Creative Dialogue in the Classroom I

Creative thinking:                                                    Questions to ask:

• Apply imagination                                            What might be..?
• Generate hypotheses, ideas                            What is a possible solution..?
• Develop creative skills                                    What methods could you use for..?
• Assess own/other's work                                 How well did they succeed in..?

Creative talk in practice

1. Solve a challenge together - an improvement to human body; a learning chair; the perfect planner
2. Invent a word - a machine; a custom; a new game/sport
3. Brainstorm ideas - how to keep school free of litter; how to meet new friends;a new electronic consumer product
4. Picture it - describe a picture without showing partner; Shut your eyes & listen to music-describe; discuss shapes
5. Find a use - think of as many uses for paper clip, hair-brush, CD, sock...;discuss how a pattern/design might be used eg. cobweb
6. Possibilities - A car is found crashed in ditch, no driver - what happened? You discover your best friend is a thief -what alternatives do you have?
7. Seeing other viewpoints - you lend friend money for lottery ticket - they win a million - who does prize belong to? What are different points of view? Use for characters in a novel/poem.
8. Thought experiment - What if animals could speak? What if we could live forever? What if the moon got knocked out of orbit? Wouldn't it be nice if your classroom had..? What if your house had no..?
9. Create a metaphor - Why is summer like a bridge? Which animal is like a rubber band? Which piece of furniture are you?Studying is like...; Life is like...;my brain is like...
10. Creative connections - Anger: choose associated words in pairs/ try to reach in chain of connection a very different word from the first; associate concept words from a unit of study; poetry fragments - compose new poem from fragments (a la Eliot!)
11. Improve it - a pencil, lighting, bus, desk, spoon, home, life, country - use CREATE or SCAMPER to improve further.
12. Create a story - Choose six random words/items: create a story of 500-1000 words/diff genres/condense into 50 then 10 words.
13. Reverse thinking - How might a teacher improve teaching in a classroom? becomes children teaching teacher becomes teacher not teaching children becomes children teaching themselves becomes children teaching each other becomes teacher teaching herself becomes children unteaching teacher!
14. What else could be done? - Characters in a story: discuss what they are thinking; what should they be thinking; what are they feeling; what should they be feeling; what is best for them to do? Eg Of Mice and Men
15. Discuss creativity - What is it? Is it important? What questions stimulate it? What stops you being creative? What would you most like to create  ?