Category Archives: JM13D
response #5
What is not creativity? Creativity is everything and nothing; it depends on how people look at the world. I am not going to get into examples on how people can see one thing and someone else can see another because that I would need an entire blog for that. In short, just by writing and using words is creative. Creativity transforms itself into many things. Other than just words, it can be pictures, thoughts and event emotions. What I find that is really creative is different angles someone can take a picture of a beautiful scenery. There are beautiful pictures that people just cannot stare away from. Human brains are very complex [as I learn from psychology]. Just by processing and thinking is creative. I am thinking about a puppy. That is creativity right there. You might be thinking to yourself, a puppy? Wow okay, so what is so creative about that? Well just by imaging a puppy uses imagination and creativity. Imaginary puppies are not going to pop out of nowhere. Now creativity, I believe really leaves a footprint when I am sitting somewhere comfortable, for example where I am now. Everyone is sleeping in the house so there is complete silence and I can hear the raindrops outside. I can smell the fresh water, blessed from the heavens. What perfection.
My feelings for ambiguity are ambiguous itself. It all depends on my mood. There are times when I feel depressed or angry and I would hate when someone leaves something ambiguous or open-ended. During those times, I would not want to think, I want to just sit there and cool myself down. I find that I can be irrational when I am in those moods. However, a lot of times, I can be happy and everything would be wonderful. I would love to use my imagination to think about the different possibilities and paths to take. There are times when not understanding something can be the best feeling in the world. You could be wherever you are and think things through however you like. This is most likely because I feel like I would be in control to do whatever I want.
Mother nature is creative.
Being Wrong [Response Paper #5]
Creative urges seems to come to me only when I least need or want them, like when I am doing some much-needed cramming the night before a midterm or pushing myself to finish my homework in a timely manner. That probably says a lot more about me than about creativity, but I just felt like putting that out there.
Ken Robinson’s short little speech brings up the idea that schools actively stifle the creativity of children. Through standardized testing and classroom interactions, students are heavily influenced to believe that being wrong is a bad thing. That kind of mindset leaves them afraid of trying new things and making mistakes for fear of judgment from their peers, which consequently discourages out of the box thinking. The key to being safe is to conform. We are indeed a society more dominated by workers than thinkers, because that is what our education system has specifically trained us to become.
This flaw in our education might be the reason as to why so many people–regretfully, often including myself–seem to dread being assigned ‘vague’ essay topics. More specific prompts means less of a need for us to think for ourselves. They are considered the safer route because the major decisions have already been made for us, and there is less pressure about being judged as ‘wrong’ or ‘right’ based on the content of the work we hand in. The more creative freedom we are given in assignments, the harder they seem to become. I’m sure that it’s a relatable struggle for many people, since we’ve probably all been taught that it’s best to color inside the lines.
Creativity Response Post #5
We all know what creativity is; however, how would you define the term? Just like many other terms that I find difficulty explaining, I searched the meaning of creativity. According to Wikipedia, creativity is defined as ‘The use of the imagination or original ideas.” For some reason as soon as I read this definition, I had an issue with it. It in a way contradicts the idea of creativity. It is true that creativity is something that is original, but when analyzing the definition, it makes no sense to put a concrete definition to a word that brings a sense of openness and well, creativity. I just feel like the definition itself is not creative;it does not portray the true meaning of creativity.
In addition, something that I have been thinking about is the measurement of creativity. How can creativity be measured? How is one individual more creative than another? What abilities make certain people more creative, or appear more creative than others? When ”measuring” creativity, I think most people refer to terms of artistic ability. Creativity is usually expressed in art form, which is quite funny t mention, because when looking back at the definition of creativity, it was stated that the term is especially used in artistic form. I understand that creativity is vital in art, the strive for something new and interesting for viewers. However, why does it have to ”especially ” relate to art? After all, doesn’t creativity just deal with originality? Can’t someone be original in other fields, other than art?
This brings me to one lecture I had last semester in Psychology. I was told that one side of the brain was focused more on creativity, while the other is used for mathematical operations and similar forms of thinking. This is interesting, because when I was given this information, I was under the impression that mathematics was concrete, and absolute. It led me to believe that math was something that one had to learn, but required no creativity. I completely DISAGREE. Math I believe more than any other field, requires enormous amounts of creativity. When looking at math problems, there are many ways one can go about solving a problem. In addition, if it weren’t the creativity of the historic mathematicians who founded the basics of math, where would math be today? In addition, math is closely related to science. Each day, there are many new proposals to cures for diseases that years ago, were impossible to treat. The creativity of scientists has allowed the world to positively prosper in health, as it seems each day more diseases have been discovered, in need of more treatment.
The area of creativity is not only limited to artistic abilities. The idea of creativity is broad and not limited to art, which is what most people relate the term to. In addition, it is true that creativity is oppressed today because of the present educational system. With all the teachers who are losing their jobs, and the lack of proper material for students to have a successful education, it seems as if creativity will be hard to have.
Creativity and Ambiguity
Personally, I think I’m one of the least creative people you’ll ever come across. I am terrible at anything artistic or aesthetic. I am not talented when it comes to drawing or writing poetry or making up stories. I was just never drawn to these things. And throughout my entire childhood education, I remember teachers always giving us these crazy projects to do in order for us to be able to show our creativity. Well clearly, what I did every single time was I asked my sister or parents to help me with the project, and I think that many people can relate to this. I’m sure that there are many parents who feel like whenever their elementary school child is assigned a big project, it’s basically the parents and not the students who end up doing the project. Parents want their students to do well in the class and so they take on the responsibility of completing the assignment because they know their children are usually incapable of doing so themselves. I don’t know, that’s been my experience. I’m sure it doesn’t apply to everyone.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that I hate being forced to think creatively. I think that when it comes to ideas, I can be creative when I want to be. I think of interesting ideas here and there, but not when I’m being forced to do so. Also, I think that even I, a completely un-creative person, have very creative dreams. I think we all do. I feel like everyone has that dream once in a while that is extremely weird and unrealistic but it definitely is creative, sort of like many of Salvador Dali’s paintings.
So I think we all have it in us, but we just shouldn’t be forced to use it unless we want to.
One problem I do have with education is that, before college at least, we were always taught to pass standardized tests. I guess the argument for making them standardized is to be fair in making sure every single child has the same questions being asked of them and is required to meet the same criteria for their age group. However, I know that in high school, for example, whenever I took a class that was required either for a future Regents exam or for an AP, the teacher would teach to the test and once the test was over (like the APs in May) then we would either just watch movies for the rest of the time or start learning something that nobody took seriously because we knew that the most important exam was over and that anything we learned after that point was “not important.” At the end of the day, I felt extremely under prepared for the college workload because I was used to just skimming through some reading, taking a multiple choice test, and forgetting everything I read 5 minutes after it was over. I’m not advocating for more creativity in the classroom, but I’m advocating for a better incentive to learn.
I feel somewhat comfortable living with ambiguity. At the end of the day, there will always be questions I’ll never have answered, and I decided that there’s just no point worrying about something that I can’t change. Life in general is ambiguous. We never know what will happen next, and there are always new surprises in store for us. How boring would life be if we always knew what would happen next?
Creativity in Today’s World and the Idea of Ambiguity (Response #5)
Creativity, just like happiness, is a broad term that has been thoroughly studied for many, many years. Even so, the ability to be “creative” in school and allow children to explore their creativity is somewhat controversial. As I mentioned in class, the videos reminded me very much of “Hard Times” by Charles Dickens (as I said, “it’s like my favorite book…like ever!”). “Hard Times” does a great job of bringing to light how the abolishment of creativity in the educational system can lead to a loss of individuality in children. In the book, children were assigned numbers in the classroom and were only supposed to state facts. This is from a scene from an old film based on the book, in which students were supposed to define a horse. In the book, Sissy Jupe has a more creative way of defining a horse, and in the film, they don’t show that but they show that she is unable to define a horse and can only relate it to horseback riding (which is deemed creative):
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/LfDmr7hmmOI" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
Also, if anyone has read “Le Petit Prince” (or “The Little Prince”), they too would be familiar with the idea that as adults, we tend to be less creative and less imaginative. The book points out, that from seeing the image on top (below this), adults would think it’s a hat. But, the image created by the narrator as a child is meant to represent a boa who swallowed an elephant.
But anyways, to answer the question, I don’t feel like I have the ability to be as creative as I would like to be in school. I mean, I remember in high school..I was able to create or write something in my own unique way, but I still had to follow certain rules and keep everything within certain acceptable boundaries. But, there was this Humanities teacher who everyone hated because she used to take creativity to a whole new level. One time, my friend (who had this teacher) told me that she gave out an assignment, and the assignment was to take any quote from Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” and to visually represent it. You couldn’t create a poster though and your representation couldn’t have words. I remember when the project was due, kids came in with boxes and mazes and costumes and it was just like a crazy, art convention. It was interesting..but it was just hard for some kids that felt they were being forced into thinking creatively for the sake of a grade. Some people just don’t like the idea of expressing their creativity or may feel they don’t have any. I think it’s always fun to step out of the box, especially in education. Sometimes, the classroom environment can become quite monotonous. But then, there is the belief that there is no room for creativity in education. I mean, don’t we live in a society where everyone wants to go to the top? Be part of that 1% of wealthy people? Isn’t that the notion behind the American Dream, to climb up the socioeconomic ladder? In doing so, you have to learn the facts, right? This relates to Alex’s past two posts about how we live in a society that aims to create a nation of workers.
——
Now onto ambiguity. I love ambiguity. I love the idea of surprises, not knowing..the thrill of getting to connect ideas and events and trying to fill in the holes. I feel okay not understanding anything from time to time, although like a child, I like to ask “why” a lot. But, sometimes..it’s just awesome to not know things. Like for example, “Inception”, the great film directed and written by Christopher Nolan ends in an ambiguous way that has created a lot of debates and I think that’s awesome and just fills everyone with a thrill for more.
Personally, I don’t think we need to know everything. Actually, I think it is impossible to know everything. I feel like the idea of a mystery applies to a lot of aspects in life. I know that I am attracted to mysterious people because I like to learn about them. I get bored when I know too much about a person, and in doing so, I try to prevent others from knowing every little thing about me. Maybe this connects to my love for crime shows and mystery novels. The idea of “what happens next” or “what are their (a person) intentions” is fun to explore.
Creativity
Prior to watching those two clips in class, I always perceived creativity as being something worthless. I still do but I have more sympathy for it. First off, let me begin by stating that I’m seeing this from a business perspective and no other. Yes you might think I’m some sort of monster but I really don’t care. The reason we are all in school, especially BARUCH College is to receive a degree in a business field ( most of us anyway ). The corporate world is cut-throat and there is no time for moral and ethical behavior. It’s all about maximizing profit and minimizing cost. It doesn’t matter if you take advantage of cheap-labor or outsource in third-world countries, as long as you are making the big bucks, it’s all good. Creativity from my own perspective is needed no doubt, but it should reside in a specialized department within a company or corporation. There is no chance in showing off your creativity if you are merely interpreting graphs or crunching numbers. For example, if I’m an Accountant at a firm. My job is to calculate the balance sheets, income statements, financial reports and predict future revenue and losses. Creativity plays no part in that role.
Creativity is almost non-existent anymore in the corporate world. Take a look at the iPod for example. It’s basically the same piece of technology but in a different form. No creativity whatsoever. The only time creativity even exists if when the invention was first created. The iPod was just one of the few MP3 players that really took off. All companies need to do now is just rearrange pieces of technology to create something “new” but in reality it’s still the same shit. But people still buy millions of them and companies rake in billions of dollars in revenue. This just proves that creativity necessary AT THE MOMENT in the corporate world. Who knows? It might all change and our world will be completely based on creativity.
Personally, I have little to no creativity whatsoever. Whenever I read a book or passage, I’m unable to see any images. I have much difficulty reading fiction novels or anything not related to non-fiction. I have an extremely tough time conjuring up images in my head as I read. Also whenever I’m doing any sort of work that involves creativity, it’s like someone putting a brick wall in front of my face. When someone tells me “Do something creative!”, it’s essentially telling me to do nothing. It’s one of the reasons why I do poorly in Language arts classes or any class that deals with an “Artsy” subject. I dislike being forced to take certain classes in order to graduate, I hope they will change that in the future. With that said, I do like CERTAIN things that are ambiguous so that its open to interpretation. I admire all the ambiguity in the works of philosophers and critical thinkers because it allows you to think for yourself rather than be told. However, I still prefer to work on problems that have an answer rather than no answer. I think it’s funny how there are still philosophers to this day attempting to answer questions that Plato or Aristotle has brought up. Some things just don’t have an answer. I’m going to end my response with one of my favorite expressions: “Cash Is King”.
My thoughts on creativity
This response “paper” is probably the hardest one for me to write as I am not that creative at all (or at the very least, a person whose creative instincts were not nurtured and was left to wither and die in a small, desolate place in my mind) as it requires be to visualize some aspects about “Creativity”. In any case to answer the questions posed by Ms. Kaufman, I do feel that there are times where I am given the chance to be creative, but I often choose not to. One such example for me would be my background in the arts (oil painting and piano). I was never particularly interested in composing my own works or painting my own abstract works. Instead, I preferred to concentrate on playing classic pieces or reproducing famous works and painting still life/landscape works. So as a result, my creative muscle is not very strong and thus I won’t be able to “paint” as vivid a picture of my “creative” impulses.
I can only give you an example of the level of creativity I am capable. The most important requirement for me to be creative is that it have to have some basis in “reality”. For example, I can fantasize about fictional military engagements (though that could just be an extension fantasizing about playing strategy games) or put myself into a fantastical situation in a world that had been already been “created” (as in, any sci-fi /historical-fiction/military-fiction universe,though I admit, some of those “fantasies” are probably subconscious wish fulfillment stuff). That said, I do not engage in fanfiction writing as no one should ever be subjected to the horrid stuff that I would churn out if I actually did write (this fear comes from seeing the loads of horrid sh*t I see on those sites which leads me to believe that most people are not creative by nature, or conversely, non creative people like me, gravitate towards fantasies other people have created).
On the question of ambiguity, I prefer to have things answered as if the world was like that, it would simple and easy to understand. But knowing that its impossible to expect to know everything in life, I can live with a bit of ambiguity in my life. If something was so ambiguous and I can’t find any answers to on the INTERNET, I’ll just chalk it up as something I’ll never understand (or that its not my place to understand) and just go on with my life. And no, its not that “exciting” when your confused but it is exciting when you resolve the source of your confusion.
The Mission
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/maCX6f7AFZE" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
Charlotte Iserbyt was Senior Policy Advisor in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, Department of Education during the first Reagan administration.
Creativity and critical thinking are very important. Kids are being conditioned to be workers, who follow orders and the methods of teaching in elementary and high school show this. There is a lack of creative and critical thinking in schools today, as well as a lack of traditional education of the founding fathers, Constitutional Law, classic literature, and basically all of the educational tools which this country was originally founded upon. To create separate class structures, the majority of the population, the bottom poorer part, is taught this workforce training version of education, where creativity is looked down upon. The advances in technology are also to blame for this, there is no more privacy, a student cannot formulate his own creative view or opinion because they are so inundated with what to think and when from all outside forces including and not limited to the tv, internet, social networking, advertising, corporate run media, and every other outside stimulus imaginable.
This is an excerpt from Jim Marrs’ book “The Trillion Dollar Conspiracy” where he quotes Beverly Eakman a former educator, government speech writer, and author of “Walking Targets: How Our Psychologized Classrooms are Producing a Nation of Sitting Ducks”: “Rugged individualism encompassed a range of characteristics — independence, self-sufficiency, thinking for oneself. In the 1970’s the axe was laid to all three. Negative terminologies like “loner” and “misfit” redefined the individualist. Independence was scrapped for interdependency, self-sufficiency for redistribution, and thinking for oneself was equated with intolerance. Today any close reading of the newspaper reminds us daily that the loner requires psychiatric intervention, and maybe drugs as well….”
I believe that we need to have children learn the basics, about english, math, and history, but achieving a higher level and mastery of all three, while reinforcing creativity and individual thinking. To be creative is not enough, and a creative mind easily falls into the world of getting a gold star and a pat on the back, without attaining a level of intelligence needed to be a driving and positive force in the world.
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/a422R4h2bPM" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
The Marley kids know, in order to pull ourselves up, and not become the downtrodden victims of class warfare, we must educate ourselves and the youths with creativity, knowledge, science, research, math, true history, language, and all of the other foundations of intelligence. The other option is to be a worker who’s back is used to get someone else rich. Anyone reading this who thinks that they may come from an upper class family with money and this doesn’t apply to them. You don’t, we are talking about the global top 1%, and none of us are apart of it!
Ambiguity and Creativity
From yesterday’s class, i came to the realization that it is okay not to know something.It is alright to be ambiguous. We live in a society obssesed with having the definite and right answers. We have become too critical and logical. We are crazy about memorization , test and numbers. This reminds me of why i was really nervous the hours before i had to take my calculus midterm. We leave no room for creativity, ambiguity and our right brain. Our education system assumes that all students have the same abilities, talents and the same ways of thinking. Our creativity and talents are often destroyed at an early age. We are not allowed to even develop it.
However, it was quite heartwarming and encouraging to see that in our new age of life, from web 1.0 to 2.0, creativity is being taken into account.We are in dire need of creativity now than any moment in history. The internet has changed how humans live.Today we have become more creative.This is what we all need. Humans were made by their creator in a sense that they were to use their freewill and creativity to improve their life. But obviously that has not been the case. Our system of education will have to change in order for us to be truly creative
Response # 5!
At first, creativity to me seemed to be something you had to be born with. Like said in the “Education and the Changing World of Work” video, left of your brain is for logic and right of your brain is for creativity, and I just thought I was a left brain person. Things came easily to me, just as long as they were obvious. Creativity was something I thought I did not have and could not have because I simply wasn’t capable of manifesting my own intense ideas. Over time I began to realize that I actually was a creative person but I wasn’t allowing myself to go further than just black and white. When it comes to school, I believe that listening to other students’ ideas helps me generate my own and enhances my ability at becoming creative.
Ambiguity is something that to a certain extent drives me nuts! Although I can handle not understanding things from time to time, I feel extremely deprived when things are too vague and unspecific. In my opinion, it all comes down to whether or not I am willing to give something a try and actually use the right side of my brain to come up with interpretations. It definitely isn’t exciting for me to be confused. When being confused there is absolutely no way for me to proceed in doing whatever it might have been that I was doing.
