The Journal of the National Art Education Association: January 2011 by flavia bastos

ART

E X P L O R E Creativity, Imagination, & Innovation in

A RT E D U C AT I O N

The Journal of the National Art Education Association

2011 NAEA National Convention

January 2011 Volume 64, No. 1 $9.00

YOUR PRE VI E W E N C LO S E D !

March 17-20 | Seattle, Washington

E D U C A T I O N

CREATIVITY EXPANDING OUR FOCUS

INSIDE:

Creativity as a 21st-Century Skill Creative Thinking and Expression Creativity, Technology, Art, and Pedagogical Practices Cognition and Emotions

AND MORE…

“

OUR PROFESSION and our students will benefit from a renewed focus on creativity and innovation, as we offer greater clarity of meanings, processes, and purposes.”

INTRODUCTION

Creativity, Imagination, Innovation in Art Education

Christine Ballengee Morris is Professor of Art Education at the Ohio State University. E-mail: Morris.390@ osu.edu

am excitedly writing this, my first issue as Editor of Art Education, the journal that has been closest to my heart and mind as an art educator. Although i approach this role with humility and a huge sense of honor, at this particular point in my life the theme of “creativity, imagination, and innovation”—has a personal and urgent relevance.

My mother’s visual memories of my childhood include little blue legs and bright pink cheeks. My condition, known as coartation of the aorta, led surgeons to implant a plastic tube in hopes of equalizing my blood pressure. Thirty-odd years later, the tube failed with similar symptoms, but more critically, to rapidly developing brain aneurysms. As my doctors say, any invasive brain procedures result in what they term brain injury and require therapies. It is at this point that creativity, imagination, and innovation became crucial to my recovery. Fortunately, my therapists were open in recognizing my need to understand their pedagogies. What were their goals? Why use strategies that had no personal meaning for me? How can I, a brain injury patient, advocate for my own personal learning style (important before and after the surgery)? Although it was quite an anomaly for them, many of my therapists listened and began actually collaborating with me. Other therapists watched closely with the hope that the imaginative process going on between my therapist and me would assist their patients. I, of course, may never know if my experiences made any difference for others, but I can hope. Just as I can hope that after this next surgery, my and my therapist’s creative approaches may lead me again back to being me. My purpose in sharing this very personal story in this first issue of my editorship is to point out the life burdens that can indeed change everything. It is how we creatively, imaginatively, and innovatively approach those burdens that makes the difference. And, that difference is made in more than just art education. What role does creativity play in the poverty of people living in southern Ohio (Curry, 2010)? What does innovation have to do

with struggles and political positioning internally and externally in the Middle East? How can/could imagination affect the environmental and human calamities in Louisiana and West Virginia (Urbina, 2010)? What do these kinds of issues have to do with art education? Join me as I look forward to the exciting conversations about these issues that I feel sure will extend from our 2010 NAEA Convention on social justice on to our 2011 Convention on creativity, imagination, and innovation in art education. I would like to acknowledge the innovative and collaborative approaches that friends1 and NAEA staff demonstrated recently in my support and medical recovery, and recognize the people who are assisting me in this venture. My graduate assistant Morgan Green spent the summer familiarizing herself with the filing systems and making sure that the editorial transition was as smooth as it could be. Her role is crucial, as she is the one in the know. Dr. Kathleen Keys’ background includes being a community arts organizer, which will serve her well as Instructional Resource Editor. If you have ideas about what you would like to see in this section, please contact her. Past Editor Flávia Bastos has again raised the standard for Art Education, and she and Enid Zimmerman, who guest-editied a special March 2010 creativity issue, have taken on the task of co-editing a second creativity issue in their roles as guest editors of this January edition. As this issue of the journal continues defining and exploring creativity, these people elevate it to actually make meaning in human lives. Christine Ballengee Morris Editor RefeRences Curry, A. (2010). Friends and neighbors: How do you choose between paying your bills and feeding your kids? MSNBC online. Retrieved July 29, 2010, from www.msnbc.msn.com/ id/38382773/ns/dateline_nbc-america_now Urbina, I. (2010). No survivors found after West Virginia mine disaster. New York Times online. www.nytimes.com/2010/04/10/ us/10westvirginia.html

endnote

1A special thank you to past editor, colleague, and friend Dr. Pamela G. Taylor for her comic relief, support, and assistance.

creatively filtered images of Editor christine Ballengee Morris following her first brain surgery, summer 2010.

See call for Editorial Review Board Nominations, p. 31

ART

The Journal of the National Art Education Association January 2011 Volume 64, No. 1

E D U C A T I O N

EDITOR: Christine Ballangee Morris EDITORIAL ASSISTANT: Morgan Green Instructional Resources Coordinator: Kathleen Keys EDITORIAL REVIEW BOARD: Cynthia Bickley-Green, Melanie Buffington, Kelly Campbell-Busby, Sheng Kuan Chung, Nicole Crane, Melanie Davenport, Read Diket, Rick Garner, Mark Graham, Jay Hanes, Suzan Harris, Jay Heuman, Olga Hubard, Karen Hutzel, Themina Kader, Sharon Johnson, Lilly Lu, Marjorie Manifold, Anne Marquette, Elizabeth Reese, Priscilla Roggenkamp, Ryan Shin, Cathy Smilan, Kryssi Staikidis, Michelle Tillander, and Gina Wenger. NAEA BOARD: Barry Shauck, Bonnie Rushlow, F. Robert Sabol, Deborah Barten, Mark Coates, Kim Huyler Defibaugh, Patricia Franklin, Kathryn Hillyer, Mary Miller, Bob Reeker, Diane Scully, Lesley Wellman, John Howell White, and Deborah Reeve. NAEA Publicatons Manager: Lynn Ezell NAEA Editor: Elizabeth Snow Art Education is the official journal of The National Art Education Association. Manuscripts are welcome at all times and on any aspect of art education. Please send 1 double-spaced copy, prepared in accordance with the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association and guidelines found at, www.arteducators.org/writing-fornaea, to Dr. Christine Ballengee Morris, Editor, Art Education Journal, Department of Art Education, 128 North Oval Mall, Columbus, OH 43210. To facilitate the process of anonymous review, the author’s name, title, affiliation, mailing address, and phone number should be on a separate sheet. Retain a copy of anything submitted. For guidelines, see Art Education under ‘Writing for NAEA’ at www.arteducators.org/writing-for-naea. Authors are encouraged to submit photographs with their manuscripts. Art Education is indexed in the Education Index, and available on microfilm from University Microfilms, Inc., 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. For quantity reprints of past articles, please e-mail to lezell@arteducators.org for order forms. © National Art Education Association 2011. Allow up to 8 weeks to process new member and subscription publications. Art Education (ISSN 0004-3125) is published bimonthly: January, March, May, July, September, and November by the National Art Education Association, 1806 Robert Fulton Drive, Suite 300, Reston, VA 20191-4348. Telephone 703-860-8000; fax 703-860-2960 Website: www.arteducators.org Membership dues include $25.00 for a member’s subscription to Art Education. Non-member subscription rates are: Domestic $50.00 per year; Canadian and Foreign $75.00 per year. Call for single copy prices. Periodicals postage is paid at Herndon, VA, and at additional mailing offices. Printed in the USA. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Art Education, National Art Education Association, 1806 Robert Fulton Drive, Suite 300, Reston, VA 20191-4348.

Art Education / January 2011

Contents 3

INTRODUCTION Creativity, Imagination, and Innovation in Art Education Christine Ballengee Morris A personal look at how the enduring power of creativity, imagination, and innovation shapes the uniqueness of our lives and our collaborations with others.

EDITORIAL Surprise Me! Flavia Bastos and Enid Zimmerman A conversation about the important role of creativity as a 21st-century skill, including examples of how it can be successfully incorporated into the classroom.

Creativity:

What Are We Talking About?

Melody Milbrandt and Lanny Milbrandt N How is “creativity” (creative thinking and behavior) to be understood and defined? A range of approaches highlight growing global interest in research on this topic.

When is Creativity?

Intrinsic Motivation and Autonomy in Children’s Artmaking

Diane B. Jaquith Children’s creative thinking and expression thrive in and out of the classroom when learners are given autonomy and choice to direct their own artmaking experiences.

In Search of the Wild Things:

The Choice, Voice, and Challenge (CVC) Model for Creative Instruction

Emma Gillespie Perkins and Mary C. Carter N An instructional model to aid art educators in explaining the creative process to their colleagues and its classroom applications for teachers in other disciplines.

INSTRUCTIONAL RESOURCES

Experience2

Kim Barker N In this elementary lesson resource and introduction to the medium of stop-motion video, explore the imaginative work of artist Oliver Herring.

A “Toolbox Approach”

for Developing Thoughtfully Structured, Creative Art Experiences

Michael Hanchett Hanson and Rebecca Shulman Herz A comprehensive overview of creativity theories and a description of a project by New York City 5th-graders who, inspired by Gehry’s architectural designs, are guided to create their own designs and structures for buildings in their communities.

Creativity, Technology, Art, and Pedagogical Practices

Michelle Tillander N As more people interface with new technologies, popular culture, and social media that touch all aspects of daily life at a rapid pace, art educators are engaging their students with questions designed to connect art, technology, and meaning in personal and collective contemporary experience.

Cognition and Emotions in the Creative Process

Nicole M. Gnezda Exploring cognition/perception as applied to higher-order critical thinking and experience, the author asks how art educators can “coach” their students in the creative process, rather than prescribe a desired outcome.

N denotes New Voice, a first-time author in Art Education Cover quote and Image from “Creativity: What Are We Talking About?” Image, The Imperfect Self, by Shauna Fannin, p. 11, and quote, p. 13.

EDITORIAL

This issue, guest-edited by past editor Flávia Bastos and distinguished art educator Enid Zimmerman, continues the exploration of creativity begun in the March 2010 issue of Art Education.

Surprise Me! Flávia and Enid: the national Art Education convention in Seattle in March 2011 has as its theme creativity, innovation, and imagination in Art Education. these are cited on the nAEA website as 21st-century skills that all students need to be successful, not only those who will work as artists, but also those who will work in all sectors—from scientists to computer program designers to consumers. in a recent nAEA publication, Learning in a Visual Age: The Critical Importance of Visual Arts Education, teaching students to use processes that lead to creative outcomes is highlighted as a major component of high quality instruction in the visual arts. in this report, expert art teachers are recognized as those who, through introducing creative process in the visual arts, enable their students “to identify a problem, gather relevant information, try out solutions, and validate those that are effective.” these same skills are described as needed in learning environments in school subjects such as history, science, and mathematics. Enid: this is the second of two issues of Art Education1 that focuses on creativity. concerns about creativity and reconsidering its place in art education were evident in the over 45 articles that were submitted in response to our call for papers for an issue of Art Education devoted to creativity, for which i was guest editor. Flávia Bastos, immediate past editor of Art Education, and i edited this issue about creativity and art education. We are also co-editing a book on this same topic and received 90 abstracts in response to our call for submissions. obviously, there is an overwhelming interest in this topic and its applicability to the field of visual art education. current research about creativity indicates scores in creativity measures were rising in the uS until 1990 and since then the trajectory has been downward, especially for K-6 students where the decline is most obvious (Kim, cited in Bronson & Merryman, 2010). recent inquiry demonstrates that around the world other countries are making creativity a national pedagogical priority, while standardized curriculum, rote memorization, and national testing (Plucker, cited in Bronson & Merryman) have predicated against developing creativity, innovation, and imagination as being in the vanguard of our country’s educational agenda. ironically, the arts often are touted as a prominent place where creativity takes place in our nation’s schools. in art education research, when current boundaries of our discipline are being reconfigured, what currently is emphasized are themes such as visual culture, arts-based research, community-based pedagogy, environmental and eco-based pedagogy, and Lacanian psychoanalytic theory. these paradigm shifts are highlighted toward a “profoundly critical, historical, political, and self-reflective understanding of visual culture and social responsibility” (carpenter & tavin, 2010, p. 329).2 Although these might be considered paradigms in flux, a walk down the corridors of most elementary schools, and in many cases secondary schools, demonstrates there is a BiG gap between what is espoused in much of current art education research literature and what is actually practiced in art classrooms. Mind that gap, otherwise what is important for quality art education may fall between what is status quo and what is being suggested as expanded boundaries for the field. i recently was at a state art education organization meeting and found my place at a luncheon table at which each setting was a placemat constructed from a 10” x 12” piece of laminated white watercolor paper on which were colorful designs of plants. i looked over at my neighbors’ place settings and thought at first we all had photocopies of the same design. on closer inspection, i noted that different first-grade students in the same art class made all the placemat paintings (right). on the backside of the paintings was information that explained that all standard procedures were spelled out in detail to assure that there was no deviation from what the teacher expected from the lesson. the title related to a particular garden in the county, state and local standards were listed, and the objective was for students to understand the art element—line. Students were to learn about a variety of lines, follow directed teacher instructions, discuss line in artworks, read about line in art textbooks, and show their knowledge about line by creating a painting using a variety of lines. Students were assessed

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

with a rubric that included elements and principles of art, craftsmanship, and originality and creativity (the last two items were not mentioned anywhere else). Although the students appeared to be expected to follow the teacher as their compositions progressed, it is hopeful to note that all was not lost in terms of creativity, innovation, and imagination in the young students’ reactions to this lesson. Hidden in the replications are small reminders of the inherent creativity that could have been harnessed for more individually inspired paintings by the art teacher, such as the cleverly incorporated caterpillar and snail, heart flower and spider web, and an angelic face of a sun (below). Most of the art teachers at my table responded positively to what one defined as “the children’s adorable artwork.” What can art teachers and art educators do to address the gap between theory and practice and how can this treacherous space be made a place of true creative endeavor so that when students mature they are supported in generating bodies of work that demonstrate creativity, innovation, and imagination?

Art Education / January 2011

Flávia: Many art teachers tend to favor bona fide practices and teaching strategies. Many novice and experienced art educators often believe in using methodologies that include discrete and sequential steps that deliver standard instruction, incorporate simple assessment measures, and assure a well-managed classroom. Creativity and its range of manifestations, from pedestrian everyday solutions to extraordinary accomplishments, should be an essential dimension of both art and education. Tharp (2003) proposes that “creativity is a habit” (p. 7) and the best creative work is the result of good work habits. Therefore, it is critical that we engage in discussion of how to infuse classrooms with a more legitimate pedagogy that nurtures and promotes core dimensions of the arts, such as creativity, innovation, and imagination. As a Brazilian, born and educated until the completion of my undergraduate degree in my home country, I am still mystified by the technical bias of North American education. Perhaps, at the core of a developing country experience, with its drastic disparities and pivotal problems, is a need to keep creativity and imagination alive to cope with, transcend, and transform the conditions of the everyday. Therefore, my own background provides a foundation for some of my views regarding art education and creativity in particular. During my years in school, the curriculum was regulated by general guidelines, leaving opportunities for teachers to design lessons that often made connections to local culture and current events. I attended urban public schools and my teachers took advantage of what was available around us. In art, we had lessons about key concepts—perspective, the human figure, Cubism, hand-built ceramics, Brazilian art—but our artwork was always a personal response to the information received, and often connected to a body of inquiry each student developed through his or her own research and self-expression. I have never seen a demonstration in an art class. We experimented with materials, searched in books or in our school’s library; our work was individual and did not resemble our classmates’ endeavors. Only in the 1990s when I arrived in the United States to attend graduate school, did I witness for the first time an art teacher showing her class a ‘sample’ of the work she expected her students to produce and then walk them through a stepby-step process that set out how to do it. It all felt foreign to me.

As we confuse higher standards with greater regimentation, we compromise the very essence of our discipline. Art is integral to daily life, and as such it is shifting, multidimensional, and not easily contained. Accordingly, our teaching with and about art must reflect the openness and dynamism of the everyday. One of my most passionate and talented students, Pamela Palmerini, is a high school teacher who routinely asks her students to “surprise her” with their work (see Aaron Ector’s work, p. 7). In her syllabus, she invites them to “embrace the unknown,” experimenting beyond conventional boundaries. In doing so, she teaches students simultaneously about the impossibility and undesirability of closed-ended outcomes in art. She encourages them to use what they know and what is being learned in personal ways as she creates a stimulating learning environment where teacher and students learn from one another. She facilitates engagement with issues, problems, and subjectivities and nurtures the practice of creativity, not as an add-on to her program, but as integral to art and the lives of her students.

Enid and Flávia: In this issue of Art Education, all authors in one way or another ask art teachers to be surprised by their students’ creative processes and products as they engage them in art activities in a variety of settings. Seeking to clarify meanings associated with the broad term creativity, Melody Milbrandt and Lanny Milbrandt identify observable processes that have connection to teaching and learning that focus on creativity. Diane Jaquith discusses why intrinsic motivation should be at the forefront of any discussion about creativity and art education as learners engage in artmaking through self-directed learning to find and solve problems of their own choosing. Emma Perkins and Mary Carter use “the wild things” metaphor to describe an instructional model, Choice, Voice, and Challenge (CVC), to promote creativity, and its possible applications. In the Instructional Resource section, Kim Barker explores the work of Oliver Herring, a whimsical artist who explores the world in fanciful and imaginative ways, using technology applications to introduce students to stop-motion video. Through use of Creativity Toolboxes by teachers, groups of learners, and individual students, Michael Hanson and Rebecca Shulman Herz demonstrate how art units and lessons can be thoughtfully structured to foster creativity. Michelle Tillander offers suggestions for art teachers about how to build a creative synthesis among technology tools, teaching strategies, and content that results in

new approaches for engaging art learning that have surprising results. Nicole Gnezda proposes that it is helpful to understand complex neurological and emotional operations that are active during creative processes and how these operations can help art teachers more fully understand what happens inside their students as they engage in processes to create art products. As a practice, creativity emerges at the very unstable edge between routine and innovation. We need to mind the gap. This requires a destabilizing force of an issue or an idea that generates a response that is uniquely appropriate for that situation. As educators, we often grow accustomed to systematizing what we do. The two issues of Art Education that focus on creativity and the upcoming 2010 NAEA Convention invite us expand our focus and develop our educational practices so that we expect to be surprised by each student’s innovation, imagination, and creativity.

Three artworks from student Aaron Ector’s body of work that are influenced by his research about art from different cultures: I am the Wisdom Warrior (Grade 11). Acrylic painting on canvas board. The task was to create a self-portrait based on a chosen artist. Rene Magritte influenced this student’s work that contains a personal reflection in which he is transformed into an owl.

Flávia Bastos Enid Zimmerman Flávia Bastos is Associate Professor of Art Education and Director of Graduate Studies, College of Design, Art, Architecture and Planning, University of Cincinnati. E-mail: flavia.bastos@uc.edu Enid Zimmerman is Emerita Professor of Art Education and currently Coordinator of Gifted and Talented Programs in the School of Education at Indiana University. E-mail: zimmerm@indiana.edu References Bronson, P., & Merryman, A. (July 10, 2010). The creativity crisis: For the first time, research shows that American creativity is declining. What went wrong—and how we can fix it? Newsweek, Retrieved August 15, 2010, from www.newsweek. com/2010/07/10/the-creativity-crisis Carpenter, B. S., II, & Tavin, K. (2010). Drawing (past, present, and future) together: A (graphic) look at the reconceptualization of art education. Studies in Art Education, 51(4), 327-352. National Art Education Association (no date). Learning in the visual arts: The critical importance of visual art education. Reston, VA: Author. Tharp, T. (2003). The creative habit: Learn it and use it for life. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Endnotes

1 The first was Art Education, 63(2), March 2010. 2 Carpenter and Tavin note there are two movements that influenced art education in the last century: creative self-expression and discipline-based art education. They focus their attention on the latter noting that the former has also been a major influence on the field. In this article, the authors have creatively pushed the boundaries of research reporting by presenting their findings in a graphic novel format.

Radial/Mandala (Grade 12). Ebony pencil drawing. This was the outcome of an assignment in which four 15-minute automatic drawings were developed into a finished work based on perceptions of evolving images. African art was the primary influence chosen by this student for his final project.

A Sculptural, Ceramic Place Setting (Grade 12). Glazed clay and acrylic paint on canvas. This ceramic place setting reflects the student’s interest in Salvador Dali’s artwork.

January 2011 / Art Education

Creativity:

What Are We Talking About? M el o d y M ilbrandt and L ann y M ilbrandt

n the United States, our collective definitions, perceptions, and myths about creativity have, at best, produced an uneven understanding of what it means to be a creative person. A primary goal of this article is to help clarify meanings associated with the broad term creativity and identify some observable processes associated with it. Part of the problem in our current educational context is that the term creativity is so ill-defined, ambiguous, and fuzzy so that no common agreement exists on its meaning. Creativity remains an elusive concept where discussion, definitions, procedures, and expressions of the term may be regarded superficially unless broad understandings about creativity can be broken down to manageable and assessable specific operations.

Depending on the context, creativity may be presented as the brilliant spark of inspiration residing in the talented genius, an essential ingredient of American resourcefulness and inventiveness, or a deviant personality trait manifest in unstable behavior with little social value. Our country’s Constitution and protection of personal freedom laid the foundation for creative endeavors, yet one has only to watch the yearly extravaganza of Super Bowl commercials to know that the most popular public connotation and focus of creativity in this country has shifted from the expectation of thrilling innovative breakthroughs in scientific or artistic thought to the frivolity and innovation of rampant commercialism. For many in Western cultures, novelty often is sought through goods and experiences that can be purchased in marketplaces of every sort, rather than through internal thinking processes and application of creative effort. There is little evidence in the current educational system to suggest that schools teach students how to selectively discuss or use creative thinking processes for personal or collective benefit or openly support students’ sustained creative involvement. As a result of the lack of understanding of creativity and a general agreement on meaning, research in art education has generally been dismissive of the topic for at least the latest generation of art educators (Zimmerman, 2009). In the wake of No Child Left Behind (2001) there is growing concern that the convergent, ‘one correct answer’ mentality that our educational system is encouraging in students results in an inability of students to seek, confront, and solve non-linear, divergent, open-ended problems. This unbalance in educational experiences and competencies is

Art Education / January 2011

leaving a gap in the preparation of future citizens and leaders. In his forecast of our collective future, Daniel Pink (2006) speculates, “We’ve progressed from a society of farmers to a society of factory workers to a society of knowledge workers. And now we’re progressing yet again to a society of creators and empathizers, of pattern recognizers, and meaning makers” (p. 58). Without the practice and aptitude for engaging in creative thinking, our citizenry may not be prepared to meet a world in continual flux (Liu & Noppe-Brandon, 2009). Although it is impossible to consider all definitions or aspects of creativity, it is important to acknowledge the complexity of multiple definitions or theories to begin to construct a useful understanding. Some creative definitions and theories contradict or negate one another while others easily co-exist or overlap in practice. As Zimmerman (2009) notes: Researchers and practitioners need to conceive of creativity as multidimensional with consideration of how cognitive complexity, affective intensity, technical skills, and interest and motivation all play major roles. (p. 394) Talking about creativity or making judgments about creative products might be more fruitful if we understood and used creative theories as we understand and use aesthetic theories. Art educators often have discussed merits of art based on understanding of traditional aesthetic views or artistic intentions of mimetic, expressive, instrumentalist, or formalist aesthetics. Aesthetic theories did not develop as clear independent theories simultaneously. Numerous philosophers and aestheticians developed their aesthetic theories independently or

The domain-changer definition of creativity may seem highly constrained as it necessitates in-depth understandings and skills within a field in order for creative acts or products to be recognized. In her pastel drawing, The Rock Collector, Susan Kang demonstrates the kind of strong technical artistic skills some deem necessary for domainchanging creativity.

ilbrandt

in response to each other with some redundancy and often with controversy. Eventually history gave us a vantage point for clustering these writings into similar conceptual content or categories. In Becoming Human through Art, Feldman (1970) offered a model of art criticism utilizing traditional aesthetic theories that became widely used with the advent of Discipline-Based Art Education. New frameworks have emerged for addressing postmodern or contemporary art in the art classroom, as those suggested by Gude (2004), but the majority of art educators continue to blend their understanding of traditional aesthetic theories and production alongside contemporary artistic practice. A similar understanding and clustering of the numerous definitions of creativity might offer a means for art educators to consider definitions of creativity from a variety of diverse, observable viewpoints and purposes,

and provide a range of opportunities for engaging students in creative thought in more overt and coherent ways. In looking at a wide range of traditional research about creativity, categories of Domain-Changing, Self-Expression/Search for Meaning, and Creative Problem Solving may offer a foundation and initial framework for discussing and facilitating creative activities in art classrooms.

Domain-Changing Creativity

In the systems model developed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1996), creativity is defined as “any act, idea, or product that changes an existing domain, or that transforms an existing domain into a new one” (p. 27). Foundational to Csikszentmihalyi’s theories of creativity impacting a domain is the assumption that experts or gatekeepers will determine whether efforts to change

or move the field are successful. According to Csikszentmihalyi, a domain cannot be changed without the implicit or explicit consent of the field, as defined by the gatekeepers, experts, critics, and others who have capacity to accept or reject the value of a creative product in a domain in which they have expertise. Stein (1984) similarly presents a common view of creativity from the domain of psychology. He suggests that, “Creativity is a process that results in novelty which is accepted as useful, tenable, or satisfying by a significant group of others at the same point in time” (p. 1). The definition of a creative person, according to Stein, is someone whose thoughts or actions change a domain or establish a new domain. Based on the literal reading of these Western domain theories of creativity, children and youth would not be considered creative because they will not be likely to nor expected to change any domain or discipline such as art, math, biology, etc. In the history of art, artists such as Picasso, Kiefer, and Kahlo would be viewed as domain changers and according to Stein (1984) and Csikszentmihalyi (1996), would earn the title of ‘creative individual.’ While the domain-changer definition of creativity may seem highly constrained, it necessitates in-depth understandings and skills within a field in order for creative acts or products to be recognized. Many art teachers subscribe (consciously or not) to the domain criteria for creativity when they plan a scope and sequence in curriculum that relies on acquisition of basic technical skills and concepts that must be attained and demonstrated prior to execution of more

Note: The authors wish to thank the following high school student artists and their art teachers for the use of the images accompanying this article: Susan Kang, Mill Creek High School, Gwinnett County, Atlanta (Mike Lassiter, art teacher); Izabelle Garcia, Milton High School, Fulton County (Marea Haslett, art teacher); Shauna Fannin, Savannah Arts Academy (Steve Schetski, art teacher); David White, Chamblee High School, Dekalb County Public Schools (Lisa Guyton, art teacher); Melody Hanson, North Atlanta High School, Atlanta Public Schools (Natalie Brandhorst, art teacher); Alex Lievens, North Atlanta High School, Atlanta Public Schools (Natalie Brandhorst, art teacher).

January 2011 / Art Education

activities that teach them about an artist’s world; students see connections between their artwork and work by artists in the past. Looking at artwork by other artists helps students solve their own visual problems. Relevance of the Domain-Changing definition of creativity for art education lies in developing creative artistic habits of mind, acquiring skills and knowledge of the content area, and producing a product that is novel and recognized as significant in the context of students and classrooms. Art educators need to consider the degree to which their understanding of creativity is domain dependent and how rethinking domain-change as classroom-change can guide their teaching, curriculum, and evaluation.

Self Expression and the Search for Meaning

In the tradition of Surrealist painter Rene Magrite, Izabelle Garcia’s Self Portrait positions realistic images in unexpected relationships, metaphorically challenging the viewer’s perspective of reality.

expressive or open-ended assignments. In traditional societies, artists often replicated imagery and symbols to make rituals and ceremonies special. In this context, the instrumental value of art lies in its ability to solidify and enhance the social cohesion (Anderson & Milbrandt, 2005; Dissanayake, 1988), and the creative genius of the artist lies in her or his ability to master materials and techniques important for satisfying social and cultural needs. Often in an art classroom teachers give assignments that require students to replicate technical processes that take place in an artist’s studio with the expectation of a solution that is plausible and satisfying for the problem and appropriate to the development, artistic tradition, and social context of a learner. Bruner’s (1960) educational theories suggest that students of a particular discipline be engaged in discovery learning through involvement in ‘real world’ processes that are parallel to creative successful models in a field. His problem-solving approach within a discipline is similar to

much traditional curriculum development in art education, including DBAE, which focuses teaching practice on four disciplines of art professionals (art historians, art critics, aestheticians, and studio artists). Although participation in artistic processes and problem solving by P-12 students may not result in transforming or extending the body of knowledge in the adult level domain of art, it is developmentally and perhaps socially valuable for students to engage in artistic thinking and learning within the context of artistic traditions. Dewey (1934) observes, “New ideas come leisurely yet promptly to consciousness only when work has previously been done in forming the right doors by which they may gain entrance. Subconscious maturation precedes creative production in every line of human endeavor” (p. 37). Parnes (1988) observes that one of the necessary ingredients for creative expression is a fund of knowledge and experiences related to the problem. As Hetland, Winner, Veenema, and Sheridan (2007) suggest, students engage in

Anthropologist Dissanayake’s 1988 book, What is Art For?, made the electrifying claim that creativity and art are biological necessities for homo sapiens. She suggests that art and other creative enterprises have survival value; otherwise we would not have continued to create artworks. This anthropological point of view is only one good reason to believe that all humans have some creative capacity and that creativity is a valuable attribute, because it helps us to adapt to change and celebrate life. Numerous educational philosophers have written about creativity and self-expression in art education, but among the more influential, and often the most misinterpreted, have been Dewey (1934) and Lowenfeld (1947). As a pioneer of progressive education in the early 1900s, Dewey saw the need for centering the child in the educational process and tapping imagination and art as a viable means for transforming society. He views emotional discharge (in art) as a necessary, but not sufficient condition of expression. Burton (2009) observes, “Within Lowenfeld’s theory of creative and mental growth not all children and adolescents became professional artists, but they all develop flexible and free minds able to construct and express personal meaning” (p. 335). Much of Lowenfeld’s writing suggests the need for children to develop a sense of self-identification through expression of their personal experience, which later translates into an ability to empathize and identify with others (Lowenfeld & Brittain, 1988).

Art educators need to consider the degree to which their understanding of creativity is domain dependent and how rethinking domain-change as classroom-change can guide their teaching, curriculum, and evaluation.

Art Education / January 2011

Although Lowenfeld does not emphasize dialogue in the social construction of learning as does Vygotsky (1962), like Vygotsky, he envisions creative practice as a vehicle for development of autonomous individuals, who are living in the moment, reflecting critically on their own experience, and engaging responsively with others. Rather than self-expression as a solitary act, Lowenfeld sees relationships to others as central (Burton, 2009). Lowenfeld’s process-oriented perspectives of creativity seem to be echoed in a 2005 Rand Corporation Report (McCarty, Ondaatje, Brooks, & Szanto, 2005) that suggests that the visual arts do more than simply embellish an individual’s life experience. According to the report, the arts connect and engage people more deeply in new ways of seeing, which often elicits social bonds and encourages community cohesion. The arts engage students’ affective, intuitive, and emotional sides, which Lowenfeld believed were important to balancing the overload of cognitive and intellectual experiences in educational institutions. In a similar educational movement today, supporters of ‘whole child’ education advocate for educational experiences that engage students through a variety of modalities, learning styles, and possibilities for creative outcomes (Scherer, 2009). Even a short discussion of self-expression would not be complete without discussing the role of meaning in creative expression. Peter London (1989) suggests that in our efforts to produce art that is highly original, beautiful, and technically proficient, artists may lose their personal relationship with the work. He views creative activity as “inquiry, the expansion of emotional depth and range, the tuning of the spirit, and the quest for meaning” (p. 18). London observes that art may be used as a vehicle for personal transformation by freeing individuals from their secondhand beliefs and conditioned behaviors. While there is not space in this article for an in-depth look at all publications connecting creativity to personal transformation, it is important to note that there has been a sustained interest in the construction of personal meaning as a critical goal of art education in a variety of contexts, as evidenced in the work of numerous art educators such as Anderson and Milbrandt (2005), Carpenter and Taylor (2006), Gnezda (2009), Lowenfeld and Brittain (1988), Sandell (2006), Sullivan (1993), Szekely (1988), and Walker (2001), to name only a few. In the art classroom the most essential quality of self-expression and the construction of meaning is that students view their processes and/or products as a meaningful representation of their personal experiences. When guiding art students, a teacher may look for evidence of strong internal, personal references, and students’ focus on personal experiences rather than established knowledge as indicative of performance that is consonant with self-expressive creativity.

top The arts can engage students’ affective, intuitive, and emotional sides. The most essential quality of self-expression and construction of meaning is that students view their processes and/or products as a meaningful representation of their personal experiences. The Imperfect Self, by Shauna Fannin, conveys strong emotions that arouse an empathetic response in the viewer. bottom When guiding art students, a teacher may look for evidence of strong internal, personal references and students’ focus on personal experiences rather than established knowledge as indicative of performance that is consonant with self-expressive creativity. In Malaise, David White incorporated contemporary popular culture imagery and personal symbols in his highly expressive work.

January 2011 / Art Education

Creative Problem Solving

If multiple possible solutions to a problem are probable then creative problem-solving processes are appropriate. The Creative Problem-Solving Model developed by Parnes (1988) generates multiple solutions that are neither right nor wrong, but may be more or less successful depending on the context and solution criteria. In this model, the process may move in a divergentconvergent cycle of problem and fact-finding, analysis, idea generation, and judgment. Often a creative problem-solving process involves an initial proactive phase of problem (or opportunity) finding and problem definition. The expectation for multiple solutions in a creative problem-solving process is based on a broad range of alternatives possible, because knowledge or ideas can be re-combined and manipulated multiple times through a problem solverâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s use of personal and established knowledge and relevant experience. The structures for creative problem-solving processes determine pathways a problem solver may elect to follow. These structures include many processes or strategies familiar to visual problem solving in the art classroom. Brainstorming (Osborne, 1957), analogical thinking (using analogy and metaphor), transformational thinking (Eberle, 1977), and visualization and forced or remote associations (Roukes, 1982, 1988) are but a few examples of strategies for generating new ideas. Roukes provides a number of additional approaches to stimulating creative ideation in his book, Art Synectics, including a checklist of adaptations such as magnification, reversal, distortion, and metamorphosis, which may be used to push visual solutions in unexpected, less mundane and teacher-anticipated directions. Creative problem solving offers an opportunity for students to engage in a wide variety of discreet processes that may enhance their potential for more divergent and unusual responses. With the acquisition of a depth and breadth of creative problemsolving strategies, teachers and students could develop a more sophisticated understanding of creative behavior. If teachers and students are cognizant of their own creative thinking strategies, they are more likely to use them as a tool for creative thinking in other contexts beyond the art classroom.

Conclusion top In a summer assignment for her International Baccalaureate high school art teacher Natalie Bandhorst asked her students to do a series of 50 sketchbook drawings of hands or feet. When students returned to school in the fall they were asked to create another drawing using only multiple hands or feet in an interesting and unified composition. Alex Lievens solved the creative challenge by combining his hand drawings into a new piano-like instrument entitled Pihando. bottom Creative problem solving offers an opportunity for students to engage in a wide variety of discreet processes that may enhance their potential for more divergent and unusual responses. Melody Hanson responded to Bandhorstâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s creative problem solving assignment to create an artwork of only hands with an elegant abstract composition entitled Love.

Art Education / January 2011

The three broad categories for theories of creativity, (a) DomainAltering, (b) Self-Expression and Meaning Making, and (c) Creative Problem Solving, are not meant to serve as a model for all creative theories. It is hoped that this clustering might serve to generate further discussion regarding specific definitions of creativity and the implications of those definitions for art teaching and learning. In his well-known open concept of art, Morris Weitz (1959) proposes that art cannot be characterized by a singular definition because creative thought, at the core of artistic pursuit, continues to evolve, reflecting multiple changes and needs of society. As Parsons (2004) notes, much creative work occurs on the borderland of disciplines; in the 21st century discipline borders are permeable and continue to shift. In his 2001 text, Information Arts: Intersection of Arts, Science and Technology, Wilson points to the convergence of artistic and scientific thinking as an emerging approach to innovation. One only has to look at the November 2009 issue of Popular Mechanics to see the integrative relationship of art and science in creative thought. The work of Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway personal transporter and holder of over 400

patents, is highlighted in the issue because of his robotics competition for students. Kamen believes that students need hands-on experiences to use technology, science, and math in concrete ways. Building a robot to assist in curing cancer, landing an expedition on Mars, or building a 400-mpg roadster engages students in solving real-world problems, while inspiring the creative potential of young inventors (Ward, 2009). Similar visualization and innovative thinking with real-world relevance drives art students to create animations, digital imagery, Web designs, and other product designs. As Liu and Noppe-Brandon (2009) point out, unlocking the power of possibility first requires imagination and “creating an ecosystem where good ideas can emerge from anywhere” (p. 203). Numerous economists, psychologists, sociologists, media experts, artists, and educators are calling across all disciplines and organizations for

heightened imagination and a synthesis of complex understandings to construct a more successful and satisfying collective future (Gauntlett, 2007; Liu & Noppe-Brandon, 2009; Perkins, 1992; Pink, 2006). This article is focused on definitions of traditional Western concepts of creativity, but the topic is of growing concern among educational theorists and researchers around the world. In Kaufman and Sternberg’s International Handbook of Creativity (2006), descriptions and functions of creativity in research from at least 15 countries around the world are reported. To engage in a global conversation about the importance of creativity, art educators must be prepared to define, as well as speak clearly about our aims and strategies for motivating and nurturing creative behavior and the implications of growing numbers of cross-disciplinary intersections. Art educators are endowed with

a rich history and passion for the value of creativity that seems to have been lost in the past two decades and must again be embraced in our ever-changing global contexts. Our profession and our students will benefit from a renewed focus on creativity and innovation, as we offer greater clarity of meanings, processes, and purposes. Melody K. Milbrandt is Professor of Art Education at Georgia State University. E-mail: artmkm@langate.gsu.edu Lanny Milbrandt is Professor Emeritus and former Dean, College of the Arts, Valdosta State University. E-mail: lmilbrandt@ earthlink.net

References Anderson, T., & Milbrandt, M. (2005). Art for life. New York: McGraw-Hill. Bruner, J. (1960). The process of education. New York: Vintage Books. Burton, J. (2009). Creative intelligence, creative practice: Lowenfeld redux. Studies in Art Education, 50(4), 323-337. Carpenter, S. B., & Taylor, P. (2006). Making meaningful connections: Interactive computer hypertext in art education. Computers in the School, 23(1-2), 49-61. Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996). Creativity: Flow and the psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Collins. Dewey, J. (1934). Art as experience. New York: Putnam. Dissanayake, E. (1988). What is art for? Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press. Eberle, R. F. (1977). SCAMPER Games. Buffalo, NY: DOK Publications. Feldman, E. B. (1970). Becoming human through art: Aesthetic experience in the school. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Gauntlett, D. (2007). Creative Explorations: New approaches to identities and audiences. New York: Routledge. Gnezda, N. (2009). The potential for meaning in student art. Art Education, 62(4), 48-52. Gude, O. (2004). Postmodern principles: In search of a 21st century art education. Art Education, 57(1), 6-10. Hetland, L., Winner, E., Veenema, S., & Sheridan, K. M. (2007). Studio thinking: The real benefits of visual arts education. New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University. Kaufman, J. C., & Sternberg, R. J. (Eds.) (2006). The international handbook of creativity. New York: Cambridge University Press. Liu, E., & Noppe-Brandon, S. (2009). Imagination first: Unlocking the power of possibility. San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons. London, P. (1989). No more secondhand art. Boston, MA: Shambhala. Lowenfeld, V. (1947). Creative and mental growth. New York: Wiley and Sons. Lowenfeld, V., & Brittain, W. L. (1988). Creative and mental growth (8th ed.) New York: Macmillian. McCarty, K. F., Ondaatje, E. H., Brooks, A., & Szanto, A. (2005). A portrait of the visual arts: Meeting the challenges of a new era. (Rand Corporation Report MG-290-PCT). Retrieved August, 24, 2009, from www.rand.org/pubs/ monographs/MG290/

Osborne, A. (1957). Applied imagination. New York: Scribner’s. Parsons, M. (2004). Art and integrated curriculum, In. E. Eisner & M. Day (Eds.), Handbook of research and policy in art education (pp. 775 -794). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum. Parnes, S. J. (1988). Visionizing: State-of-the-art processes for encouraging innovative excellence. East Aurora, NY: DOK Publishers. Perkins, D. (1992). Smart schools: From training memories to educating minds. New York: The Free Press. Pink, D. H. (2006). A whole new mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. New York: Riverhead Books. Roukes, N. (1982, 1988). Art synectics: Stimulating creativity in art. Calgary, Canada: Juniro Arts. Sandell, R. (2006). Form + theme + context: Balancing considerations for meaningful art learning. Art Education, 59(1), 33-38. Scherer, M. (2009). Engaging the whole child: Reflections on best practices in learning, teaching, and leadership. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD). Stein, M. I. (1984). Anecdotes, poems and illustrations for the creativity process: Making the point. Delray Beach, FL: Winslow Press. Sullivan, G. (1993). Art-based art education: Learning that is meaningful, authentic, critical and pluralistic. Studies in Art Education, 35(1), 5-21. Szekely, G. (1988). Encouraging creativity in art lessons. New York: Teachers College Press. Vygotsky, L. (1962). Thoughts and language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Walker, S. (2001). Teaching meaning and artmaking. Worcester, MA: Davis. Ward, L. (2009). The 2009 breakthrough awards. Popular Mechanics, 186(11), 70-73. Weitz, M. (1959). The role of theory and aesthetics. In M. Weitz (Ed.), Problems in aesthetics (pp. 27-35). New York: Macmillan. Wilson, S. (2001). Information arts: Intersection of art, science and technology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Zimmerman, E. (2009). Reconceptualizing the role of creativity in art education theory and practice. Studies in Art Education, 50(4), 382-399.

January 2011 / Art Education

When is C

n Figure 1. Big Evil Monster. the transformation from puppet to monster took several months’ time during which there were recurring periods of reflection and revision.

DIANE B. JAQUITH

Art EducAtion / January 2011

ot once in 6 years did Robert ever enter the art room emptyhanded. A collector of recycled materials, he always arrived for class with a fresh box full of bottle caps, skinny and thick cardboard tubes, film canisters, coffee cans, and the like. He maintained a small storage area on the shelves and shared his bounty with classmates. the biggest excitement came in 5th grade when he reappeared from summer vacation with a squeaky clean bicycle chain. this drew admiration from every child in the class and it was lovingly handled and played with throughout the year. Although nothing was permanently constructed with that chain, it served as a catalyst for the children’s creative thinking about what ifs and why nots. robert is a three-dimensional thinker who finds two-dimensional artmaking tedious and uninteresting. He has always preferred to construct and over the years he has become highly skilled and reflective about his work. Big Evil Monster, a sculpture by robert and his friend, is the result of intrinsic motivation to creatively find and solve an artistic problem (Figure 1).

The title of this article borrows loosely from the philosopher Nelson Goodman (1977), whose classic essay “When is Art” addresses context and symbolic function. The discussion here concerns an entirely different matter: identifying moments when a learner’s creativity is sparked in school art programs. The word creativity usually enters conversations with students, teachers, parents, and administrators as a generic term for children’s overall artistic output. Now school systems are rapidly incorporating 21st-century skills into their curricula, including creativity skills. In order to implement these skills in classrooms, teachers need to know what is and what is not creative work. Recently I was invited to an administrative meeting where curriculum coordinators were asked to develop definitions for inquiry, critical thinking, creative thinking, collaborative problem-solving, and connections. Confident with defining most of these

skills, administrators struggled with an explanation for creativity that would be equally effective for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math), English language arts, visual art, and music. Zimmerman (2009) notes that school leaders face a dilemma with definitions for creativity; this reflects the controversy among scholars regarding universal definitions and attributes (Sternberg & Lubart, 2008). Others debate whether children’s work can be considered creative or if creativity is reserved exclusively for adults who make practical contributions to their field. Nickerson (1999), Rostan (2006), and Zimmerman (2009) support the notion that creativity is not limited exclusively to adults; in education, ideas that are novel to a learner can be considered creative. To facilitate for this, art teachers will need to develop strategies to enhance creative thinking and creative artmaking.

s Creativity?

Intrinsic Motivation and Autonomy in Children’s Artmaking Intrinsic Motivation Activates Creativity

Intrinsic motivation should be at the forefront of any conversations about creativity in schools. Research shows that intrinsic motivators such as personal interest and curiosity are closely correlated with creativity (Amabile, 1996; Csikszentmihalyi, 2008; Hetland, Winner, Veenema, & Sheridan, 2007; Runco, 2007). Amabile’s explanation of intrinsic motivation states: We define as intrinsic any motivation that arises from the individual’s positive reaction to qualities of the task itself: this reaction can be experienced as interest, involvement, curiosity, satisfaction, or positive challenge. (p. 115) Intrinsic motivation and student interest are central to creative problem finding and solving. In learning environments where self-directed learning and ambiguity are the norm, learners challenge themselves to take risks. The following list highlights some intrinsic motivators: • Content has personal relevancy • Preference for and enjoyment of certain art media • Curiosity • Divergent thinking through play • Satisfying a need by making a purposeful object for play or for a gift • Collaboration or proximity to others with similar interests • Work that is challenging and personally rewarding While preparing for Big Evil Monster, three personally relevant concepts fueled intrinsic task motivation for the artists: environmental, through the use of recycled materials; social, through collaborative work; and cultural, using a Chinese dragon puppet as inspiration. The boys worked in a domain within which they have high skill level, enabling them to be satisfactorily challenged. They described their work process:

The inspiration for this artwork comes from a giant dragon head that Robert brought into art class. It was brightly colored with a working (moving) puppet mouth and tail. Now it is transformed into a giant monster with arms, legs, and head. We started by making a body and attaching the head with hot glue. We sawed off cardboard tubes to make legs. Then bottles were used for arms, with more tubes. Big Evil Monster can even stand on its own! During preparation, the young artists knew that they would have full autonomy in this work, including choice of media, process, scale, and pace. A combination of artistry and engineering allowed them to meet a challenge, defy gravity, and complete their artwork under their own terms.

Extrinsic Motivation Can Hinder Creativity

Extrinsic motivating factors influence students’ creative output in both positive and negative ways, depending upon how much emphasis they are given in the classroom (Nickerson, 1999). Amabile (1996) offers the following definition for extrinsic motivation: We define as extrinsic any motivation that arises from sources outside of the task itself; these sources include expected evaluation, contracted-forreward, external directives, or any of several similar sources. (p. 115) Extrinsic motivators may deter creativity when learners are distracted by control factors or extraneous information (Collins & Amabile, 1999; Runco, 2007). What may seem like time-on-task may actually be a student resorting to a simpler solution to appease perceived pressure from a teacher. The same student might be far more creative if he or she felt autonomy to pursue a problem in his or her own way, not under the constraints of a tight assignment. Among extrinsic motivations that may limit or hinder creativity are:

• Prescriptive step-by-step directions • Strict teacher expectations, such as assigned seating or no talking when working • Inflexible deadlines • Rewards, such as ‘free draw’ when students can draw whatever they want • Emphasis on grades • Competitive atmosphere • Peer pressure or interference • Desire to please teachers or parents • Limits of scheduled time to complete projects • Inadequate storage for artwork • Required exhibitions Art class cannot function effectively without certain constraints and boundaries. Students understand and appreciate knowing what choices are and are not acceptable in terms of artistic practice, content, and behavior. By reviewing this list of extrinsic motivators, teachers can make decisions about what is non-negotiable and where flexibility is possible. Some matters are beyond a teacher’s control, such as the number of minutes a class meets and assigning grades. However, teachers may request additional time for learners at critical moments in a creative process. Rewards for early completion of work, such as ‘free draw,’ may elicit undeveloped artwork from those who prefer doing their own drawing rather than another assignment. Instead, each student can be provided with a recycled book in which they can draw, paint, collage, and alter pages. Callie (Figure 2) was able to access her altered book throughout the year and sometimes deferred working on other projects to pursue a page of interest. Even young learners may be aware of time restrictions in school and learn to plan accordingly. While some extrinsic motivators have potentially harmful effects at the problem identification stages, Collins and Amabile (1999) introduce “synergistic extrinsic

January 2011 / Art Education

right Figure 2. This student in grade 5 inserted a special folder into her altered book to keep her collection of collage papers handy. far right Figure 3. Seek and Find is a two-sided drawing that folds up and becomes a traveling sketchbook.

motivatorsâ&#x20AC;? that can influence creativity in positive ways. These external motivators work together with intrinsic motivators to keep students on target while persevering through less exciting parts of an art process. For example, when a student is trying to move past a frustrating critical juncture, a synergistic extrinsic motivation such as peer support or a desirable exhibition opportunity may help him or her remain focused despite any perceived failure.

Problem Finding

Csikszentmihalyi (1996) presents five stages of creativity: preparation, becoming curious about ideas or questions; incubation, subconsciously making connections; insight, when an understanding is realized; evaluation, analyzing the worthiness of a problem; and elaboration, the physical realization of the idea or question. Under typical constraints of school schedules, the first four stages of problem finding and solving often are compressed, leaving more time for the final stage where an artwork is pursued. Some teachers engage learners in discussions that promote divergent thinking toward solving an assigned problem. Other teachers avoid stages of problem finding altogether by assigning a problem to students with no discussion, and students resort to convergent thinking with limited access to creativity in their artmaking. Csikszentmihalyi (2008) believes that problem definition is more challenging than problem solving. Problem

Art Education / January 2011

finding can be a lengthy activity; however, when students feel autonomy, much of preparatory thinking can occur outside of an art class. For example, I observed an 8-year-old girl drawing an intricate grouping of symbols on graph paper. Each square contained a different configuration; she revealed that each shape symbolized a valued aspect of her life. She told me that she had started this activity at home and carried one or more of these drawings folded up in her pocket at all times to entertain herself during free moments. Her Seek and Find serial drawings inspired several classmates to do the same (Figure 3). This story exemplifies the fluidity that arises when boundaries between school art and home art are erased. When this learner wants to elaborate on one of her ideas, her Seek and Find drawings serve as an immediate resource.

Learner-Directed Pedagogy and Autonomy

Learners who control their artmaking are guided by intrinsic motivation to find and solve problems of their choosing. Choicebased teaching and learning promotes learner autonomy through arts-based practice focused on multiple studio centers. Teaching for artistic behavior in choicebased settings can sustain intrinsic motivation because students challenge themselves with ideas and art media of personal interest (Douglas & Jaquith, 2009). Self-directed

learning in choice-based art classes can be pursued in a carefully designed structure that promotes independence. This permits an art teacher to function as facilitator, providing instructional support where needed. It is not easy to teach children who are all heading in diverse directions while also facilitating cultural connections and meaning making discussions. Eisner (2002) observes: To be able to make educational gold out of emerging activities in the classroom requires a high degree of artistry in teaching. Artistry in teaching is more likely to occur when the classroom provides a context for improvisation and where unpredictability, rather than predictability of activities and consequences, is acknowledged. (p. 152) Jake, a kindergarten student, possessed few of the skills necessary to construct a three-dimensional structure at the beginning of the year. Several classmates had been introduced to construction in preschool and were eager with unbridled independence. Instead of using paper and cardboard for constructing a flat collage, as I had demonstrated, the children immediately charged forward, folding and building upwards. I decided to not intervene when I observed their productive work, peer coaching (unusual in the beginning of kindergarten), and genuine enthusiasm. Jake observed his peers and experimented with construction, first tentatively and later with conviction. After numerous trials, he found an engaging

far left Figure 4. Learners take responsibility for their work in self-directed environments. This boy stored his work safely and remembered to bring it out every week to continue working. left Figure 5. Improvisational play can lead to new directions.

idea about a battle station. Beginning with a 6” x 9” cardboard base, Jake initiated and independently worked on an artwork that held his attention for several months (Figure 4). Like Robert, Jake was intrinsically motivated through personal interests, a passion for constructing, and the innate curiosity of a 5-year-old. He learned about form, composition, and balance, and added benefits of creative exploration including responsibility, perseverance, and satisfaction. He described his work, Battle Station, in his artist’s statement: These are army games. There is a tower and double guns and a clone trooper tank. The chimney has smoke so hot it’s red! There’s also an X-wing fighter that comes off. Concern about students’ perceived lack of interest often surfaces in conversations with teachers about self-directed learning. John Holt (1995) insists that everyone has interests and it becomes a teacher’s challenge to bring forth those interests: We might say of a student that he doesn’t appear to be interested in anything, or at least in any of the things we try to interest him in. But this only means that he has chosen not to let us see his interests, perhaps because he has learned from experience that the less the adults, teachers above all, know about what he cares about, the safer he is from mockery, contempt, put-downs. (p. 79)

Autonomy empowers young artists in their creative inquiry. When children are permitted to self-direct their learning, control shifts from teacher to learner. Teachers who support learner-directed pedagogy are likely to improve creativity through heightened intrinsic motivation (Amabile, 1996; Rostan, 2006). Rather than designing problems for students to solve, Runco (2007) advises teachers to: Use intrinsic interests. Students may not be all that thrilled by presented problems. They should be allowed to identify, define, and redefine assignments and tasks for themselves. (p. 358) In self-directed learning, the teacher’s role shifts from instructor to facilitator, living resource, and guide. Teachers respond to students’ needs with encouragement, challenge, and relevant connections to the art world. Students have responsibilities as well. High school teacher Barbara Andrews (2001) expects students to become active learners and requires them to maintain a journal of their ideas, goals, and plans which she reviews with them. Younger children learn self-assessment skills in journals and by charting their progress (Douglas & Jaquith, 2009). Finding a balance between direct teaching and facilitating for independent work is critical to support autonomy and creativity in art class.

Some teachers engage learners in discussions that promote divergent thinking toward solving an assigned problem. Other teachers avoid stages of problem finding altogether by assigning a problem to students with no discussion, and students resort to convergent thinking with limited access to creativity in their artmaking.

January 2011 / Art Education

The Role of Play in Creative Work

Play is associated with both problem finding and solving; opportunities for play lead to divergent thinking and flexibility (Pitri, 2001; Runco, 2007; Zimmerman, 2009). Szekely (1988) integrates play with artmaking to activate learnersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; imaginations and idea generation. Play is innate to children; through play, new directions and insights connect their work with their personal interests. Art ideas of young children often are motivated by play. Improvisational play in art class can lead to new thinking, such as the simple transformation of a paper bag into a character (Figure 5). Play objects also motivate children, as in the diligent work on a house by a 1st-grade girl (Figure 6). Her artist statement describes her many choices: This is my dream house. It has two floors. On the second floor there is a big bed and I used wallpaper for the sheets. I put in chairs and tables. I used feathers, felt, sticks to make things. I had to think about how to make the sides stand up. It took me a long time to make. Danny, an advocate of graphic abstraction, began his color line drawings in second grade when he was introduced to this style by a classmate. It began as a competitive game between the two boys to see who could come up with the most detailed drawing. Because this work requires intense concentration, Danny would often alternate among several drawings at the same time (Figure 7). Play, the initial catalyst, led Danny to a 4-year exploration of design through line, shape, color, rhythm, and visual metaphor.

Interventions to Enhance Creativity in Art Class

top Figure 6. Many children enjoy architectural and interior design. This house was created by a first-grader. bottom Figure 7. These complex patterned drawings evolved slowly over several years.

Art Education / January 2011

Csikszentmihalyi (1996) and Szekely (1988) agree that creativity is not linear; rather, these stages spiral continuously as the artist pursues the problem. In truly open systems, learners may revisit an idea or process repeatedly to explore deeper and develop mastery (Hathaway, 2008). During the problem-finding stage, creative thinking may occur while a student is engaged in an entirely different activity, causing him or her to defer that activity in favor of another. The following strategies can help encourage creativity during art class: â&#x20AC;˘ Identify the locus of control. Be mindful of the purposes of instructional activities. â&#x20AC;˘ Restructure lessons to give learners ownership of problem finding as well as problem solving.

ART eDUCATion

• Minimize effects of extrinsic motivators. Limit information, downplay grades, and use extrinsic motivators to support—not control—creativity. • Organize lessons around intrinsic motivators, including choice, play, divergent thinking, and making relevant connections. • Focus more on process than product and look forward to a surprise of open-ended solutions. • Teacher-directed lessons are effective for skill building that is essential for creativity. • Whenever possible, let students make choices. • Count to ten before intervening in a student’s process of thinking or making. • Help students identify intrinsic motivators that influence their creativity. • Encourage metacognition through examination of choices, analysis of relationships, and recognition of the stages of creativity. There is great joy in the surprises that emerge when learners direct their own artmaking. This is the gift found in teaching—to watch learners take control

and become independent thinkers and doers. When is creativity not in school art programs? Creativity is not found in rote exercises and prescribed assignments. Creativity is compromised by external motivations that supply students with excessive information, reward closed systems, and place undue emphasis on grades and deadlines. Creativity can arise when students respond to visual culture around them, particularly when they can integrate meaningful connections with popular culture into their own work. Creativity abounds when a student thinks divergently, ponders, intuits, perceives, infers, plays, makes mistakes, and embraces ambiguity. Creativity in school art programs thrives when learners are intrinsically motivated and have full autonomy to problem find and solve, defer, revise, redirect, and work at their own pace. Diane B. Jaquith is a K-5 art teacher in Newton, Massachusetts with 20 years’ experience in public schools. She is a co-founder of Teaching for Artistic Behavior and co-author of Engaging Learners Through Artmaking: Choice-Based Art Education in the Classroom.

RefeRences Amabile, T. M. (1996). Creativity in context. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Andrews, B. H. (2001). Art and ideas: Reaching nontraditional art students. Art Education, 54(5), 33-36. Collins, M. A., and Amabile, T. M. (1999). Motivation and creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 297-312). New York: Cambridge University Press. Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996). Creativity: Flow and the psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Perennial. Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2008). Implications of a systems perspective for the study of creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity (pp. 313-335). New York: Cambridge University Press. Douglas, K. M., and Jaquith, D. B. (2009). Engaging learners through artmaking: Choice-based art education in the classroom. New York: Teachers College Press. Eisner, E. (2002). The arts and the creation of mind. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Goodman, N. (1977). When is art? In B. Leonder & D. Perkins (Eds.), Art and cognition (pp. 11-19). Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Hathaway, N. (2008). 10 teaching and learning strategies in a “choice-based” art program. Arts & Activities, 144(1), 36-37. Hetland, L., Winner, E., Veenema, S., & Sheridan, K. M. (2007). Studio thinking: The real benefits of visual arts education. New York: Teachers College Press. Holt, J. (1995). Freedom and beyond. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. Nickerson, R. S. (1999). Enhancing creativity. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 392-430). New York: Cambridge University Press. Pitri, E. (2001). The role of artistic play in problem solving. Art Education, 54(3), 46-51. Rostan, S. (2006). A young artist’s story. Advancing knowledge and the development of artistic talent and creativity in children. In J. C. Kaufman and J. Baer (Eds.), Creativity and reason in cognitive development (pp. 244-268). New York: Cambridge University Press. Runco, M. (2007). Creativity: Theories and themes: Research, development, and practice. Burlington, MA: Elsevier Academic Press. Sternberg, R. J., & Lubart, T. L. (2008). The concept of creativity: Prospects and paradigms. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of Creativity (pp. 3-15). New York: Cambridge University Press. Szekely, G. (1988). Encouraging creativity in art lessons. New York: Teachers College Press. Zimmerman, E. (2009). Reconceptualizing the role of creativity in art education theory and practice. Studies in Art Education, 50(4), 382-399.

FRom Intellect

Why We Make Art And Why it is Taught Second Edition Richard Hickman

“This book deserves close attention by those artists, teachers, and academics who identify themselves with art education not simply as a subject in the curriculum but as a way of understanding and engaging with a wider meaning in life.”—John Baldacchino, Teachers College Record PAPeR $25.00

Moving the eye Through 2-D Design A Visual Primer Buy Shaver

This book provides a step-by-step approach to understanding what causes us to look at a painting, photograph, or any two-dimensional media and what is needed to maintain visual interest. PAPeR $40.00

Now in Paperback Art, Community and environment Educational Perspectives edited by Glen Coutts and Timo Jokela

“I highly recommend both for teacher education and fine arts education classes in higher education.”—Rita L. Irwin, Studies in Art Education PAPeR $35.00

Distributed by the University of Chicago Press www.press.uchicago.edu January 2011 / Art EducAtion

Deﬁning Wild Things: characteristics of creativity

aurice sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are (1963) provides a visual and written tale about a child’s journey of possibilities. in Sendak’s somewhat autobiographical illustrated children’s story, he weaves a tale of Max, a young boy, whose imagination allows him to find alternate possibilities for his real life situation through the creation of an island of wild things. things Where the Wild Things Are provides a metaphor for a

In Search of the

Wild Things:

The Choice, Voice, and Challenge (CVC) Model for Creative Instruction

rewoven story regarding the everyday instructional journey of art teachers who seek to nurture wild things in their classroom. Creativity or “wild things” are encouraged through a proposed instructional model: Choice, Voice, and Challenge (CVC) Instruction (Perkins, 2004). CVC Instruction defines ways in which classroom teachers may provide vehicles for their students’ mental journeys that can lead to creative and imaginative actions and outcomes. There is much in the literature describing multiple and identical art projects that appear on elementary and middle school classroom walls across the United States. CVC Instruction, as defined by Perkins, began as a way to change these identical works to more imaginative outcomes and explain creative instruction to non-art teachers. Perkins’ journey continued as she developed an instructional tool for preservice teachers that evolved into a formalized and integral part of a K-12 model focused upon creativity in art. The CVC model provides a working definition of creative instruction that can assist art teachers in their explanation of the creative process to colleagues. CVC provides a way for creativity to be explained, defined, and situated in art education practice. Creativity or the cultivation of thinking about the world through imagined ideas, symbols, and metaphors is the essence of a visual art experience. Classroom strategies can provide opportunities for creative visual thinking—the wild things of the imagination—that can transform creative processes of students. In order to envision instruction that encourages the wild thing as a part of a contemporary art classroom, the journey begins with ways to define characteristics of creativity.

Identification of wild things, or ideas that denote creativity, generally fall into two categories: the creativity of everyday life and world-changing creativity. The wild things or creative thinking present in classrooms is defined as everyday creativity, while world-changing creativity occurs when an expert in a field develops or discovers new concepts that change thinking in different domains or in the world (Amabile, 1989; Cropley, 1999; Feldman, Csikszentmihalyi & Gardner, 1994; Torrence, 1962). Worldchanging creativity in art, as exemplified by artists such as Cassatt, Koons, Picasso, or Sherman, requires extensive knowledge and mastery within a field acquired through traditional learning (Cropley, 1992; Feldman, Csikszentmihalyi & Gardner, 1994). Alternately, everyday creativity as viewed by Feldman, Csikszentmihalyi, and Gardner is a capability present, in varying degrees, in all individuals and age groups, potentially providing the wild things of creative outcomes in the classroom and beyond. Everyday or classroom creativity evolves from a learner’s cultural context, whether or not others have discovered the same idea on many other occasions (Amabile, 1989; Beattie, 2000; Boden, 1994). For example, an art lesson introduced to ten different art classes may generate the same novel variation on the project for 15 of 200 total students. Although similar, these novel solutions are defined as everyday creativity for these students within their classroom context. CVC instruction recognizes and encourages the possibilities in everyday creativity for students. Everyday creativity emerges as ingenious interpretations in the process of knowledge acquisition, providing moments that create interest in learning and life (Amabile, 1989; Cropley, 1999; Feldman, Csikszentmihalyi & Gardner, 1994; Torrence, 1993). Creativity may be situated in the student process and/or outcome. In Sendak’s story, Max—motivated by rambunctious disobedience— transforms his bedroom, the furniture, and his dreams into a unique world. The creativity of everyday life may include the story of a child such as Max retelling his or her imagined journey, novel variations

EMMA GILLESPIE PERKINS and MARy C. CARTER

Art EducAtion / January 2011

for an evening meal recipe, or a student using humorous or surprising metaphors to develop content or design an art composition. In art classrooms, everyday creativity or the exploration of wild things includes a student art process or a teacher-assigned classroom project that takes a different or surprising approach, utilizes media in an innovative manner for the class, provides a novel descriptive critique or explanation for processes/product, and/or applies visual ideas in a transformative adaptation. An example is an upper elementary art unit that incorporated development of archihats. These hats, based upon an architecture unit, encouraged each student to design a home or habitat they imagined or thought about (in the future, in space, underground) to wear as a symbolic visual thinking/ thought cap. The archihat assignment was an everyday innovative teacher’s assignment that allowed for possible everyday student creative outcomes (Figure 1).

Locating Wild Things in the Classroom

In Where the Wild Things Are, Max displays this everyday creativity through a childhood proclivity for exploration of imagined places and things. Imagining of wild things, while delightful, is not an exceptional process. Weisberg (2006, 1986) and Boden (1994) argue that all varieties of creative work are brought about by ordinary cognitive processes. There is a relatively close relationship between creative thinking and other forms of cognition, such as problem solving, reasoning, and the use of memory (Swartz & Perkins, 1990; Weisberg, 2006). A creative product or idea in an art classroom might include a student application of individual knowledge in science or social studies, and art integrated into a new approach beyond the class context to create an art project that is interdisciplinary and innovative in application. An example includes a secondary contemporary social issues unit that assigned research with a personal narrative connection. The project themes included war and society (a brother in the army), violence and bias (area hate crime), as well and media and feminist issues (eating disorders). An innovative student developed her story about a relative’s struggle with an eating disorder. She selected a cooking pan as her “canvas” to represent challenging Appalachian eating styles (grits, fried chicken, and Derby

pie), body image issues, and the change to healthier eating habits. Religious symbols reflect her relative’s strength to overcome the disorder through the support of Appalachian family and spiritual values. (See Figure 2.) Previous notions of creativity include a view of art as an activity that is mystical or special; however, these views limit opportunities for broad pedagogy that encourages each student’s everyday creative thinking. While others within the field of creativity identify multiple factors such as personality traits that are present in creative individuals (Amabile, 1989; Csikszentmihalyi, 1996), CVC Instruction (Perkins, 2004) addresses the need for educating all students by providing opportunities to actively explore imagined potential and reflectively engage with the context of their environments and cultures.

• Allowance for student-expanded interdisciplinary and global questions accompanied by time to reflect, generate ideas, and pose problems/questions through a dialogic interaction of questioning and classroom discussions. • Creation of a supportive, risk-free environment for problem-posing and solution possibilities.

Choice, Voice, and Challenge Instruction

Much like the journey of Max, our much longer pedagogical journey of years and a day led us to ways to encourage wild things in the art classroom and introduce creative instruction through Choice, Voice, and Challenge or CVC Instruction (Perkins, 2004). This approach to instruction includes creative and critical strategies broadly categorized in three components: student choice, student voice, and challenge. CVC instruction requires time for presentation, idea development, meaningful discussion, problem posing, and solutions to problems. Sandell (1991) observes that the “structure, setting and time allotted in most art programs often tend to repress creative studio activity and critical response” (p. 183). However, CVC instructional strategies may be incorporated in everyday lessons that aim to create a classroom environment that affirms everyday creativity and the thinking processes that foster it. Suggested Choice, Voice, and Challenge instructional strategies include: • Incorporating open-ended and diverse thinking activities with student exploration within learning contexts taught across social, cultural, and interdisciplinary areas. • Multiple choices of materials, solutions, and projects incorporating critical reflection and questioning.

top Figure 1. Two archihat thought caps. bottom Figure 2. Eating disorders social issues project.

January 2011 / Art Education

CVC: Choice

Figure 3a, b, c. After-school Middle School Program for At-Risk Students, Wild Thinks and Things Project.

The choice component of CVC incorporates thinking strategies that promote diverse opportunities through media and materials. Developing classroom choice encourages a greater degree of personal engagement with instructional content. This provides opportunities for students to have a greater sense of ownership in an art project, whether choices are given in the content, media, style, or subject matter. Student choice in an art classroom may include providing diverse media and multiple outcome options for the completion of artworks as well as an instructional tolerance for ambiguity. Outcomes of CVC Instruction will be diverse and reflect student development of processes and production. An example is a Wild Thinks and Things afterschool project with 6th grade at-risk students. Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are children’s picture books as well as contemporary media provided literacy connections to student learning regarding performing objects, kinetic art, form, sculpture, and individualized character development. Instruction encouraged diverse outcomes based upon idea generation, student abilities, and media exploration with culminating puppet performances (Figure 3). In this project, student choice was embedded within the development and production process by providing: opportunities for brainstorming, time for critical questioning and evaluation, and diverse puppet construction opportunities, as well as incorporation of multiple and sometimes unique found materials. CVC Choice includes the ordinary thinking activities of student judging and deciding as a facet of creative thinking. These choices foster independence and self-assurance by cultivating risk-taking in a supportive environment. As the work is completed, the students will be faced not only with application of the content, but also with critique of the concrete results and consequences of their choices. These activities develop creative problem-solving skills and become the backdrop for further experiences in the classroom and elsewhere.

CVC: Voice

Figure 4. Hippie Lamb: Art as narrative and reflection of cultural context.

Art Education / January 2011

Voice in art is the expression of our thoughts and beliefs made concrete through art outcomes. According to Bakhtin (1993), individuals frame self-contexts as a creative act. This self-construction is the place where students can commit their values and themselves—their voices—acting as

their signature in a concrete visual form. The act of creating in visual art is another way of communicating to ourselves and others what matters—in life, our world, our experiences, our history, etc. (Ratcliffe, 2008, 2009). By developing voice, a particular aspect of life is given importance and expression. Voice affects and influences others and becomes part of the dialogue of our culture (Bakhtin, 1990, 1993). However, another aspect of self-construction occurs when an individual encounters a different version of a shared experience in the created image or art product of another. These differing versions provide opportunities for expanding understanding through critical re-evaluation. This requires care and planning to “set the stage” for a degree of risk-taking students might feel in expressing their voices. Presenting these choices in a surprising or playful manner develops what Szekely (1988) describes as a creative and motivating art classroom environment that encourages risk taking. Classroom strategies that encourage CVC Voice occur in everyday thinking processes identified by Weisberg (2006) that include: encouraging students to remember something, to imagine a life event or experience that occurred, or to plan how to give that image visual form. Therefore, Voice in the CVC model, can provide opportunities for individualized creative expression within the production of art processes or outcomes such as: journals, sketchbooks, artworks, and verbal/written products. Voice project criteria allow for inclusion of individual content and meaning. CVC Voice encourages students to intentionally seek to express something of their selves. A high school project demonstrating voice included student research regarding narrative as a purpose of art and as expressed symbol making. Students evaluated a variety of artworks such as Ringgold, Eakins, and Kahlo, with a focus upon artists’ narrative content. The students then selected key elements of their past and ways these elements connected to present perceptions. Classroom activities encouraging voice included reflection and discussion regarding social contexts, role models, urban/rural perceptions, as well as family structures. A student project example depicted a three-dimensional tie-dye style, earth-friendly lamb representing her parents’ farm (Figure 4). She viewed her parents as contemporary hippies and their holistic lifestyle as different, creating her unique cultural context. Classroom products encouraging voice move away

far left Figure 5. Not A Superhero as a Hero: Performing object based on personal narrative. left Figure 6. Jungian Symbols and Journey of the Heroes: Student work from Journey of the Hero Plaques clay unit.

from the replication of cultural or artistic content and foster individualized student understandings of their own uniqueness and the diversity of others. In addition to CVC voice, this project encouraged choice through diverse options in materials and art product formats (found object sculptures, relief narratives, and papier-mâché).

CVC: Challenge

The third aspect of CVC, challenge, occurs in art assignments designed to incorporate content learning or inter-disciplinary knowledge. A creative outcome does not emerge from a knowledge vacuum, but rather from knowledge transformed into imagined visions. CVC challenge assignments include a degree of difficulty, but are sufficient to encourage deeper engagement and thought (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996; Walker, 2001). An assigned project that is too easy and requires little thought, or is too difficult and beyond student capabilities, will not engage students. Content objectives and learning about application of that content must be present for a creative challenge to occur. Walker comments that “thinking innovatively is easier in the presence of resistance and divergence” (p. 53), and that a problem-bound framework for art instruction motivates students. Challenge assignments are developmentally appropriate for

the individual student and require effective complex solutions derived through expanded student thinking. A challenge assignment should include an application of content learning and require open-ended, individual, and diverse solutions. The goal is to establish foundational skills so that when a CVC challenge aspect is introduced, the difficulty factor for students is exhilarating rather than bewildering. A challenge classroom example includes development of performing objects or puppets. This performing object concept, described earlier in the article for at-risk middle school students, adapts to high school and preservice teaching students. During the unit, students identify visual qualities, mechanics, and characteristics of performing objects; explore art history regarding performing objects of Klee, Picasso, and Taymor; and rewrite a not-superhero-ashero or other story into their own puppet and narrative. Students identified themes and then wrote a personal script or narrative. An innovative student developed a complex performing object that reflects a rewritten story about a gay hero (Figure 5). The challenge content included: key issues of plot and character development; performing object aesthetics with art history references;

dramatic movement and performance; and complex performing object construction. In addition to CVC challenge, this otherhero project exemplified choice and voice. Students were given the choice of form and materials for the performing object such as a marionette, hand puppet, Taymor-style human performing object. Students were challenged to choose their own combination of visual qualities from the three reference artists (Klee, Picasso, and Taymor). The voice aspect was provided by student-driven selection of other-hero characteristics they wished to rewrite as an atypical hero character. This instruction generated self-reflection and social awareness about people not seen as readily or easily accepted, whether socially, culturally, physically, or racially (challenge). The culminating product reflected student voice through a performing object performance. A similar example of CVC instruction can be identified in a clay unit for secondary and college-level non-art students—Journey of the Hero Plaques (Figure 6). Content included Jung’s archetypal hero and quest symbols found in myths and fables in many cultures and contemporary media. The overarching idea was, “Where are you in your ‘hero’s journey?’” Through low-relief clay images, the students incorporated

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

symbol-making appropriated from other cultures, their own family history, and selfdesigned images. Architectural elements provided a sense of a “special place” or retablo-style personal altar. This project incorporated student symbol-making (voice), personal self-reflection connected to Jungian archetypes (challenge and voice), and the development of ceramic imagery within a student-developed clay relief format (choice).

Mapping the Wild Things

The three aspects of CVC—choice, voice, and challenge—are part of a wild things journey that combine, inform, reinforce, and enhance each other to allow for individualized and thoughtful student solutions. Just as Max’s journey involved multiple scenes, these separate instructional approaches provide a map, with many routes, to identify, define, and explain creative instruction in a classroom setting. CVC instruction may be introduced in varying degrees throughout the K-12 setting and can provide components that can be assessed in a high stakes testing environment. While the assessment of creativity is problematic and context-based, ordinary thinking outcomes and content application can be assessed with traditional testing methods such as critiques, performance rubrics, and pencil and paper testing. Further, the outcomes of CVC instruction can be identified when assessing whole class

outcomes. For example, when observing classroom walls displaying CVC student creative outcomes, projects can demonstrate a variety of materials and diverse student solutions. CVC is a pedagogy of creativity, providing instructional options for creative or novel expression. Regardless of teaching strategies, some students will be risk-adverse and select traditional or safe solutions rather than novel options. As art teachers we can provide the opportunities and develop strategies that lead to classroom “wild things.” Teachers who model creativity or divergent thinking are more successful in the development of creative thinking behaviors in their classrooms (Beattie, 2000; Cropley, 1992; Gardner, 1994; Rejskind, 2000). The classroom art teacher is well trained to model creativity, encourage creative behaviors, and provide creative definitions to increase public understanding. Further, as a professional educator, art teachers understand the everyday pedagogy required to develop ordinary thinking skills. The field of art education provides rich opportunities for social and individual voice and cultural development in an art classroom. These moments arise during student idea generation, open discussions, critiques and presentations of individual student ideas. In the everyday creative classroom, our goal is to allow wild things to emerge during synergistic instruction.

Conclusion

Creativity is located in and arises out of the everyday experiences of our life, context, and world. Creative thinking, the exhilarating and often frustrating but rewarding engagement in the creative process, is the reason most of us became art educators. Our hope is that one day classroom creativity may be defined in a way that allows creative thinking practices to become part of accepted content standards. Creative thinking and creative production are notions embedded within the art education discipline. In addition, identifying creative strategies is a part of an everyday teaching challenge. Art teachers are uniquely educated to enact a CVC creative model within structured classroom environments and to guide other travelers on an imagined journey to visit wild things. Emma Gillespie Perkins is Associate Professor of Art at Morehead State University, Morehead, Kentucky. E-mail: e.perkins@moreheadstate.edu Mary C. Carter is Assistant Professor of Art Education at Ball State University, Muncie, Indiana. E-mail: mccarter@bsu.edu

References Amabile, T. (1989). Growing up creative: Nurturing a lifetime of creativity. Buffalo, NY: Creative Education Foundation Press. Bakhtin, M. (1990). Art and answerability: Early philosophical essays by M. Bakhtin (V. Liapunov & K. Brostrom, Trans.). Austin: University of Texas Press. Bakhtin, M. (1993). Toward a philosophy of the act. (V. Liapunov, Trans.). Austin: University of Texas Press. Beattie, D. (2000). Creativity in art: The feasibility of assessing current conceptions in the school context. Assessment in Education, 7(2), 175-192. Boden, M. (1994). What is creativity? In M. Boden (Ed.), Dimensions of Creativity (pp. 75-117). Cambridge, MA: M.I.T. Press. Cropley, A. (1992). More ways than one: Fostering creativity. Norwood, NJ: Ablex. Cropley, A. (1999). Creativity and cognition: Producing effective novelty [Electronic version]. Roeper Review, 21(4), 1-28. Available University of Kentucky, INFOTRAC, online database (Article A55127604).

Art Education / January 2011

Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996). Creativity: Flow and the psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Collins. Feldman, E., Csikszentmihalyi, M., & Gardner, H. (1994). Changing the world: A framework for the study of creativity. Westport, CT: Praeger. Gardner, H. (1994). The arts and human development. New York: Basic Books. Perkins, E. (2004). Enacting creative instruction: A comparative study of two art educators. Un-published dissertation, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky. Ratcliffe, M. (2008). Feelings of being: Phenomenology, psychiatry, and the sense of reality. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Ratcliffe, M. (2009). The phenomenology of mood and the meaning of life. In P. Goldie (Ed.), Oxford handbook on emotion. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Rejskind, G. (2000). TAG teachers: Only the creative need apply (talented and gifted). Roeper Review, 22(3), 153-157. Sandell, R. (1991). The liberating relevance of feminist pedagogy. Studies in Art Education, 32(3), 178-187.

Sendak, M. (1963). Where the wild things are. First Harper Trophy 1984. 25th anniversary edition. New York: Harper Collins. Swartz, R., & Perkins, D. (1990). Teaching thinking: Issues and approaches. Pacific Grove, CA: Midwest Publications. Szekely, G. (1988). Encouraging creativity in art Lessons. New York: Teachers College Press. Torrence, E. (1962). Guiding creative talent. Princeton, NJ: Prentice Hall. Torrence, E. (1993). The nature of creativity as manifested in testing. In R. Sternberg (Ed.), The nature of creativity (pp. 43-75). New York: Cambridge University Press. Weisberg, R. (1986). Creativity: Genius and other myths. New York: Freeman. Weisberg, R. (2006). Creativity: Understanding innovation in problem solving, science, invention and the arts. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons. Walker, S. (2001). Teaching meaning in artmaking. Worcester, MA: Davis.

Instructional Resources

Experience2 Kim BaRKeR Above: Detail from Figure 1 (Oliver Herring, Gloria), p. 26.

Recommended for Grades K-5

January 2011 / Art EDucAtiOn

Figure 1. Oliver Herring, Gloria, 2004. Digital c-print photographs, museum board, foam core, and polystyrene. 72 by 40 by 40 inches with vitrine. 182.9 by 101.6 by 101.6 cm. courtesy of the artist and Meulensteen Gallery, new York.

n George Szekely’s (2006) book How Children Make Art, we (re)discover how fun and captivating art is when given the latitude to engage the world around us on our own terms. The forming of ideas without preconceptions empowers students to explore what is of value to them in innovative ways. Along this path of discovery, students engage with complex ideas and emerge confident in their abilities to manipulate and imagine matter in unexpected ways. As art educators, we foster students imaginatively investigating their environment. We facilitate animated artful experiences where children can play with their ideas and materials to create compelling objects and memorable experiences that keep them creatively engaged with their world.

Art EDucAtiOn / January 2011

Researching whimsical and spirited artists can inspire new ideas and methods of communicating how art remains a valuable part of people’s lives both in and out of the classroom. This instructional resource explores one such contemporary artist who, driven by a curiosity in human interaction, continues to explore the world in fanciful and imaginative ways. The artist discussed here, Oliver Herring, generates a multitude of ideas with regard to involving children in artmaking. For the purposes of this resource, I emphasize the use of technology to introduce students to stopmotion video, which is a technique used by Herring. I suggest the use of a still camera to capture several discrete still frames that can be compiled in stock software programs such as iMovie or Windows Movie Maker. For schools that dedicate resources toward the purchase of computers, there is increased opportunity to extend a child’s experience with art. The approach presented here is one that encourages student-initiated experiences that are then re-perceived through video. Borrowing from John Dewey’s (1934/1980) Art as Experience, a child’s animated experience before the camera exhibits both a “doing and undergoing,” which are united and reinforced when the experience is replayed as a stop-motion short—the distance between the performing of a playful act and the watching of that act from a new perspective heightens a student’s ability to

Instructional Resources

Figure 2. Oliver Herring, stills from Exit—Video Sketch #6, 1999. courtesy of the artist and Meulensteen Gallery, new York.

connect his/her actions to an outcome, thus facilitating a “complete experience” (pp. 39-46). This sense of accomplishment broadens student understandings of themselves and their ability to constructively engage with one another, technology, and the world.

Oliver Herring

Oliver Herring (b. 1964, Heidelberg, Germany) received his BFA from the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art in Oxford, England. Herring later earned his MFA from Hunter College in New York (1991) where he continues to live and work. Herring’s earliest works include woven sculptures using reflective materials such as Mylar or packing tapes and simple stitch knitting techniques. When Herring liberated himself from his knitting chair, he began working with a video camera to create stop-motion vignettes. In a number of Herring’s “video sketches,” we see him exploring fantastical landscapes one frame at a time. Just as Herring depended on readily available materials to create his knitted works, he used common colored papers and paints to create backdrops, costumes, and various set-dressings in his early video works. In addition to videos, Herring creates photo-sculptures. Whereas most photographic work is understood as freezing time, an overview of Herring’s photo-sculptures evokes the diverse conditions that occur over time. Light changes, bodies change, artistic explorations define and redefine themselves, and each fluctuation is captured in thousands of images that are later cut and stitched together over a carved polystyrene form (Figure 1). Like with much of Herring’s video work, these photo-sculptures are evidently handmade, constructed one frame (or part) at a time, and result from a

collaborative effort. Herring’s practice relies heavily on the presence of others who through the offering of their time provide contour to these works. Collaborations, whether spontaneous or planned, or spontaneously planned, connect the last decade of Herring’s work. In Herring’s first short video titled Exit, 1999 (Figure 2), he is seen sitting in his knitting chair only to be rough-and-tumbled out of it as the chair seemingly climbs a nearby wall. This jump-start transforms Herring into a longhaired blonde who we see flying or swimming, or fly swimming, through a maze of color that could just as easily be above the surface of a pond as beneath it. As Herring continues to discover this new environment, plants evolve into human beings. Works soon after, while retaining the technique and sense of whimsy illustrated in Exit, place Herring more often behind the camera loosely directing others who have responded to his various advertisements soliciting for collaborators (Sollins, 2005). Responders to Herring’s ads have the freedom to inform his video work in improvisational ways. Herring is a facilitator of people and a responder to situations that emerge from within the visitors themselves so that he might capture movements and interactions as his participants discover them. His video Dance I, 2002 (Figure 3) is evidence of the possibilities that arise when strangers meet to create a work of art. When the man and woman present in Dance I arrived, Herring played music and asked the pair to dance. Such a request, according to Herring, put each of the participants on equal ground yet challenged them to work with one another in a manner that precluded any social roles either of them embraced prior to entering Herring’s studio (Sheets, 2009).

January 2011 / Art EDucAtiOn

Figure 3. Oliver Herring, stills from Dance I, 2002. courtesy of the artist and Meulensteen Gallery, new York.

Herring further investigates the limits people impose on themselves as well as the depths to which people free themselves to act spontaneously in TASK, which began in late 2002. TASK offers a participatory, performative structure wherein any number of people might engage to interpret, create, recreate, and generate continuous interactions through the invention of new tasks. Such community collaborations can last hours. During this time, participants who may have approached the event with trepidation have the opportunity to reflect on whatever constraints they impose on themselves while at the same time observing others who initiate various productive acts in which new visitors are welcome to join at any time. While Herring produces both object-oriented as well as more ephemeral situational works, the aesthetic that connects all of his work is the hand-made or made-from-what-is-at-hand, which often results in accessible works of art. Herring’s process is evident in his work, which is often obviously handcrafted or very

Art EDucAtiOn / January 2011

simply executed with little forethought or prep, thus communicating his deeper interest in spontaneity, collaboration, and the setting wherein diverse groups of people can let go and build something together without concern for preconceived expectations. In simple terms, Herring plays. His work is playful and experimental. And those who engage in Herring’s work play with ideas and each other. This quality makes Herring a most fitting contemporary artist to inspire K-5 art rooms.

Learning Objectives

Students will: • Explore collaboration in art • Experiment with a variety of moving image technologies • Demonstrate myriad understandings of moving images • Create individual and collaborative art projects

Instructional Resources

Figure 4. Oliver Herring, stills from Little Dances of Misfortunes, 2002. courtesy of the artist and Meulensteen Gallery, new York.

activities Playing with Perception Thaumatropes are simple devices that help introduce the concept of implied motion. There are many examples on the Internet, with some of the most charming being no more than two small papers glued back to back over the end of a pencil. Children can draw a figure of their choice on side one, for example, a flower with petals, and on the second side repeat the flower, but this time with no petals. When the pencil is spun back and forth in a student’s hands, the flower appears to gain and lose petals very quickly. To introduce the method behind stop-motion, have students experiment with several motion studies. Ask volunteers to perform a single action (walking, climbing, etc.), but to break it into 12-181 discrete units. After a series of motion studies, students can create their own “filmstrips” by drawing the individual parts of a single action on a strip of paper. There are plenty of templates online for both

filmstrips and zoetropes. These Victorian devices can help children understand how varying rates of spinning in combination with a varying numbers of frames can make a series of single frames appear as a continuous motion. Students can choose a zoetrope template, craft their personally designed toy, and create filmstrips documenting the various motions observed in class. Talking points: • Describe what happens when you spin your thaumatrope back and forth in your hands. Why do the images appear to move? • How do the slits in the zoetrope affect how you see your filmstrips? What changes when you view your filmstrip from above the rim? • How do you think you could speed up or slow down the action on your filmstrip? (fewer or more slits to frame ratio) • Have you seen anything else that you think might use a series of frames like on your filmstrip to suggest continuous movement? (movies, cartoons)

January 2011 / Art EDucAtiOn

Educators using this instructional resource in their classroom can observe the growth of their students through discussion and the application of new skills and concepts, as well as assess the students’ ability to work together. exploring Collaboratively Constructed Landscapes Pixilation is a stop-motion technique practiced by Oliver Herring and many other artists and filmmakers to produce stopmotion videos and films using live actors. Sharing clips from Oliver Herring’s Exit or Little Dances of Misfortunes, 2002 (Figure 4) with students can inspire lively discussion as students determine how these effects are created. Talking points for Exit: • Can you guess how the artist is suspending himself? Is he moving like you move when you are swimming? How did he make it look like he is swimming? • What kind of environment did the artist create? What materials did he use? What do you think about when you see this place? Talking points for Little Dances of Misfortunes: • How do you think the artist made it look like this person is playing with all of these moving shapes? What happens to all of these little shapes? How did the artist create this effect? • Do you think these people are really climbing and jumping off ladders? Explain. • Have you ever seen a ladder fold itself up like this? When? How do you suppose the artist made it look like this is what the ladder is doing? The motion study volunteers and observers have already started to practice the technique of pixilation by breaking a range of motion into singular poses. To ensure understanding of the “trickier” motions, having the students create a chorus line of synchronized movements (such as gliding across the frame with one leg in the air) can be an inclusive and fun way to test the method in front of a camera before any more planning takes place. The key is to keep the camera stationary and emphasize that the motion occurs between still shots. Advise performers that 12-18 unique poses are required for one second of playback. This activity often results in children scooting around on their bums so capturing 45-90 poses is obtainable as students only need to inch over between shots. Drop the frames from the test exploration into a video timeline (using iMovie or Windows Movie Maker) and watch the video. Talking points: • Did you know your actions would look like this when saved in the computer? Explain. • Where/when is the motion really occurring? (between takes) Why does it look like you are really moving when you watch the video?

Art EDucAtiOn / January 2011

As a culminating activity, have available plenty of materials around the room for “shopping.” Items such recycled cardboard, paints, rolls of colored butcher paper, newsprint, scissors, colored construction papers, and so forth can inspire children and give them tremendous flexibility in constructing fanciful backgrounds and lively, animated set dressings. To mix up the pace a bit from the test activity, clear a large floor space in the art room for set creation (or locate another large space the class can occupy for one or more days) and designate an elevated area for the camera and tripod. All of the students can participate in creating a set and prepping set dressings. Individuals and small groups can collaborate to construct vignettes that incorporate both people and things “floating” in and across the set. Having the art room floor as the set (as opposed to the walls) allows children to defy gravity (as in Little Dances of Misfortunes), to capture themselves, for instance, somersaulting (one frame at a time) over a forest of two-dimensional trees while flowers or planets magically change colors and flit around them. Because the camera and tripod must be elevated to capture the floor as backdrop, I suggest instructors operate the camera while students manage the set and direction. Once all of the vignettes imagined by the students are captured, drop the images into a timeline (or create a video clip per vignette). Have students guide the ordering of the vignettes, design title screens, and select a soundtrack. The video can be saved to disc and/or published on the school’s intranet and website so all can enjoy. Talking points: • Describe how it felt to work with so many people to create our set. • What were some times when you felt really inspired by what someone else was doing? Were there times you felt you couldn’t do what you really wanted to do? How did you work through these situations? • During this activity, when did it feel like you were making art? What about those experiences made them “artful”? • What was your favorite part of the activity? (constructing objects for the set, performing the “stop-motions,” directing someone else in their movement, etc.) • How does your understanding of the creation of the stage and set change when you see the video? How do you think the video would be if we didn’t all work together? • Referring to the video, what are some words that describe what you see? Is this video art? Why?

Instructional Resources

assessment and Conclusion

Leveraging technologies that are currently available in schools not only maximizes school resources, but also expands the breadth and depth of a child’s experience by exposing him/her to the many playful uses of technologies that often appear in schools for their utility as teacher/tester. Connecting students to “work tools” like computers in fun and innovative ways enhances creative thinking and reinforces creative engagements with their day-to-day worlds, which in turn positions creativity as a worthwhile and meaningful experience to be nurtured throughout one’s life. Educators using this instructional resource in their classroom can observe the growth of their students through discussion and the application of new skills and concepts, as well as assess the students’ ability to work together. The activities can be adjusted to match the developmental needs of the class including, but not limited to, asking students to be responsible for photographing, downloading, and creating individual video works. Here, students directly experience the potential of this medium to communicate ideas. Kim Barker is Adjunct Instructor, Department of Language and Arts, at the College of Western Idaho in Nampa. E-mail: kim@owyheesound.com

ART

E D U C A T I O N

RESOURCES www.pbs.org/art21 www.youtube.com www.ubu.com REFERENCES Dewey, J. (1980). Art as experience. New York: The Berkley Publishing Group. (Original work published in 1934) Sheets, H. M. (2009). Turning the subject into artist. Art News, 108(8), 95-99. Sollins, M. (Ed.). (2005). Art: 21 Art in the twenty-ﬁrst century. New York: Harry N. Abrams. Szekely, G. (2006). How children make art: Lessons in creativity from home to school. Reston, VA: National Art Education Association.

ENDNOTE

1To imply continuous movement, generally anywhere between 6-30 frames per one second of playback are required. The range is dependent on the specific media used (cheaply produced cel animation through to video camera capture). The fewer frames per second, the more stilted the motion. The greater the number of frames per second, the smoother the motion. For the stop-motion technique proposed here, 12-18 frames per one second of playback will effectively convey a sense of motion, thus asking students to break motion into this range of parts prepares them for the production of a stop-motion video.

Call for editorial Review Board Nominations

ominations are requested for the Art Education Editorial review Board to replace current members who will soon complete their terms of service. nominees should be active art educators who are willing to review approximately 12 manuscripts per year. the Editorial review Board should consist of “nAEA members representing each division and region of the association.” Following nAEA policy, each member would be willing to serve a 3-year term beginning at the 2011 nAEA convention in Seattle, WA. nominees should be familiar with current trends and issues in art education and should be able to make positive, concrete suggestions the editor can use to help writers strengthen their submissions to the journal. Willingness to evaluate and return manuscripts in a timely manner is vital.

Please send the nominee’s name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, resume or brief description of relevant experience, and a statement that the nominee has agreed to serve in this capacity to: christine Ballengee Morris, PhD Professor, Department of Art Education room 118c-D, 1st Floor Stadium 1961 tuttle Park Place columbus, Ohio 43210 Phone: (614) 292-1230 FAX: (614) 688-4483 cmorris5568@gmail.com

Response requested before February 19, 2011.

January 2011 / Art EDucAtiOn

lesson plans from fellow art teachers throughout the country. We share with you their best classroom-tested, art-teaching experiences and creative ideas. Tap into this invaluable, time-saving resource ... subscribe to Arts & Activities magazine. (Published September through June)

10 issues for only $19.95

(reg. $24.95)

call toll free: 866.278.7678 or visit www.artsandactivities.com SPECIAL PRICE FOR NAEA MEMBERS

When ordering, use promotional code: shb-nae (case sensitive).

A “Toolbox Approach” for Developing Thoughtfully Structured, Creative Art Experiences

Michael hanchet t hanson and Rebecca shulMan heRz

rt and creativity are closely linked in the minds of most people. When asked to explain why art should be part of the school curriculum, respondents commonly answer that art provides an opportunity for students to be creative and express themselves. As professionals who have worked with art education for years—an administrator who works closely with teaching artists engaged in long-term classroom-based teaching residencies, and a psychologist specializing in the development of creativity—we suggest a different perspective. in this article we draw on research that shows how difficult it is to teach students to be creative, and how lessons, including art lessons, need to be thoughtfully structured in order to foster creativity.

To help teachers facilitate students’ creative development, we offer a ‘toolbox approach’ to teaching creativity. This approach encourages teachers to mine existing research as well as personal experiences to develop strategies that can foster creativity. A teacher’s Creativity Toolbox is a set of concepts and techniques that a teacher develops over time to help students think and act creatively. In collaboration with students, teachers may also develop a class toolbox, which includes relevant concepts and techniques that are part of a classroom culture. Finally, students can develop their own toolboxes, which include interests, activities, goals, and habits of mind that spark their curiosity and help them to think creatively.

Art teachers, like other teachers, face the challenge of cultivating creativity within a structured environment. In order to teach skills, concepts, and information effectively, art lessons sometimes require well-defined processes and outcomes, and the very idea of creativity resists such recipes. In successful classrooms we have observed, art teachers and teaching artists find ways to challenge students to consider new possibilities, engage in self-directed processes, and create unique products that reflect students’ own ideas. They innovate in ways that are appropriate but could not have been predicted by the teacher. Students in these classrooms are engaged in interesting, sophisticated, creative, and often surprising work.

In this article, we start by examining ways of defining creativity, as it is a concept that even people immersed in creative work find difficult to describe. We will make suggestions for art teachers regarding developing their own Creativity Toolboxes. Finally, we will give an example of a classroom in which a teacher puts some of these ideas into practice.

Creative Development over a Lifetime

There are two general approaches to thinking about creativity. The first is to understand it as development of a unique point of view over a lifetime; the second is as a set of specific techniques or habits that help people think in different ways. Each of these approaches has supporting research and implies certain approaches to teaching. Creativity can be understood as development of a unique point of view over a lifetime. This idea is recognized by a number of prominent creativity researchers (e.g., Gardner, 1993; Stokes, 2006; Torrance, 2002). Howard Gruber (1989, 1999) found that people who do creative work at some point, or over time, come to commit their time and resources to creative goals and then organize their lives and activities—what Gruber referred to as their network of enterprise—to meet those goals.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

There are, however, significant problems in applying this long-term view of creativity to the classroom. First, it requires teachers to think simultaneously of the class as a whole, learning a shared set of skills and knowledge, and of individual students, developing particular interests, talents, goals, and perspectives. Certainly, almost all teachers accomplish this to some extent, but the classroom context forces a primary focus to be shared classroom goals as outlined in a unit or lesson plan. A second problem is that the ultimate creative outcome, development of the individual’s unique point of view, does not happen within any individual class, but is a long-term pursuit. Even when we think of creativity as a group process, as in recent research on distributed creativity (Sawyer, 2007; Sawyer & DeZutter, 2009), individual team members bring their knowledge and ways of thinking, their own Creative Toolboxes, to the group. It is individuals who take what they learn from that group to their future work. In a classroom, unlike a business setting, learning is a primary objective. Thus, thinking about a class project as a creative group process may add important collaborative skills to a student’s toolbox, but it does not escape the challenge of addressing each individual’s creative development.

this approach, each step includes a brainstorming or divergent thinking phase where numerous ideas are produced, followed by a convergent thinking phase where ideas are evaluated. Following such a formulaic concept of creativity consciously, however, has at least three big problems. First, a formula for creativity is self-contradictory. Second, while formulaic models offer techniques that can generate creative products, creativity can describe processes as well as products. Finally, these approaches assume that creativity is equivalent to problem solving. But creativity is not just problem solving, it is also a process of problem posing. Creative people do not choose a discipline, such as painting or composing music, just because they have to solve a specific problem. Rather, they find that they have an attraction to a discipline, and then pose problems or challenges to further engage with that discipline (Gruber & Wallace, 1999). Vincent van Gogh did not become a painter to find new ways to paint a landscape; rather, he identified painting landscapes as his way to be engaged with the discipline of painting. No single lesson, unit, or even teacher can independently teach a child to be creative; at best, he or she can offer encouragement and tools. To help students develop creativity, teachers should feel empowered to define

In whatever ways students decide to be creative, they will need to appreciate their own distinct perspectives and will need to learn to express those distinctive aspects of themselves in skillful and powerful ways that others can appreciate. Techniques that Help Students Think in Different Ways

The second way to think about creativity is more reductive: to teach students specific techniques or habits that help them think creatively. The idea of divergent thinking (Guilford, 1950; Torrance, 1963/1984) as a cognitive trait of people who tend to think “outside the box” is one such idea. Other approaches tend to prescribe processes, even providing formulas. For example, the Osborn-Parnes approach, known as the Creative Problem-solving Process (Osborn, 1963; Parnes, 1981), prescribes six steps: objective-finding (or “mess-finding”), data-finding, problem-finding, idea-finding, solution-finding, and acceptance-finding. In

Art EducAtion / January 2011

creativity for their own classroom contexts, while recognizing that there is no single method to ensure or assess the impact on any single student’s creativity. From this perspective, the wealth of approaches to creativity is a boon to teachers, who can delve into a variety of concepts and select ones that make most sense for a given project or group. A key idea that teachers can introduce to students is that creativity is a commitment to long-term development of a unique point of view. In whatever ways students decide to be creative, they will need to appreciate their own distinct perspectives and will need to learn to express those distinctive aspects of themselves in skillful and powerful ways that others can appreciate.

The Toolbox Approach

To help teachers use the vast resources available, and to think about creativity in a manageable way, we propose the idea of Creativity Toolboxes that work at three levels: 1. The teacher’s toolbox is part of his or her lifelong development. This is a varied set of concepts and techniques for helping people appreciate how they already think and explore different ways of thinking. The teacher assembles this toolbox over time by studying, and experimenting with, various approaches to creativity. 2. The class’s toolbox is a set of skills and techniques that become part of a particular classroom culture that the teacher introduces and that the students bring to the table as well. 3. Individual students’ toolboxes are the interests, activities, goals, and habits of mind that they accumulate over many art classes and experiences and that strike them as motivating and exciting, and become part of their long-term development. What are possible tools for teaching creativity, and when do we use them? How can teachers create their own approaches to teaching creativity? Luckily, there has been a good deal of research on encouraging creativity in the classroom. Some leading thinkers have synthesized these into very helpful descriptions of how the techniques can work together (e.g., Nickerson, 1999; Runco, 2007; Starko, 2004; Sternberg, 2003; Sternberg & Williams, 1996). A few of the more prominent techniques that tend to appear in these descriptions include: • Modeling creative behaviors and attitudes (including studying lives of creative people) • Talking about creativity as an educational goal • Using open-ended tasks (with many valid solutions) • Encouraging people to define/redefine problems • Providing choices so that people can follow their intrinsic motivations—and encouraging people to follow their inclinations (find what they love to do) • Linking ideas and perspectives (including analogic thinking/metaphor and collaboration) • Questioning assumptions

• Encouraging sensible risks and tolerating mistakes How can teachers decide which aspects of creative thinking to apply? Many researchers agree that modeling desired skills and attitudes is one of the most important techniques (Runco, 2007; Starko, 2004; Sternberg, 2003; Sternberg & Williams, 1996). That is in keeping with the idea that the teacher is developing his or her own toolbox. Each teacher, therefore, has to develop his or her own creative abilities. Ultimately, the question of which tools to use is a question of goals. Each teacher must ask himself or herself, “When I say I want to promote creativity, to what extent do I mean that I want to…” • help students appreciate the thrill of thought and discovery to have that “Aha!” experience? • give students confidence in their individual potential to instill a belief that idiosyncratic ways they see the world can be valuable? • expand students’ senses about the possible by shaking up conventional ways they have come to see the world and teaching them to use imagination, make broad associations, consider metaphors/ analogies, break frames, and take chances?

• show students that a particular modality of expression, like visual art, is valuable and engaging? • help them discover new roles for themselves as artists, as leaders, as thinkers, etc.? or help them engage in their current roles more robustly? Some tools work better for particular goals or art projects than others. And some will work better with particular groups. As with other creative tasks, there is no single, right answer. To illustrate how an art teacher might create a Creativity Toolbox that helps achieve his or her personal goals for students, we offer an example of a teaching artist from the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Learning Through Art Program. In this program practicing artists conduct art lessons at schools over 20 weeks during a school year. The teaching artist works with a classroom teacher to develop a curriculum that complements topics covered in other subject areas. We chose this teaching artist, Ascha Kells Drake, because we had seen her teach previously, and she impressed us with her thoughtfulness and commitment to teaching young students to think like artists. She has articulated two important goals related to creativity: she wants students to have confidence in their own voices and potential,

and she wants them to try taking on the role of artist. Below is the beginning lesson that we observed, in which Drake put her toolbox to use to achieve these goals.

Creating Structures Inspired by Frank Gehry

At P.S. 153 in Manhattan, fifth-grade students are gathered on the rug, with an image of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao in front of them (Figure 1). Drake asks students to look closely and notice details, to think of questions they might ask the architect, Frank Gehry, and to think about materials Gehry used. “It reminds me of a fun house,” shares one student. Others notice shapes, colors, weather, and materials. They want to know what might have inspired Gehry. Drake tells them, “Frank Gehry was very inspired by his grandfather, who had a hardware store. Growing up Gehry worked with pieces of metal and wood, and the experience of playing with these materials transformed him into an architect.” She then asks the students to think back to their earlier experiments with paper. As a group they list techniques they used in creating paper sculptures: folding, twisting, cutting, ripping, rolling, crumpling, and bending as these also will apply to work they are doing today with cardboard. Then she explains the task at hand. “You will be invited up to get four pieces of cardboard. There are two types of cardboard you can choose from. As an artist I make choices about what materials to use, and one choice I made for today is to use masking tape. We have thin masking tape and thick masking tape, so it’s your choice which tape works better for you. Your challenge is to use the cardboard to create a structure.” To demonstrate, she takes four pieces of cardboard and asks students what she should do with them. They guide her in rolling, cutting, and taping the pieces. As the students talk she adds new words to the list: Stack. Build. Slot. Tab. Before she sends students back to their seats, she tells them, “Everyone’s going to come up with a different solution.”

Figure 1. Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. Photo by david Heald.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

After students have worked for about 15 minutes, she says, “Everybody has a beginning form. Take that form and turn it and look at it in a different way. Consider working on it that way—orientation of the structure changes things.” Mid-class, Drake gathered students on the rug and asked them to reflect on their work (Figure 2). She introduced the reflection by saying, “This is a really important part of an artist’s process. I do this in my own studio. You’re lucky. As a group of artists you have each other to learn from.” She then asks students to choose another student’s work and share what they like about it. For example one student says: “I like the one over there, because they tried rolling, and also making little triangles, cutting the cardboard.” After hearing from a number of students, Drake asks, “Does everyone have one new thing they want to try from having looked at the other artists’ works?” We can see in this example some of the choices Drake made about her Creativity Toolbox. She actively models creative behaviors and attitudes through both talking about her own work, and sharing the biography of other artists, such as Frank Gehry. She explicitly relates these stories to the students’ own experiences, telling them that the work they do with her may inspire their own futures in unpredictable ways. Drake treats students as individuals and young artists with their own ideas and encourages them to learn from their fellow student artists in the classroom. Drake poses explicit, open-ended challenges in the art room. She provides an objective for the project, but then takes the students through data-finding, as they brainstorm a list of techniques they had learned for working with paper and evaluate whether or not these might now be applied to cardboard. As the students work, they engage in their own problem-finding and solution-finding.

Figure 2. Students' cardboard strutures.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

If Drake’s understanding of, and goal for, teaching creativity was to expand students’ sense of the possible by shaking up conventional ways they have come to see the world, she would need to re-think her toolbox. However, the tools she has gathered work extremely well for motivating and encouraging students to have confidence in their own voices and to be prepared to solve more individual, in-depth problems that would result from this initiating experience. The lesson featured here was a motivational part of a unit that engaged students in thinking about their own neighborhoods, and what types of structures might transform it in positive ways. Students learned about structures, public art, and architecture; studied their neighborhood; and wrote about what their neighborhood needed to become a better environment in which to live. Suggestions included a space to hang out, a volunteer corps, and more schools with fewer students. Ultimately in another lesson, they created prints, inspired in part by their imaginative cardboard structures, which could serve these functions (Figure 5).

The P.S. 153 fifth-grade class developed its own Class Creativity Toolbox. Their tools included observing art (both their own and that of professionals) in an open-minded way, making free associations with other things that interested them, and using imagined scenarios to stimulate their curiosity such as what they now would ask Frank Gehry. They alternated between imaginative thinking and rooting ideas in their own real-life neighborhoods, opening up a world of possibilities, but also making concrete connections. They also kept sketchbooks, in which they recorded notes and saved copies of images viewed, as well as sketched out their own ideas. With the support of these sketchbooks, they adopted a multi-modal approach to their work, alternating between visual and verbal modes of thinking. The students at P.S. 153 looked to each other as resources, asking each other for advice, and borrowing ideas from one another as projects developed. Finally, each student developed his or her own Creative Toolbox. For example, one of the students, Brian,1 is interested in three-dimensional art, and experimented

Figures 3 and 4. Ascha Kells drake helps students create prints of their imaginary neighborhood strutures.

with ways to make two-dimensional prints as layered and three-dimensional as possible. He also used engineering books as resources, studying different parts of architectural structures. Brian created interesting titles for his work, evidencing his fluency in moving between visual and verbal modalities. Brianâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s emerging creative interests and skills are obvious. The teacher, however, may never know all of the interests and skills that students develop and may someday trace back to this class. Thinking of the studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; creative development as personal toolboxes, however, can be helpful as teachers look for opportunities to help students find their interests, deepen their motivations, explore new ways of thinking, and develop useful skills.

Surprise: The Underlying Challenge

Biographies of creative people are full of stories of skipping school, going days without sleep, and, in general, disregarding many of societal norms and rules. Truly creative ideas and people challenge us, and a creative student can catch a teacher off-guard. A student engaged in posing his or her own problems may not complete an assignment as outlined by a teacher. A student who uses materials in an innovative way may appear not to be completing an assignment and may even disrupt the class. Responding to that moment may be one of the most difficult teaching skills to develop. Again, there is no right answer, there are many appropriate answers, and no teacher is on target all the time.

One of the biggest surprises we saw Drake address was during a printmaking lesson late in the project. After weeks spent exploring their neighborhood and imagining structures that might transform their communities in a positive way (Figure 3), students were creating prints of their imaginary structures. They had printed earlier in the year, creating print plates and prints based on existing buildings. By this point in the project, students were able to combine their experiences printing, their envisioned buildings, and their strong identity as artists. Drake asked each student to choose a single ink color for this print (Figure 4). One student, however, combined ink colors, creating a print with horizontal lines of color. This solution was not what the Drake envisioned, and the surprise was a bit disturbing, amid the effort of managing 30

Drake treats students as individuals and young artists with their own ideas and encourages them to learn from their fellow student artists in the classroom.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

Figure 5. Prints inspired by a neighborhood transformation lesson.

fifth-graders making prints. In the final reflection, though, Drake told the class, “I really appreciate that this artist took the techniques in a totally new direction. It’s taught me as a printmaker a new way to use this material.” A commitment to teaching creativity is a commitment to helping each student discover his or her inner artist, rebel, and thinker. Teaching individuals, and creating a space where individuals act differently— sometimes, very differently—is more difficult than teaching a skill such as color mixing, or a concept such as composition. The art

classroom can be a place for developing critical thinking. The difference is in careful consideration of goals and techniques by applying insights and skills that teachers develop over the course of their professional lives. Likewise, facilitating creativity effectively in an art lesson requires careful consideration of the goals for—and definitions of—creativity, as well as supporting these goals with a Creativity Toolbox of techniques and approaches that they have developed and continue to expand on as they help students develop their own Creativity Toolboxes as both class members and as individuals.

Michael Hanchett Hanson is Director, Masters Concentration in Creativity and Cognition, Teachers College, Columbia University, Department of Human Development. E-mail: Mah59@columbia. edu Rebecca Shulman Herz is Head of Education, The Noguchi Museum, Long Island City, New York. E-mail: rherz@ noguchi.org

RefeRences Gardner, H. (1993). Creating minds: An anatomy of creativity seen through the lives of Freud, Einstein, Picasso, Stravinsky, Eliot, Graham, and Gandhi. New York: BasicBooks. Gruber, H. E. (1989). The Evolving Systems approach to creative work. In D. B. Wallace & H. E. Gruber (Eds.), Creative people at work (pp. 3-22). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gruber, H. E., & Wallace, D. B. (1999). The case study method and evolving systems approach for understanding unique creative people at work. In R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Creativity handbook (pp. 93-115). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Guilford, J. P. (1950). Creativity. American Psychologist, 5, 444-454. Nickerson, R. S. (1999). Enhancing creativity. In. R. J. Sternberg (Ed.), Handbook of creativity (pp. 392-430). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Osborn, A. (1963). Applied imagination: Principles and procedures of creative thinking. New York: Scribner’s. Parnes, S. J. (1981). Magic of your mind. Buffalo, NY: Bearly. Runco, M. (2007). Creativity: Theories and themes: Research, development and practice. Burlington, MA: Elsevier Academic Press. Sawyer, K. (2007). Group genius: The creative power of collaboration. New York: Basic Books. Sawyer, K., & DeZutter, S. (2009). Distributed creativity: How collective creations emerge from collaboration. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 3(2), 81-92. Starko, A. J. (2004). Creativity in the classroom: Schools of curious delight. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Sternberg, R. (2003). The development of creativity as a decision-making process. In K. Sawyer (Ed.), Creativity and development (pp. 91-138). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Sternberg, R., & Williams, W. M. (1996). How to develop student creativity. Baltimore, MD: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Stokes, P. D. (2006). Creativity from constraints: The psychology of breakthrough. New York: Springer. Torrance, E. P. (1963/1984). The Torrance tests of creative thinking. Bensenville, IL: Scholastic Testing Service. Torrance, E. P. (2002). The manifesto: A guide to developing a creative career. Westport, CT: Ablex.

endnote

1Not student’s real name.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Teaching Students with Learning Disabilities and ADHD Nasco Arts & Crafts Division (NAEA) Art Education Jan 2011 NAEA1101

NAEA1101

A comprehensive one day workshop, held on May 20, 2011, for art teachers who work with students with learning disabilities and ADHD. This program presents the exciting and innovative ways the arts can be used to teach academic skills to students with learning disabilities and ADHD. Meet Christopher Rauschenbe Rauschenberg, noted photographer and son of Robert Rauschenberg.

lois.meyer@labschool.org

DEADLINE: March 15, 2011

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

Creativity, Technology, Art,

and Pedagogical Practices

s I started preparing and writing this article, a colleague inferred that everything to be said about creativity had been said 10 years ago. in the shadow of such preconceptions, i want to organize some thoughts on the relationship of contemporary technologies and creativity. i start by considering various definitions of creativity along with underlying questions of how we live, how we think, and how we learn with new technologies. i soon realized that the relationship of the expressive nature of new technology with creativity is complex and requires a renewed examination of how these apply to art education. Creativity serves an important role in culture, education, and the workforce as it “provides the impetus for any act, idea, or product that changes an existing domain or discipline into a new entity” (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996, p. 28). In the 21st century, information technology is forming a powerful alliance with creative practices in the arts and design to establish new domains in information technology and creative practices. According to Mitchell, Inouye, & Blumenthal (2003): the start of a creative act is the escape from one range of assumptions—a context—often with the aid of another context seemingly at odds with the first but that provides a new way of viewing what we already thought we understood. The arts do this for IT, and IT does this for the arts. (p. 31) Likewise technology processes, tools, and interfaces rekindle an interest in creativity and its expression, as exemplified by the many online activities that are engaging creative innovation. An example of creativity’s effect and expression is the massive hyperwall display that pulses in sync with downloads, and showcases the 20,000 iPhone® applications (Marsal, 2009). The display illustrates not only the underlying insurgence in the creation of iPhone applications (over 200,000 applications at this writing) by the public, but is also reflective of a popular interest in adapting new technology creatively for personal use (Figure 1). In living with contemporary information technologies, more and more people are becoming active participants and co-creators with interfaces—expanding into development of tutorials, blogs, wikis, and social bookmarks. These personally meaningful activities emphasize sharing and collaboration through transparent formats. As a result, art educators should recognize that creative and cultural education extends beyond classroom curricula and into contemporary everyday life and consider possible creative resolves in more formal education environments.

Michelle tillandeR

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Today’s technologies motivate and offer an opportunity to engage with systems and an array of “objects to think with” (Pappert, 1980) and as a medium to elucidate multiple possibilities dynamically (Carpenter & Taylor, 2003; Graham, 2004). In these contexts engagement is not a material object in the traditional sense, but a shift to a technological process as an ‘object’ of interest and play, as well as an interface that moves beyond the computer to a culture encoded in digital process and form (Manovich, 2001; Pappert, 1993; Turkle, 2005). As the previous iPhone wall example showcases, shifting from material object to process is becoming increasingly more evident in our lives as consumers are becoming producers. Additionally, digital technologies are changing what it means to create and what is promoted as cultural innovation. For instance, we must consider new frameworks that promote both agency and control (Karaganis, 2007). These frameworks range from social network representations (e.g., Twitter, Flickr, Facebook), to filtering techniques (e.g., Google and Bing search engines, Animato, Wordle), and digital rights management (e.g., creative commons, open source software). As communication technologies offer a powerful union with creative and imaginative expression, the breadth of these technologies offers opportunities for creative synthesis and hybrid forms of information representations. The following discussion explores a range of assumptions about creativity, art, and technology and the role that they play in pedagogical practices.

Assumptions and deﬁnitions about creativity and Visual Arts

Definitions of creativity often change as a result of a specific cultural climate and create challenges with the conceptualization of creativity research as it relates to visual arts. Creativity is typically used to refer to the act of producing new ideas, approaches, or actions; while innovation is the process of both generating and applying such creative ideas in a specific context (Davis & Rimm, 2004; Horowitz & O’Brien, 1985; Piirto, 1998; Sternberg, 1999). As a process, creativity has been defined as application of synthetic, analytic, and practical thinking (Sternberg & Williams, 1996). Creativity research is often contentious, and LaChapelle (1983) calls attention to the shift from definitions such as problem solving and elaboration as strategies, and argues that we take a closer look at how creativity interfaces with sociological contexts. He questions the composition and characteristics of groups as they establish a social structure of values, norms, and

codes that characterize a creative construct. He contends that the greater the degree of boundary breaking of normative values and codes, the greater the degree of creativity elicited by a cultural group. For example, contemporary artists often engage in code switching—namely, learning new values and codes, and questioning old values and codes through critical art practices that often collude, repurpose, and re-engineer newer technologies. I would argue that it is critical to reflect on sociological aspects of creativity as well as considering how boundary breaking, code switching, and technological environments might hinder or facilitate creative use of technology in art teaching and learning. One approach is exploration of new media artists and their artwork to expose not only the innovative uses and misuses, but to additionally uncover technology’s hidden possibilities. Cross (2002) explores creative cognitive processes of three exceptional designers from different design domains and discovers commonality among their approaches. One common observation is that creative design often comes about when there is tension between a problem’s goal and the criteria used for its solution. This can happen when designers are constrained within a framework of design principles and explore a design space holistically to foreshadow different outcomes, and then restructure problems in a distinctively personal way. In terms of pedagogy, when designing a curriculum I look at young people’s engagement with new media beyond the framework of my classes to gain new insights on what motivates self-guided learning and peerbased learning. This reflection offers insights for restructuring teaching strategies. Designers engage creativity to balance multiple constraints and interpretations to arrive at a desired solution. As an example, the next paragraph describes a lesson that demonstrates the use of metaphorical thinking, divergent thinking, and synthesis as a holistic approach for students to frame and creatively express themselves through their artwork. Cross’ process can be seen through both teaching and learning experiences in which I engage high school students in critically examining the shifting forms and meanings in digital advertisements. Using the works of artists Nancy Burson and Mariko Mori, my students explored issues of identity, metaphor, and the fluid interface of digital imaging in advertising; the students then framed the lesson in terms of their personal experiences. In considering the meaningmaking process holistically, students were prompted with questions that considered curriculum, art, and technology as disciplines and identity. For instance, how do artists organize their knowledge and skills? What theories govern knowledge and visual representation? How are personal and audience outlooks grounded? Answers to these questions, along with students creating digital, non-representational, and representational self portraits, focused on the use of metaphor, analogy, and identity to expose many layers of underlying tensions between traditional forms and digital representations. As the students visually made meaning through their art, they grappled conceptually with conflicts among skills and ideas, skills and context, the role of school and inspiration, the order of ideas and outcomes, and the relationships among visual information, form, and process. (See Figure 2.)

Figure 1. iPhone wall. Since the writing of this paper the number of iPhone apps over past few months has gone from 20,000 (August 2009) to 200,000 (February 2010).

Figure 2. Untitled, digital image, by high school student Brittani Kelzenberg.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

Figure 3. Unplugged from Technology, ink, color pencil, and watercolor, by high school student Ben Boshart.

Likewise Csikszentmihalyi (1996) shifts thinking about creativity from problem-solving to problem-finding, further arguing that, “It is easier to enhance creativity by changing conditions in the environment than by trying to make people think more creatively” (p. 1). Our assumptions, constructs, and varying definitions of creativity that shape teaching creatively, teaching for creativity, and teaching as artistry, create tensions and dilemmas for educators especially in schools with a centrally controlled approach to pedagogy.

technology, Art, and things as they could Be otherwise

It is interesting to note that as the computer began to be used for and with art, questions as to what constitutes tools began to surface for early computer art pioneers. For example, Harold Cohen, an artist and early pioneer in computer-generated art, developed an autonomous art-making machine (AARON) as an initiate for artificial intelligence (McCorduck, 1990). This work caused him to wrestle with creative innovations such as machines generating or initiating autonomous behavior (Cohen, 1973), along with differences between traditional artist tools and the computer as a tool. He describes a computer that has its own feedback paths, conducts its own investigations, and modifies its own behaviors from feedback on what it has done. These ideas—that people can create in tandem with computers—confront historical Western constructs of creativity and originality, and in having no precedents we need inquiry on how thinking and knowing are impacted when creating in tandem. With Cohen’s early research came many assumptions that moved to a broader and more holistic understanding, thereby impacting definitions of technology. More recently, we have come to define technologies though a variety of means such as inventions or machines, development of ideas or epistemologies, changing social practices, or a combination of these (Gitelman, 2006). With these broader definitions of technology comes a continual requirement to re-examine and expand our personal and pedagogical definitions of technology. For example, Gitelman’s definition of media not only encompasses technological forms and their associated protocols of communication, but also realizes communication as a cultural practice that brings “different people on the same mental map, sharing or engaging with popular ontologies of representation” (p. 7). Thus technologies are viewed as complex, and uniquely grounded in social and cultural contexts with room for creative exploration and context. This requires developing a balance among creative expression, knowledge, and skills. In educational settings, this balance must also include fostering creative development for students across all learning styles, and various social, cultural, and economic barriers. For example, in one high school, I introduced works of new media artists and then designed a lesson plan to conceptually include the students’ everyday experiences with technology into their artwork.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

This intentionally broad definition of technology and its application resulted in artworks inclusive of social experiences, and inspired expression through traditional art forms about technology as well as artworks involving new media. By combining multiple perspectives of differing domains—art, digital media, self, culture, and society—with reflections on the contours of these networks, one student communicated that technology almost forms our culture, and is defining where contemporary art fits in our world. In revealing this idea through a cultural analysis of technology and art, a student can move beyond understanding art and technology as isolated entities and gain alternative perspectives and critical insights on the constructed boundaries of technology and art education. By creating possibilities and exploring interpretive frameworks, students gained insights on how artistic and aesthetic expressions can contribute to an understanding of digital cultural worlds. One digital artwork juxtaposed digital text and digital images to discuss the topic of abortion. Another example used an ink-and-pen drawing (see Figure 3) to whimsically explore how we are like a ‘fish out of water’ when we are unplugged from technology. It is naïve to consider a radical break or to overemphasize the unique possibilities of entirely new digital worlds. What are often overlooked are artworks by young people who creatively adjust to, explore, and illuminate responses to information technologies. In one high school, the technology themes generated by students involved concepts of old technologies as precursors to new technologies; issues of public and private spaces in regard to surveillance technology; the idea of losing clarity while gaining immediacy; being a fish out of water without technology; and technology’s role in creating ideal beauty. These themes metaphorically link agents of change in a network—and view technology as more than just a tool.

technology, Media, and Material Meaning

Technology and new media are not created or consumed in isolation from older media or in an isolated cultural context (Bolter & Grusin, 1999). Rather new and old media repeat each other. Similarly, we can look at tradition and digital approaches for a blended learning approach, often harnessing the best of both environments. We also can compare strategies in traditional and virtual learning environments to see how one might inform the other. For example, in her master’s project, Lloyd (2009) interviewed and observed art educators in traditional (face-to-face) and virtual (online) teaching environments. In this research Lloyd does not isolate the cultural context of traditional and virtual environments, but explores both environments independently and collectively to challenge teaching strategies and paradigms. For example, she finds that a common set of factors are important in both face-to-face and virtual classrooms; these include personal interaction, building community, reflection on types and frequency of strategies, and an ability to encourage personal discovery through the environment.

Figure 4. Stroller Flaneur, video installation with map, by Katerie Gladdys. reprinted with permission of the artist.

Understanding how students interact with content through creative explorations, such as those in the art classroom, becomes even more valuable in today’s technological culture. Similarly, Burton, Horowitz, and Abeles (2000) extend understanding of experience with art practices and ideas by considering our relationship to material and artists’ relationships to their artworks. Specifically they call for “re-presentation” (p. 333) through the agency of a particular material, where experiences are reflected, entertained, constructed, and deconstructed as the artwork comes into being and the world and the self are known differently. In the work Stroller Flaneur (2009), new media artist Katerie Gladdys challenges the viewer’s visual relationship with his or her environment by taking the viewer into a re-presented reality that is augmented and activated by technology (e.g., cameras on the stroller). Through editing and juxtaposition of video and audio clips, the artist forces the viewer to consider the immediate environment and the subtle differences between interactivity and engagement by reconciling two sets of stimuli (Figure 4). Likewise, art educators need to continually consider the impact of the interaction and engagement with technology in a variety of educational environments. That is reconciling the use of technology with its culture influences and implications on new teaching strategies. As we consider the agency of a particular material, we are confronted with questions such as: What are the agencies of a particular medium (e.g., new technology interfaces)? Where is materiality replaced by process? For example in Season Three of Art: 21—Art in the TwentyFirst Century (2005), exploration of contemporary art and artistic insights probes underlying assumptions of creativity to break conventional barriers and arrive at a new way of seeing. In one Art: 21 episode, artist Krzysztof Wodiczko creates large-scale, slide and video projections of images and performances on buildings and monuments. He disrupts our traditional understanding of the functions of public space and architecture by performing visually in and on the structural artifact of the institution.

Another example is Washington DC-based artist Tim Tate (2009) who blends the traditional craft of glass with new media technologies as a framework for his electronic reliquaries. His sculpture, Page 100 of Each Volume of the 1954 World Book Encyclopedia (Figure 5), captures the culture of the book though video footage of page 100 of each volume of the World Book Encyclopedia from 1954. Tate’s sculptures encase glass objects and a tiny video screen in bell jars to engage the viewer in an experience with the contemporary artifact as ephemeral video footage. By combining the narrative of the reliquary with miniature looping digital video footage, Tate engages old and new interfaces to explore themes such as memory and our intimate relationships to artifacts. Thus new media technologies in conjunction with traditional materials can be used to explore new forms of imagining, perceiving, and representing. Through these new forms we must not privilege technology, but consider the body’s relation to information aesthetics in reconfiguring bodily experience and reconceiving materiality through virtual and abstract codes of information (Munster, 2006). Although exposing art education preservice teachers to a variety of technologies for teaching can be invaluable, it actually is their personal creative synthesis among technology tools, teaching strategies, and content that offers lasting and invaluable approaches for engaging learning. Additionally, understanding how students interact with content through creative explorations, such as those in the art classroom, becomes even more valuable in today’s technological culture. These responses creatively push and pull ideas while focusing on the old and new possibilities created by these technologies. For example, the introduction of new media artworks often challenges educators about their assumptions of rule-based curriculum—that often focuses on drawing, painting, sculpture—and students about their assumptions of artistic means of expression.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

Figure 6. Untitled, mixed media, by high school student Vangel Quilon.

Figure 5. Page 100 of Each Volume of the 1954 World Book Encyclopedia, mixed media, by tim tate. courtesy Fuller Museum. reprinted with permission of the artist.

Art educators should not only be exploring new technology tools, but should be exploring and observing these tools simultaneously with their preservice art educators.

Contemporary conversations and research on young people and technology continues to demonstrate that young people are not passive in their encounters with contemporary media (Donovan & Katz, 2009). In 2006, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation launched a grant-making initiative titled Digital Media & Learning. In the initial set of exploratory grants, focus was on technology practices of youth outside formal environments of public schools. This initiative supports research about considering how communication, learning, and technology are converging and how digital technologies are changing the way young people learn, play, socialize, and participate in civic life. Specifically, several of the research projects explore how digital media and digital networks may lead to various innovations and unexpected outcomes, including a range of unintended learning experiences and unanticipated social encounters (McPherson, 2008). Art educators cannot ignore online communication and how social differences operate in a digital culture. This is especially important as popular culture and discourses are heavily saturated with visual images. As a specific intervention, artist Mary Flanagan intentionally breaks the mold of traditional gaming environments that often embody antagonistic and antisocial themes and visuals (e.g., violence, crime), and overly competitive game interaction and goals. Instead, she developed an educational computer game (RAPUNSEL) to teach underprivileged girls computer programming through a design philosophy that includes new interaction models and new role models in computer science, thus creating challenges in a playful world (Flanagan & Nissenbaum, 2009). This is an example of how an online community of learners can influence technology as a tool for learning and creative expression.

technology and creativity in Pedagogical Practices

Today effective teaching requires creative solutions to the dynamics of content, pedagogy, and technology. For example, the Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow Project (ACOT, 1985; ACOT2, 2008) is long-term research project sponsored by Apple Computer, to explore how learning and teaching change as teachers and students have access to interactive computer technologies. ACOT identified stages (entry, adoption, adaptation, appropriation, and invention) though which teachers progressively engage technology (Dwyer, Ringstaff, & Sandholtz, 1991).

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Figure 7. Untitled, acrylic paint, canvas, and tulle, by high school student Megan christensen. right Figure 8. An art teacher’s video reflection embedded in a research paper.

As teachers have become more comfortable and proficient with technology it is the stage of invention that offers teachers an opportunity to be creative, subvert original intentions of the programmer, and “repurpose technology” (Floden & Ashburn, 2006) for learning and meaning making. For example, educators and students are using Google Earth as more than a map. They are shifting from a passive use of a tool to an active engagement by constructing and designing virtual tours linking educational content (e.g., virtual tours of art museums). As another example of the inventive stage, educators are considering an archeological approach to new media (Tyner, 2009). For instance, art educators and students can explore the evolution of technologies (i.e., printing press, typewriter, and slide projector) as a way to interrogate new media (i.e., blogs, Twitter, Facebook) with a focus on the subtleties of using communication as a cultural practice through students’ actual experiences. This positions educators to repurpose strategies for teaching and learning—especially as each new generation of students investigates and uses technologies for its own creative purposes. While contemporary new media artists offer engaging insights on technology, we should encourage artworks by young people that creatively adjust to, explore, and illuminate responses to contemporary technologies. Their responses can creatively push and pull ideas while illustrating constraints and new possibilities created by those technologies in real world experiences (Tillander, 2008). Artists often exploit a technology’s hidden potential. In a recent research project, I observed high school students exploring issues such as old technologies as precursors to new and public and private spaces in regard to surveillance technology (Tillander, 2008). Specifically, one high school student critically considers how technology impacts our lives. Through a mixed media artwork (Figure 6) the student expresses her position about communication technology: we gain immediacy while losing clarity—namely, the balance of ubiquitous communication versus the transformations resulting from digital interfaces. Similarly, another student created a painting (Figure 7) that whimsically positions the viewer to consider how surveillance technologies change the notion of public and private space by juxtaposing an old-fashioned bathtub with surveillance cameras. This student drew inspiration from Jill Magid’s work Evidence Locker (2004), in which surveillance

cameras are turned on her to repurpose and investigate how tools and processes (e.g., surveillance) are ubiquitously integrated into contemporary everyday life. Art educators should not only be exploring new technology tools, but should be exploring and observing these tools simultaneously with their preservice art educators. Specifically, how technologies function in our daily lives and how artists might repurpose them for art education should be explored. This creative process activates new ways of seeing by challenging conventions, and thus can be applied to education to creatively approach content, technology, and teaching. For example, Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy (Churches, 2009) is a practical classroom teacher’s wiki that illustrates an inventive revision of Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy (Forehand, 2005) to account for new behaviors and actions emerging as technology advances and becomes more ubiquitous. Specifically it links technology processes—blogging, podcasting, media clipping, hyperlinking, tagging—to each of the verbs in the higher order thinking skills taxonomies originally developed by Bloom, Englehart, Furst, Hill, and Krathwohl (1956). Emerging conceptual spaces created by new technologies require us to develop possible frameworks that guide our pedagogical thinking. For example, Leão (2008) illustrates four tasks directing her teaching as an educator of the arts and new technologies that offer creative possibilities for art educators. She argues for thinking about pedagogical experiences as works-in-progress, creating a system that simultaneously records learning processes, recognizing that all our actions have an educational impact, and constructing a value system in collaboration with students. Leão’s tasks offer art educators a framework to re-vision and dynamically model creativity through

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

their own creative experiences, processes, and analyses. For example, the recording of learning processes can be strategized and achieved through student blogs, digital portfolios, wikis, and social networks. This can be illustrated by embedding short reflections into a text document, resulting in video experts guiding learning processes and remaining accessible by clicking on an image (see Figure 8).

conclusion

In closing, I continue to imagine pedagogical experiences with technology as a creative works-in-progress, “between what computers can do and what society will choose to do with them” (Pappert, 1993, p. 5), and to continue exploring how processes and artifacts of contemporary culture motivate creativity. I think about exploring how artists, students, and teachers using technology force the renewed examination of creative expressions in art education, especially how their understanding of creativity, technology, and pedagogy informs one another. Finally, I imagine possibilities of calling attention to the potential of problem finding and problem solving for restructuring and enhancing transformations of creativity, technology, and pedagogy in art education. Michelle Tillander is Assistant Professor of Art Education at the University of Florida. E-mail: mtilland@ufl.edu AuthoR’s note Special thanks for support from educators Betsy Dijulio, Chris Buhner, and Mr. Kinneson, along with their students and the Virginia Beach City School System. All artwork by students is reprinted with the permission of the artists.

RefeRences Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow Projects (ACOT, 1985; ACOT2, 2008). Retrieved July 24, 2008, from http://ali.apple.com/acot2/ Art:21—Art in the twenty-first century (2005). Retrieved March 30, 2009, from www.pbs.org/ art21/series/seasonthree/index.html Bloom, B., Englehart, M., Furst, E., Hill, W., & Krathwohl, D. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of educational goals. Handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York, Toronto: Longmans, Green. Bolter, J. D., & Grusin, R. (1999). Remediation: Understanding new media. Cumberland, RI: MIT Press.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Burton, J. M., Horowitz, R., & Abeles, H. (2000). Learning in and through the arts: The question of transfer. Studies in Art Education, 4(1), 228-257. Carpenter, B. S. II, & Taylor, P. G. (2003). Racing thoughts: Altering our ways of knowing and being through computer hypertext. Studies in Art Education, 45(1), 40-55. Cohen, H. (1973). Parallel to perception: Some notes on the problem of machine-generated art. Computer Studies, 4, 3-4. Churches, A. (2009). Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy. Retrieved June 2009, from http://edorigami. wikispaces.com/Bloom%27s+Digital+Taxonomy Cross, N. (2002). Creative cognition in design: Processes of exceptional designers. In Proceedings of the 4th Conference on Creativity & Cognition (Loughborough, UK, October 13-16, 2002). C&C ’02. ACM, New York, NY (pp. 14- 19). DOI= Retrieved from doi: acm.org.lp.hscl.ufl. edu/10.1145/581710.581714 Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1996). Creativity: Flow and the psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Collins. Davis, G. A., & Rimm, S. B. (2004). Education of the gifted and talented (5th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education. Digital Media and Learning. (2006). Retrieved from http://digitallearning.macfound.org/site/c. enJLKQNlFiG/b.2029199/k.94AC/Latest_News. htm Donovan, G. T., & Katz, C. (2009). Cookie monsters: Seeing young people’s hacking as creative practice. Children, Youth and Environments, 19(1), 197-222. Dwyer, D., Ringstaff, C., & Sandholtz, J. (1991). Changes in teachers’ beliefs and practices in technology-rich classrooms. Educational Leadership, 48(8), 45-52. Flanagan, M., & Nissenbaum, H. (2009). A game design methodology to incorporate social activist themes. Retrieved September 29, 2009, from http://valuesatplay.org/wp-content/uploads/ 2007/09/vap-chifinal06sub.pdf Floden, R., & Ashburn, E. (2006). Meaningful learning using technology. New York: Teachers College Press. Forehand, M. (2005). Bloom’s taxonomy: Original and revised. In M. Orey (Ed.), Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved January 2009, from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/ epltt Gitelman, L. (2006). Always already new: Media, history and the data of culture. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Gladdys, K. (2009). Stroller Flaneur. Retrieved from http://layoftheland.net Graham, P. (2004). Hackers and painters: Big ideas from the computer age. Cambridge, MA: O’Reilly Media. Horowitz, F., & O’Brien, M. (1985). The gifted and talented: Developmental perspectives. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Karaganis, J. (2007). Structures of participation in digital culture. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan.

LaChapelle, J. R. (1983). Creativity research: Its sociological and educational limitations. Studies in Art Education, 24(2), 131-139. Leão, L. (2008). The creative spirit in the age of digital technologies: Seven tactical exercises. In M. Alexenberg (Ed.), Educating artists for the future: Learning at the intersections of art, science, technology, and culture (pp. 291-301). Chicago, IL: Intellect Books. Lloyd, S. (2009). Investigating the teaching methods of visual art educators working in face-to-face and virtual environments. Unpublished master’s project, University of Florida. Gainesville. Magid, J. (2004). Evidence locker. Retrieved January 19, 2005, from www.evidencelocker.net/story.php Manovich, L. (2001). The language of new media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Marsal, K. (2009, June 9). Apple stuns WWDC crowd with pulsating App Store hyperwall. Retrieved July 10, 2009, from www.appleinsider.com/articles/ 09/06/09/apple_stuns_wwdc_crowd_with_ pulsating_app_store_hyperwall.html McCorduck, P. (1990). Aaron’s code: MetaArt, artificial intelligence, and the work of Harold Cohen, New York: W. H. Freeman. McPherson, T. (2008). Digital youth, innovation, and the unexpected. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Mitchell, W., Inouye, A., & Blumenthal, M. (2003). Beyond productivity: Information, technology, innovation, and creativity. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. Munster, A. (2006). Materializing new media: Embodiment in information aesthetics. Lebanon, NH: Dartmouth College Press. Pappert, S. (1980). Mind storms children, computers, and powerful ideas. New York: Basic Books. Pappert, S. (1993). The children’s machine: Rethinking schools in the age of the computer. New York: Basic Books. Piirto, J. (1998). Understanding those who create. Scottsdale, AZ: Great Potential Press. Flanagan, M. (2009). Rapunsel. Retrieved September 15, 2009, from http://rapunsel.org Sternberg, R. (Ed.). (1999). Handbook of creativity. New York: Cambridge University Press. Sternberg, R., & Williams W. M. (1996). How to develop student creativity. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision & Curriculum Development. Tate, T. (2009). Retrieved July 25, 2009, from http:// timtateglass.com/ Tillander, M. (2008). Cultural Interface as an approach to new media art education. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, The Pennsylvania State University, State College. Turkle, S. (2005). The second self: Computers and the human spirit. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Tyner, K. (2009). Audiences, intertextuality, and new media literacy. International Journal of Learning and Media, 1(2), 25-31. Retrieved from http://dx. doi.org/10.1162/ijlm.2009.0020

Cognition and Emotions in the Creative Process

nicole M. Gnezda

rt teachers are most successful when they teach the whole child, with an awareness of the student inside as well as the work that is being produced outside. therefore, when teaching our students about their own creativity and that of artists they study, it is helpful to understand complex neurological and emotional operations that are active during creative processes. in this article i will explain these operations in order to help art teachers more fully understand what happens inside their students as they create, and i will suggest ways teachers can effectively foster their studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; creativity.

The Experience of Creativity above Figure 1. Giving of Self, Kevin Pfefferle, Grade 3, Westerville ohio city Schools.

Creativity is a cognitive-emotional-manipulative experience that is accessible to all people. Creativity is cognitive because it is about innovating and developing ideas and occurs via specialized mental processes. It is emotional because emotions are integral (Clark, 1992) and â&#x20AC;&#x153;loom largeâ&#x20AC;? (Roe, 1963, p. 172) in the creative process. Self-reports and empirical research about creativity show a rather predictable sequence of emotional sensations that tend to occur as the process evolves. Creativity is manipulative because idea

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

development happens not only internally but also through interaction with a medium as an idea is being implemented. Why individuals differ in the quantity of creative output and the ease with which they engage in creative processes is unclear. One school of thought is that creativity is a natural human ability but is suppressed in most people by social mores and educational practices. Highly creative people are the exceptions who resist socialization pressures (Epstein, 2009). Other scholars believe that some people are gifted with higher levels of creative ability (Haier & Jung, 2008; Martindale & Hasenfus, 1978; Mednick, 1962; Torrence, 1961). Self-reports of creative experiences, brain scans, and comparisons between highly creative and less creative people have begun to reveal that specialized cognitive functions and a spectrum of emotions are associated with creative work.

Creativity and Cognitive Functions

Research suggests that creative thinking involves mental work that is different in style and brain activity than that used during other modes of thinking, such as logic or analysis (Heilman, 2005). While creative processes utilize a variety of neural areas and brain functions, the aspects of creative thinking that result in innovation may derive from work in particular neurological areas and through variations in neurological arousal. There is indication of a connection between novelty of ideas and right hemisphere processing (Haier & Jung, 2008; Heilman, 2005; Andersen & Milbrandt, 2005). Holistic/global perspectives, understanding and producing metaphors, identifying relationships between pieces of information, experiencing and expressing emotions, and perhaps even controlling arousal levels are characteristic of both creative thinking and the right hemisphere’s specialized style of cognitive functioning (Heilman, 2005). Association—making connections between disparate ideas—is often cited as the primary mental operation of creative thinking (Andersen & Milbrandt, 2005; Heilman, 2005; Koestler, 1976; Rothenberg & Hausman, 1976; Mednick, 1962). Findings from brain-mapping studies support this, showing high activation in brains’ associative

cortices during creative ideation (Andreasen, 2009; Haier & Jung, 2008; Heilman, 2005). Instead of focusing on a single subject, creative thinkers seem to unconsciously contemplate many pieces of information and trains of thought at the same time. Researchers believe that thought patterns scatter to search a wide scope of ideas and then coalesce into relationships between what might otherwise have remained unrelated concepts. These combinations of thoughts form new and unusual ideas. Effects of right-hemisphere, multi-directional, associative thinking are many and may manifest as traits common to highly creative people. Such people tend to see big pictures or underlying structures. They think metaphorically and transfer knowledge from one situation to another. They recognize patterns and are frequently described as intuitive because they often understand situations in ways not apparent to others (Myers & Myers, 1990; Barron, 1969a; MacKinnon, 1965; C. J. Jung, 1923). Highly creative thinkers are sometimes stereotyped as daydreamers or absentminded-professor types who struggle with deadlines and the completion of projects. Though perceived as negative by a society that emphasizes productivity and work ethic, these behaviors may be, instead, the outward expressions of low levels of neural activity that are essential to creative processes. Studies suggest that low brain arousal seems necessary for the ideation stage of a creative process, especially for those who are considered highly creative (Haier & Jung, 2008; Martindale & Hasenfus, 1978). Low levels of neural arousal during creative ideation (Fink & Neubauer, 2006; Haier & Jung, 2008; Molle et al., 1996) permit the scattered, multi-directionally distributed thinking necessary for innovative ideas. In their research, Jausovec (2000) and Martindale and Hasenfus (1978) compared highly creative people to more average ones and found highly creative individuals were more likely than their more typical counterparts to exhibit low cortical energy levels during creative problem solving. The reverse, high arousal, is associated with stereotypical, unoriginal responses (Martindale & Armstrong, 1974). Perhaps high arousal causes the brain to zero-in too quickly on a common thought and end the

idea search before an innovative association occurs. Longer idea searches are important to creativity because, according to Guilford (1967), a larger quantity of ideas produces more opportunity for unusual associations. So, though it may seem to observers that a creative person in the early stages of the process is idle or not on task, the person may be working hard internally, scanning his or her brain and environment for as many high quality ideas as possible. Low arousal levels do not persist throughout an entire creative process. Later in the process, when the person is settling on a new combination of thoughts (i.e. perceiving the insight of a creative idea) his or her brain will turn up the activation (Martindale & Hasenfus, 1978). The creator experiences an energy surge that may produce the excitement of inspiration, also called illumination (Wallas, 1926) or an “aha moment.” In order to, then, put the new idea into action (construct it or communicate it), cortical arousal is needed. At this point, left hemisphere modes—linguistic, critical, organizational, sequential, and logical—kick in and remain active in order to express and construct the new creation. Einstein (1929), for instance, “saw” the inspirations for his creative theories as mental images when they first occurred to him, then later had to figure out how to translate them into written mathematical notations. During this implementation stage, creative processes do not progress smoothly. Creators have to move back and forth between creative and critical thinking modes and vary their arousal levels as they manipulate their media and solve ideational and construction problems. Highly creative people tend be prolific in the number of ideas they originate (Guilford, 1967) but may have trouble implementing them (Myers & Myers, 1990). Because creative ideation is their forte and because pleasurable energy peaks occur at the time of inspiration, highly creative individuals find it easy and fun to come up with ideas. However, the hard work and left-hemisphere-style thinking involved in carrying out their ideas are often more difficult and less satisfying. In addition, just about the time a highly creative person is in the middle of implementing an idea, exciting new ideas

New ideas bring with them the need for new skills and the solutions to new problems. Creators struggle, start over, reconsider, become exasperated, and question their abilities.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

present themselves, tempting the creator to quit working on the first idea in order to jump into new, more seductive ones. Deadlines can be particularly challenging for highly creative people because of the fluctuations in energy levels. Since average thinkers tend to start at high arousal levels and select ideas sooner, they often have lengthy periods of time to spend on implementation. The brains of more creative people, however, function at low arousal for a long time, delaying idea selection until an innovative idea appears. Though the neural energy rises to facilitate implementation of the idea, time to complete the process has become short. This may underlie the difficulty many highly creative individuals have finishing products in time to meet deadlines. Contemporary neuro-science is uncovering evidence of differences between the neural functioning that is active during creative thinking and that which is active during linear, analytical thought. The manifestations of these differences affect many aspects of individuals’ cognition, ideation, and work processes.

Creativity and Emotions

A range of emotions tends to accompany the varying neural actions involved in creativity, making creativity a rich affective experience. As ideation begins, energy levels drop, and a creator enters an indolent, dreamlike state of defocused attention (Haier & Jung, 2008) that is governed by alpha waves in the brain (R. E. Jung, 2009). An alpha state produces pleasant, wakeful rest. In Gnezda-Smith’s 1994 study of internal aspects of creative processes, a participant described periods of defocused attention during the early stages of his song-writing process. He said there is “a fallow period in which, to the outside world, I am not being very productive. I’m sleeping a lot, I’m reading a lot, I’m doing a lot of nothing—to the outside world” (p. 141). Similarly, psychologist Carl Jung described a withdrawal of conscious energy that leads to “apathetic inactivity” (1923, p. 123) during the ideation phase of a creative process. At this time, thinking is turned inward to accumulate sensory and intellectual information and seek associations. At some point, a significant coalescence of thought occurs and enters consciousness (Lowell, 1930, p. 109; C. J. Jung, 1923). It is revealed to the creator as an inspiration, “flash of insight” (Ghiselin, 1952, p. 26), “illumination” (Wallas, 1926, p. 70), or an

Figure 2. Poverty, Anthony Smith, Grade 7, Worthington ohio city Schools.

“envisioned impulse toward a certain goal” (Sessions, 1941, p. 47). It is the peak emotional experience of the creative process and has been described as “wholly inexplicable satisfaction or excitement” (Ghiselin, p. 24-25). Canfield (1920) cited “a strong thrill of intense feeling” (p. 169). Carl Jung called it “a divine frenzy” (1923, p. 122). Arieti said, “the artist feels almost as if he had touched the universal” (1976, p. 186). Composer Sessions stated that the exhilaration of the inspiration is the “energy that keeps [creation] going” (1941, p. 47). Though this energy pushes the creator forward, it is short lived. Now, an individual must contrive ways of constructing or communicating a new idea. This is the implementation stage, characterized by alternating periods of intense, productive concentration that seems like “automatic functioning” (Ghiselin, 1952, p. 17) and frustrating encounters with problems that require great perseverance. When implementation of an idea is progressing smoothly, the creator experiences a heightened emotional state, a loss of self-awareness, and a sense of productivity that Csikszentmahalyi labeled “flow” (1996). Ghiselin (1952) and Lowell (1930) compared this deep engagement with one’s creative medium to a trance-like state.

Much of the implementation stage of the creative process, however, is marked not with joy but with hard work, frustration, and self-doubt. New ideas bring with them the need for new skills and the solutions to new problems. Creators struggle, start over, reconsider, become exasperated, and question their abilities. For instance, Virginia Woolf abandoned initial attempts at writing Mrs. Dalloway because she felt unable to create the book of her inspiration (Ghiselin, 1952). A stereotypical view of writers that appears frequently in the media shows a writer throwing away page after page because of continual failed attempts at an opening sentence. This image and Woolf ’s experience illustrate the discouragement creators can feel as they try to actualize what seemed at the moment of inspiration to be extraordinary ideas. As individuals eventually complete their projects, their emotional frustrations lessen and their moods may elevate. However, they usually do not return to the elation of the inspiration. In fact, as creative products are finished, people often and surprisingly feel a sense of disappointment with their work. After repeated touch-ups, rewrites, critiques, and revisions, the excitement of the illumination has long since faded. In

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

addition, the final product, executed by “an imperfect person with imperfect abilities” (Gnezda-Smith, 1994, p. 142), does not measure up to the more thrilling image of the original inspiration. Dorothy Canfield described her emotional reaction to reading her completed manuscript for Flint and Fire: “I felt fall over me the black shadow of that intolerable reaction… by the time I had reached the end, the full misery was there” (1920, p. 175). The execution of a project is driven by goal-oriented behavior that might cause one to expect an emotional climax at the finish of the project. However, since the peak emotional experience of creative processes is inspiration, the end of the project may be much less gratifying then expected. Probably glad to be done with the work, creative people also express both self-doubt and longing to be re-immersed in the creative process (Gnezda-Smith, 1994). For instance, installation artist Karen Frey Snouffer (personal communication, October 27, 2009) expressed concern about losing her “creative rhythm” and described an “underlying tension between excitement and anxiety” that is present as she is “gearing up to face” her next project. In his 2009 interview on The Tavis Smiley Show, writer Nick Hornby described periods of absence from creative work as “uncomfortable” and compared his need to write to “an itch you have to scratch.” Ray Bradbury (1992) commented that after even one day of not writing he “grows uneasy” and after four he “senses lunacy” (p. xiii). During what may seem like a challenging and empty post-project period, a creator may already be starting the process anew (Arieti, 1976), unconsciously scattering thoughts along thousands of neural pathways in search of the next significant idea.

Recommendations for Art Educators

top Figure 3. Human Coral, Y. Smith, Grade 9, Worthington ohio city Schools. bottom detail of Figure 3.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Creativity involves more than just making something, even something new. It is a process of knowledge construction that emerges from within a person and provides an experience rich with thought, emotion, challenge, insight, and hard work. According to Booth, “rather than the things you make, it is… the experience [that is] a particularly powerful act” (2001, p. 20). As art educators, we have an opportunity and responsibility to make creativity an integral part of all our students’ learning. We do this by employing teaching methods that foster our students’ creativity and by advocating within the school at large for creativity and the needs of highly creative students.

Teaching

In our classes, students should experience all the stages of creative processes, especially the low energy idea-search and the subsequent joy of illumination. Unfortunately, teachers commonly assign already developed project ideas and tightly structured lessons that relegate to students only the much harder and frustrating task of constructing what the teacher has already envisioned. “Much of the creative decision making [is] controlled by the teacher” (Szekely, 1988, p. 3) and students miss the essence of the creative process: innovating ideas. Instead, lessons can be designed to engage students in their own ideation processes and experience their own inspirations. Openended assignments based on themes, problems, or personal experience work well. For example, students could study current events and social commentary in art then create a work of art that expresses their responses to a contemporary social issue of their choosing (Figures 1 and 2). Another example would be a study of identity and imagery that results in expressionistic portraits of self, a parent, a friend, or a pop-culture icon (Figures 3 and 4). Pedagogy matters, too. Creativity is enhanced when we coach students as they develop their own processes. We need to resist the impulse to pre-plan subject matter and procedures for the assignments we make, and we need to let go of preconceived notions of what the student artwork will turn out to be. We can become comfortable watching and guiding our students’ ideas and artworks as they emerge. Our rewards will be the pleasure of experiencing with our students their many illuminations and creative processes. We will also need to individualize teaching methods because different students will work through their creative processes in different ways. Some will be able to proceed rather independently while others will need us to work more closely with them. Coaching students means staying in contact with each of them every day, perceiving what each needs, tailoring instruction to specific students and their projects, and providing encouragement as they progress through the stages of their full creative processes. Understanding our students’ emotional waves is important, too. Students need us to understand the scattered and low energy periods when they ponder and imagine. They need us to labor with them as they look deeper within themselves for ideas. They

need us to share their enthusiasm as they stretch toward original ideas. They need us to enjoy the emotional rush of their creative insights. Then, our students need us to stay engaged with them as they face the challenges of constructing their art. We can facilitate their creative work by arranging quiet places and blocks of time to allow flow experiences to occur. When our students encounter problems that make them feel inadequate or want to quit, we can teach them that all artists get discouraged as they tackle the hard work of translating ideas into form. We also need to be careful about our critical response to students’ creative work. Rather than heavy-handedly scrutinizing student work for faults, we can design evaluation procedures that are growth experiences and that help students recognize their strengths and reflect on their creative processes. Criteria for evaluations may focus on how well the meaning of a student’s idea is communicated, the student’s perseverance through the process, and his or her skill development. Student self-evaluations can be enlightening for students and teacher alike and function well as a part of an assessment process.

Advocacy

Advocating for creativity and creative students is also an important role for the art educator. Advocacy occurs when art teachers encourage teachers of other subjects to incorporate creative activities in their classes and help colleagues to better understand their creative students. Our peers may become more educated about creativity when we speak up at staff meetings and team

conferences with parents, involve ourselves in decisions about disciplinary procedures, conduct in-services, and disseminate information about creativity. Our knowledge can help our colleagues become more aware and accepting of the variant personality traits that are often characteristic of their highly creative students so that, instead of scolding or punishing, teachers can help creative students develop strategies for adapting their natural styles to school structures. For instance, we can advise colleagues that creative students may not be procrastinators, but people with prolonged idea searches whose energy kicks in late; that they may not be chronically tardy because of disrespect but because of periods of deep concentration and fluctuating energy that cause them difficulty in managing time; that they may not be scatter-brained and irresponsible but have brains that relish multi-directional thinking during periods of defocused alpha activity; that they may not be resistant to details, linear processes, and following directions, but excel instead at holistic, self-directed thinking. Because our advocacy will help colleagues relate to creative students in more enriching ways, it will lessen some of the negative socializing that Epstein (2009) implicates in the suppression of many people’s creative capabilities.

Conclusion

Creativity is a specialized type of higherlevel thinking, an emotional journey, a work process, and a high-quality human experience. Some students already function well creatively. They need more opportunities to actualize their creativity and be guided toward further development. Other students are limited in their creative development, perhaps by inhibiting forces in school, home, and society. These students need freedom to explore ideas and instruction in how to do so. The art room is where students can thrive creatively. And it is from the art room that creativity can spread into the larger school environment, broadening the educational experience for all students. Nicole M. Gnezda is a retired public school art teacher with 30 years of PreK-12 experience and a PhD in creativity and education. The content of this article is based on doctoral studies, independent research, and classroom experience. E-mail: nicolegnezda@gmail.com or see www. compassioncreativityandteaching.com

Figure 4. Female Identity, callie Herman, Grade 12, Worthington ohio city Schools.

January 2011 / Art EducAtion

RefeRences Andersen, T., & Milbrandt, M. (2005). Art for life: Authentic instruction in art. New York: McGraw Hill. Andreasen, N. (2009, May). Illuminating genius: Creativity perceived through science and art. Keynote address presented at Learning and the Brain Conference, Washington, DC. Arieti, S. (1976). Creativity: The magic synthesis. New York: Basic Books. Barron, F. (1969a). Creative person and creative process. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. Barron, F. (1969b). The psychology of creativity. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 108-103). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Booth, E. (2001). The everyday work of art: Awakening the extraordinary in your daily life. Backinprint.com. Lincoln, NE: iUniverse.com, Inc. Bradbury, R. (1992). Zen in the art of writing. New York: Bantam. Clark, B. (1992). Growing up gifted. New York: Merrill. Canfield, D. (1920). How â&#x20AC;&#x153;Flint and Fireâ&#x20AC;? started and grew. In B. Ghiselin (Ed.), The creative process (pp. 168-176). New York: The New American Library. Csikszentmahalyi, M. (1996). Creativity: Flow and the psychology of discovery and invention. New York: Harper Collins. Einstein, A. (1929). Letter to Jacques Hadamard. In B. Ghiselin (Ed.), The creative process (pp. 43-44). New York: The New American Library. Epstein, R. (2009, May). Unleashing creativity in children and adults. Presented at Learning and the Brain Conference, Washington, DC. Fink, A., & Neubauer, A. C. (2006). EEG alpha oscillations during the performance of verbal creativity tasks: Differential effects of sex and verbal intelligence. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 62(1), 46-53.

Art EducAtion / January 2011

Ghiselin, B. (Ed.). (1952). The creative process. New York: The New American Library. Gnezda-Smith, N. (1994). The internal forces of creativity: When hearts start to flutter. Roeper Review, 17(2), 138-143. Guilford, J. P. (1967). Factor analysis, intellect and creativity. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 200-208). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Haier, R. J., & Jung, R. E. (2008). Brain imaging studies of intelligence and creativity: What is the picture for education? Roeper Review, 30(3), 171-180. Heilman, K. M. (2005). Creativity and the brain. New York: Psychology Press. Jausovec, N. (2000). Differences in cognitive processes between gifted, intelligent, creative, and average individuals while solving complex problems: An EEG study. Intelligence, 28(3), 229-240. Jung, C. G. (1923). On the relation of analytical psychology to poetic art. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 120-126). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Jung, R. E. (2009, May). Neuroscience of creativity and intelligence: Implications for education. Presented at Learning and the Brain Conference, Washington, DC. King, S. (2000). On writing: A memoir of the craft. New York: Pocket Books. Koestler, A. (1976). Bisociation in creation. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 108-113). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Lowell, A. (1930). The process of making poetry. In Ghiselin, B. (Ed.), The creative process (pp. 109-112). New York: The New American Library. MacKinnon, D. (1965). Architects, personality types, and creativity. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 175-189). Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Martindale, C., & Armstrong, J. (1974). The relationship of creativity to cortical activation and its operant control. The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 124, 311-320. Martindale, C., & Hasenfus, N. (1978). EEG Differences as a function of creativity, stage of the creative process, and effort to be original. Biological Psychology, 6(3), 157-167. Maslow, A. H. (1962). Toward a psychology of being. New York: D. Van Nostrand. Mednick, S. (1962). The associative basis of the creative process. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 227-237). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Molle, M., Marshall, L., Lutzenberger, W., Pietrowsky, R., Fehm, H. L., & Born, J. (1996). Enhanced dynamic complexity in human EEG during creative thinking. Neuroscience Letters, 208(1), 61-64. Myers, I. B., & Myers, P. B. (1990). Gifts differing. Palo Alto, CA: Consulting Psychology Press. Roe, A. (1963). Psychological approaches to creativity in science. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 165-173). Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Rothenberg. A., & Hausman, C. R. (Eds.). (1976). The creativity question. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Sessions, R. (1941). The composer and his message. In B. Ghiselin (Ed.), The creative process. New York: The New American Library. Szekely, G. (1988). Encouraging creativity in art lesson. New York: Teachers College Press. Torrence, E. P. (1961). Problems of highly creative children. Gifted Child Quarterly, 5(2), 31-34. Wallas, G. (1926). Stages in the creative process. In A. Rothenberg & C. R. Hausman (Eds.), The creativity question (pp. 69-73). Durham, NC: Duke University Press.