So, for my notebook prompt today, I wanted to see what people thought about creativity and whether it was just about the Arts, or whether more areas could be considered as creative fields.
5i. Use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and/or Pinterest as a way to explore how people communicate messages/information about your issue. Try posting some information about your issue and then pose some questions to your audience. What happened? Explain why you think you received the answers/feedback that you received. Create a Wordle word cloud with all of the responses OR create a collage of the photographs and other information that was offered.
After sharing a quote from a blog-post on the way that creativity is viewed in Asia, I asked my friends if they would answer one or all of the following questions –
1).What do you think? Can you be creative in other areas besides the Arts? Have you been?
2.) Do you think creativity is important? How? Why?
3.) How are you creative? What do you make time to do?
I created word art from the site tagcrowd based on their responses –
My friends felt that creativity was used a lot in daily problem solving and work as an adult. Here were some of those comments –
“It’s incredibly important to see things in a different light. It’s creative problem solving in daily life, and we all do it more than we think. I’m creative in what punishments my kids get. I’m creative with cooking (I’m not a “follow the recipe” type of chef). I’m creative when teaching lessons in church or at home. I’m creative when there’s a home maintenance problem that arises, finding a work around. (As an example, we have a super long rod in our closet. It got weighed down too much and pulled the whole shelf and rod off the wall. To fix it, I didn’t just put it back up the way it was. We found shelving that provided better support on the two end then did the standard braces in the middle. We lost some hanging space, but now it’s not going to fall again and we have more shelf space.)”
” I am most creative when there is a challenge or problem that needs to be solved. My creativity usually has a specific purpose: write a song for Girls Camp or an upcoming baptism, create a custom planner page so I can stay organized, make dinner without going to the store for one missing ingredient, date night on a budget, figure out a solution to help my 11 y.o. to be organized, etc. Creativity doesn’t come in bold flashes while I’m binge watching cat videos. It comes through hard work, brainstorming a bunch of really half-baked ideas, then simmering and sifting until a creative idea feels right.”
” Growing up I definitely thought creativity was limited to the arts, but during my adult years I have slowly been redefining creativity until it spread to every area of life. I think there is a specific process that often results in creative thinking: see something from a new-to-you perspective, then combine that with your existing understanding, and something altogether new has been created. That process happens in painting, parenting, teaching, diplomatic exchanges, computer programming, and just about everything else.”
Other friends talked about their creative endeavors (both within the traditional arts, and outside of them –
“Love this!!! I never thought about it until I read it, but I think you can be creative in multiple ways. I lean towards what we term “arts” here, BUT as a child I used to “play” with math. In my free time I would practice doubling numbers on paper because I thought I enjoyed the challenge. But looking back, doing numbers like that put me in my creative space (same as when I write stories or do art) and that’s what I loved about it. Later on in my advanced math classes after I completed my test I would go back and find ways to redo most of the problems to check my work. Sometimes that took some creative thinking!”
“Organizing home/making personalized funny greeting cards/planning parties.I think we’re happier humans when we are creative in some way and I agree with the statement that says innovation stems from creativity. Music and I just started an art class in hopes of recapturing a lost love of creating art. Also I’m in the process of trying to figure out how I can use my music to help others.”
“I think being creative can cover any area, especially if one has some skill with a tool/medium. I have felt that connection, almost meditative feeling, with cooking. Moving beyond the recipe, using the catalogue of tastes and texture in my mind, using the kitchen skills, and coming up with new meals.”
“Having worked in the tech industry for ~15 years, the answer is yes. Creating a useful piece of software is an incredibly creative act–just as creative as writing a book or painting a masterpiece.”
I was especially happy with the thoughts that went along with my previously written research questions –
” I think we need to teach the arts and science creativity as a way to teach kids how to be stereotypically creative first, and that will then flow into other areas of their life without anyone realizing how is all interconnected.”
“Creativity is essential to human growth and happiness. We spend so much time consuming (FB, Pinterest, BuzzFeed, news, etc.) yet, our greatest happiness and fulfillment comes from producing–not consuming. Dieter F Uchtdorf said ‘The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul.’”
“Creativity is important, but I think the initial stage of brainstorming and playing with ideas is more important. It’s playful, frustrating, experimental. It also lets the mind expand.”
It’s been a fun experiment, I’ve enjoyed engaging with my friends about something other than re-posted “crazy cat videos” or political rants.
My next Notebook assignment is to choose a different one than the one I chose this week – choose from 3a, 3b, 3c, 4f, 5i, or 8c. That may be hard! I am very much appreciating the work that my students have been doing as I have been working on these pieces. In order to engage with the materials, it cannot be a half-done work, and engaging in work that is not half-done is quite time consuming – a lot of fun, but quite time consuming.
Working on it! 