I’ve been asked to evaluate my values as part of a course I’m currently taking.
Since I keep up with this part of my personality, I’ve discovered that each time I analyze this data, the results are generally the same. You see, my values have stayed more or less the same for many years.
Trust, compassion, reflection, respect, tolerance, spirituality, and dependability have all been my long-term values in my world, with the exception of my latest analysis of my values. Creativity was added. It’s funny how I’m just now recognizing creativity as important to me because I’ve been called creative for most of my life. I’ve simply dismissed the motion.
I thought creativity only dealt with art, music, literature, and creating something new. As it turns out, creativity is also something needed in problem solving and I consider teaching creative problem solving as one of my teaching skills. A superpower my students experience in my classroom.
This skill requires imagination, an ability to be original in thinking, the eagerness to experiment, and definitely the willingness to take risks.
To get kids (students) to be willing to take risks with their learning requires a new and improved mindset. A mindset not based on fear of failing, but a curious mindset that leads to a willingness to fail forward as part of the creativity process.
Albert Einstein is credited with saying a variation of this quote: “Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think” and I avidly agree. It is our job, as educators, to teach our students to imagine possibilities and see how those can become probabilities through design and experimentation.
