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Post by zaidsiddiqui on Aug 9, 2011 17:09:56 GMT -5
The article about the creativity crisis in America presents a problem, but gives no insight on the reasons as to why the crisis is occurring or on how the problem can be solved. People according to the article believe the levels of creativity are dropping and I completely agree. For example, if look at the new pokemon games you’ll see that objects like candles and chandeliers have become pokemon. The toys and games also used to be individual and unique. In the second generation of the pokemon games there was an added storyline and one could collect 16 badges, but after that the creators reverted to the 8 badges and just tiny additions to the games, making each successive generation less and less creative. I believe that during the time of the Torrance kids, it was easier to be creative, but now that creativity has become more of a challenge people don’t work towards being creative; they start believing that things are best the way they are sold and that improvements can’t be made. The article goes on to mention that kids could name off 20 or 30 improvements to toys, but now that those improvements exist what else can be added? Another reason I think creativity has gone down is because children now take iPhones and get addicted to the games and learn to do things without really thinking. This in turn prevents critical thinking and lowers the critical thinking skills of successive generations and thus results in lower creativity. In order to improve creativity scores again, children can be given toys that make them think similar to puzzles. The article states, “It is the scores of younger children in America—from kindergarten through sixth grade—for whom the decline is ‘most serious.’” In order to prevent scores from declining further, school curriculums can be changed to involve more free thought and creativity. An example would be to add more time for Art and Music classes. Schools can also involve more activities that involve creativity. In Coach Mo’s class we learned that he would do a physics lab in which students would try to build the best paper airplane. The project allowed them to think and be creative. We discovered one of the paper airplanes near the end of the school year and found that not only did it fly better than paper airplanes we’re used to but also the design was completely different and completely original. One cause of the lowered creativity scores could the development of new technologies as the article hints when it states, “Kim found creativity scores had been steadily rising, just like IQ scores, until 1990. Since then, creativity scores have consistently inched downward.” It hints at technology because the technological boom, where all people began having computers and cell phones, began in the 1990s. Another solution to the creativity crisis would be to incorporate technology into creative activities. There could be projects where students create applications for everyday use. Furthermore, classes like project based learning can be promoted and start in lower classes as well to ensure the development of the creative parts of a child’s mind. Therefore, the creativity crisis does have solutions and can and will be solved eventually.
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Post by matthewlogan on Aug 19, 2011 12:46:12 GMT -5
I agree with a lot of what Zaid mentioned. There is a major creativity crisis and we need to figure out a way to solve it. We need to incorporate critical thinking into schools. Teach kids to think by themselves instead of having someone else or the internet do the thinking for them. Since we have access to so much information, ideas and games; we have a hard time of thinking of something new and original. We are learning so much to the point we feel like everything has already been discovered. i remember during coach Mo’s class last year we would have an air plane making competition. When we would make our planes thinking they we original, we would discover that someone has already invented that type of plane before. Yes, we could make improvements to the planes to make them fly better but they weren’t new. Sometimes it is hard to be creative in a lot of things we do. A lot of assignments we do at school involve little to no creativity at all. Since we do not have to be creative, we begin to lose our creativity. Creativity can be restore if we begin to use it in our schools.
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Post by Jacob Winkler on Aug 19, 2011 16:23:59 GMT -5
I think that just about everyone is in agreement that there is a creativity crisis in the United States. However, I disagree with how this crisis began, and the proposed solutions. For one, we are no where close to running out of ideas. If aqnything, we have more opportunities for good ideas than ever before. This is due to the fact that every discovery we make in any academic field, creates doors to even more potential discoveries, very much like a growing tree and it's limbs. I feel the real issue lies in the methods of teaching. All too often we are taught to memorize and regurgitate, without really learning any of the intracacies. Coming up with new ideas becomes extraordinarily difficult when you lack an understanding of the applications of your memorizations. As much as I hate project based learning, and would prefer reading and lecturing, I feel it is the most acceptable step to take if we ever plan to correct the crisis which has befallen our nation. For the majority of people, there is no better way to learn how a concept works than to apply said concept to something in real life. The same goes for any kind of machinery or object. You will learn the most about by going out and trying to build one yourself. However, I also feel failure is the absolute most essential process of building something or applying concepts. All too often the guiding hand of instructors inhibits the learning process because it disallows any sort of failure.
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Post by marcmanheim on Aug 19, 2011 18:04:03 GMT -5
I actually y have to disagree with Jake on this one. First off, I think we might actually be running out of I ideas but not necessarily in the way one might think. This is pretty evident in the entertainment business. I don't think I have seen a single movie or game that was made in the past ten years that wasn't either based off of a another piece of media or a remake of something previous. Here's the catch; this isn't because movie writers and games designers are running out of ideas for stuff, its because they're running out of GOOD ideas and ideas for stuff that people will LIKE. For example, I could sit down right now and right about how a pink blob named Jeffry grew in Strafford Vermont and went to work at fast food joints for the rest of its life. This is something that I guarantee has never been done before, but that wasn't done because it really wouldn't make sense or be enjoyable. The real issue might not necessarily be creativity so much as it is a lack of new things that people will enjoy.
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Post by jacobwinkler on Aug 19, 2011 22:43:43 GMT -5
I think that just about everyone is in agreement that there is a creativity crisis in the United States. However, I disagree with how this crisis began, and the proposed solutions. For one, we are no where close to running out of ideas. If aqnything, we have more opportunities for good ideas than ever before. This is due to the fact that every discovery we make in any academic field, creates doors to even more potential discoveries, very much like a growing tree and it's limbs. I feel the real issue lies in the methods of teaching. All too often we are taught to memorize and regurgitate, without really learning any of the intracacies. Coming up with new ideas becomes extraordinarily difficult when you lack an understanding of the applications of your memorizations. As much as I hate project based learning, and would prefer reading and lecturing, I feel it is the most acceptable step to take if we ever plan to correct the crisis which has befallen our nation. For the majority of people, there is no better way to learn how a concept works than to apply said concept to something in real life. The same goes for any kind of machinery or object. You will learn the most about by going out and trying to build one yourself. However, I also feel failure is the absolute most essential process of building something or applying concepts. All too often the guiding hand of instructors inhibits the learning process because it disallows any sort of failure.
*Reposted from my actual account.
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