Slide 1: I’m presenting on creativity and its positives and negatives because it is something I am passionate about in a probably unhealthy amount. I am going to cover many different aspects from different viewpoints: from creator to teacher, to observer.
Slide 2: Creativity is often thought of like water. It’s there and you can see it, but defining it to a specific category is impossible. That is why I wrote several. One: it’s a series of light bulbs. These can be loosely defined as steps to a story or just simply different ideas.
It’s also a spark. You think something and run with it.
Talk about definition. It has multiple meanings.
Slide 3: Creativity is important because it is everywhere and in everything. It helps critical thinking and problem solving throughout life and is also fun and enjoyable.
Another way to think about it is: What do you study in school to learn critical thinking? We study creative writing. There is meaning in that.
Slide 4: There are several different ways to go about creativity. One school of creative thought breaks it into two categories: little c and big C. Little C is the every day problem solving and big C is the passion project-type things. But on top of that creativity exists in creation. You can find your own way. Writing, composing, designing, building, editing, or even just sitting and thinking. It’s your experience. That’s what is important. You might never share your thoughts. That isn’t the point.
Slide 5: The point, in school, relies on two main aspects: the first being responsibility of teachers. Their responsibility is to be patient, respectful, to engage students and to be actually interested in creativity.
Slide 6: Being kind is an addition to the teaching portion because it is easy for teachers to be moody and angry or annoyed. It doesn’t happen all the time, but it is a possibility and sometimes we are not self-aware enough to realize we need to be kind. This is a collaborative process and much of the students’ creative future lies in your hands whether you both know it or not.
Slide 7: The responsibility of students is to gather everything they can and to be active and involved. They should take everything the teacher says and try to apply it in someway, even if it doesn’t work out. They should be willing to explore and try their best to expand themselves and their thoughts
Slide 8: Being open is an addition to the student portion because it is easy for students to get away with not caring. Testing shows this. Students can easily not care. Students must allow the teacher to collaborate with them and the students must allow their ideas come out. The openness is inward, too. It’s a little new age-y but allow yourself to feel. Don’t hide anything. It’s difficult but important to the creative process.
Slide 9: There are three types of main learning: auditory, visual, and kinesthetic. These are important in the learning process, as some students might not know what they are interested in. This comes back to the looking inward. Every student is different. One of my sources, interestingly, says on a school-level that these may not matter actually. Creativity is about learning from yourself and what works best for you comes with positives.
Slide 10: Positives of students learning is a more of a takeaway for the students than an actual definite answer. It will vary by student. Maybe a student will find out he loves sci-fi, maybe another will find a passion for wood-working, or maybe they are great at ukulele, or maybe one student realizes they can solve any problem they think of. It’s all about them and what they get through the process. It is a process. There is work. If they are active and engaged in the work then the positives will be enormous. Even if they do not realize them.
Slide 11: Negatives- I personally didn’t think of any negatives when I took this topic on. It never crossed my mind. Upon reading articles and doing research, I can now see it. However, all the negatives come in the form of behavior or personality. Some students are quiet, and others are loud and dominating. This is a big part of it. Another part is ego. Creative thought can put your ideas above others and this is not good. It creates non-listening and non-collaboration, which is bad.
Slide 12: Creativity has major workings into every day life in regard to problem solving, collaboration, and just general happiness. Jobs aren’t just simply drones of nothing. It takes some form of creative thought. The person just has to be willing to look for it.
Slide 13: Helpfulness comes from what the learner learns from what they learn. It’s a thought-process and new way of thinking. Creative thought is one of the most helpful things a person can engage in. It’s also fun. Everyone should take fun over not fun.
Slide 14: Taking it with you comes from the idea of active engagement in the material. The things you are actively involved in will stay with you longer than the things you passively hate. You will always have the good stuff if you care, whether you realize it or not. Subconscious or not.
Slide 15: Bringing it to others is sharing. Share everything you can. If you figure it out tell everyone. Creativity is meant to be personal, but if you are comfortable with someone enough to share it with someone, please do. Maybe they will catch on to your thoughts and find their own idea that they love and then the chain continues. There is enough hate in the world already. We are purging each other every day. Share good stuff because it’s more important. Hurt doesn’t help.
Slide 16: I would like to share some of my research because I think it helped me to develop my thoughts and really realize that creativity is crazy. It’s in everything and it is everything, like, there are almost not real barriers. That’s what makes it so cool though. Anything goes, basically.
Slide 17: These quotes are from my interviews with professors. Granted they are college professors, the idea is the same and their insights helped me grasp the liquidity of the topic.
Slide 18: I watched a TED Talk from an artist who was passionate about his creations. He said this quote during his talk and I found it important in some way. I think because there isn’t much collaboration in life in general, like in the general public and people are often rude. It’s just the new system in a certain way and I would like to change that in whatever way I can. I think this is why I write. It’s personal, but I want to share. This should be the mentality to share. It is personal, but find people you trust and share whatever you feel you can. It will help.
Slide 19: This dark side helped me grasp the idea of ego and creativity because it is totally there. I personally fought through it. This quote was the reason I added the “be kind” and “be open” slides. I know its importance to beginning creative ideas.
Slide 20: To help students is another huge important part of the research I did. Many articles centered on this idea and I think it is the most important too, because it is for them: the students. We should all, even if you don’t plan to teach, be creative and open to its ideas because we need to add good things to this world. We’re not here for that long and if we don’t go outward with anything and talk and expand ourselves through creative thought, and ourselves, then there will be nothing left. Go do good things, please.
Toy Skeleton 