Reading the directions is not something I normally do. My family always says "When in doubt, read the directions." And we aren't in doubt much - we just barrel into new computers, subjects, and adventures until we have questions. Seems good from my POV.
But, then I see posts in many groups about creativity and realize that the same things I do are annoying when someone else does it - on one of my subjects, like creativity. There have been many articles, books, and comments about brainstorming not working, for example. And the latest is that creativity can't be taught. I want to rise up and announce that brainstorming has been working for me and my family for more than 30 years - that's how we figure things out when we have those doubts. And I've been teaching creativity for more than 30 years also. Student feedback is really rewarding - they change from thinking they are not creative to thinking they have ideas and methods to implement solutions they never had before.
Some of those people are still in the 1980's mode of thinking that creativity is about music and art - which addressed in a previous blog. Creativity includes evaluation. Ruth Noller's (one of the founders of our program at Buffalo State in the '60's) definition is that creativity is a function of your attitude toward Knowledge, Imagination and Evaluation. Yes, we accept that some ideas are wild at first. Wasn't the airplane? Alex Osborn, who first wrote about brainstorming in the '50's said, "It's easier to tame a wild idea than to invigorate a weak one. "
Sid Parnes, along with Ruth, did an intensive study, published in the Journal of Creative Behavior in the early '70's showing that, not only could creativity be taught and learned, but that students who were taught creativity also did better in other subjects and graduated more frequently than a control group who were not given the classes.
This stuff has been out there for a long time. And more has been reported since in 7 refereed journals on creativity since then. So please, read the directions before you sound off on this.
