lose a point.

I have always found it fascinating that in tennis you could be one point from defeat and yet still come back to win a match. My son starting his match today losing 3 early games and before long he was losing 4-2, but he suddenly woke up and won the remaining 4 on the bounce to win 6-4.

Do multiple small setbacks during tennis create a more resilient approach? I wonder if the mindset of a tennis player sees failing and losing differently to a football player?

Hold Your Ideas Lightly

28 Days of Writing, Creativity, Design ThinkingPublished onUpdated on6 Comments on Hold Your Ideas Lightly

This is a simple metaphor to understand. When you are exploring the validity of an idea, hold your idea lightly – do not clutch it tightly to your chest. We often explore if an idea is valid in the company of others and so we need to present our thinking with this mindset as lots of good things flow from it. It is an important mindset we adjust to in our design thinking workshops we run with teachers.

Instead of having to pry open our fingers to get to the idea to offer advice, when it is held lightly and openly in our open hands others can access it.

Offer an invitation to your ideas not a barrier to hurdle.

When we hold on to our ideas lightly we are being more careful in terms of what we have committed to that idea. There is no tension in our grasp of the idea because we have invested lots of time and energy into developing it. It is probably early on in terms of our thinking and we are open to what others say.

If our grasp is light it might be swept along by a strong breeze from others. Who knows if we are open to other people contributing and building on our idea it might be taken in a direction that we might not have seen.

It is all about communicating your idea as early as you can, but matching that action with a relatively low commitment in energy, time and resources.

In the workshops I have led over the last four years I have asked hundreds of people to communicate an idea they have only just created to someone else. The constraint comes from the time they have to communicate the idea or concept and the resource they have to do it with. A single Post it note. What else!

They are thrust into a situation where they are already non-committal about an idea and are encouraged to “Hold their ideas lightly”, pitching the idea to someone else quickly. All of these things create a scenario that is often alien within education – sharing something so early. I always like to follow this sort of task up by asking “What does it feel like to have to share an idea so early on in the process?”

Invariably there is a mixed reaction. From the “nerve wracking” and “scary”, to “liberating” and “exciting”. The anxious responses normally speak of a habitual culture of getting it “just so”, or working on something heavily before sharing widely. The more positive responses, which is the majority, recognise how this mindset, named up front, and the process that activates it, creates a refreshing sense of openness about our creative work.

Hold your ideas lightly – don’t clutch them tightly to your chest.