As I read the Transformation chapter in Sparks of Genius, I was enamored with the pictonyms, which use the letters in a word "reshaped" to make the form of the object. I've attempted it with a clock, a bee, and a shoe! I found the inspiration for the clock in my curio cabinet, and the bee and the shoe I found on a creative thinking trip through a giant box store.
I had the great epiphany this year that I could have students integrate science writing during writer's workshop. That doesn't sound so amazing, I suppose, but it really helped that I was taking an inquiry class that was focusing on using writing in science! Everyone hears about "integration" but it really doesn't seem so easy when you are dealing with all of the curriculum! It just so happened that I was beginning the teaching of pattern books during writer's workshop around that time that we were beginning our study of weather. So, without requiring it, I suggested that they write some pattern books about weather. It was a great way to show their thinking about weather. I estimate that about 70% of the class did try a weather related book at some point during the unit.A pattern book can be something like:
A is for apple. B is for ball... This is a red ball. This is a green ball. On a windy day, the wind blows. On a cloudy day, you cannot see the sun. On a snowy day... When a tornado comes, find a safe place. When a tornado comes... Now I am thinking that I could ask them to write pattern books in math, as well. Odd and even numbers, coins, pattern blocks, numbers and counting patterns, and more! I had considered having them write poetry, but they haven't been exposed to enough of it to try that until later in the year. Content Knowledge and Interdisciplinary applications: Mathematics, Informational Writing Creative Understanding: Playing with words and ideas to create new understandings. I do think that later in the year, I will open up our poetry unit to mathematical poetry as well as the sci Playing Play is a key to discovery. When we "fiddle" with things, we find out properties and capabilities of them that we didn't know before. Sparks of Genius lists three types of play, which all have their own purpose: practice play, symbolic play, and game play. Play reaches out over the other thinking tools and allows us to improve those skills as well. The intention of play is to have fun, to make and do without worrying about rules or responsibilities. A notable example from Sparks was Fleming's "microbe paintings," in which he used various bacteria to create paintings. It was noted that finding new ways to make different colors through experiments were "excuses to see what else might happen." I can really appreciate this approach. Over the last couple years, I am really focusing on using inquiry in all areas of the curriculum, so the spirit of let's try it is great! Marble Run - Body Style! Play often leads to new inventions. Just as Richard Feynman "played" with a plate wobbling on a table and discovered new things about the orbits of electrons, playtime in my classroom allows for free exploration of materials. These boys discovered they didn't have enough marble run supports to make their marble run as tall as they wanted, so they improvised and watched the marble fall faster and faster! Playing with the Castle Builders And would you believe it took about six weeks of playing before these students discovered that if they stuck the castle pieces together in notches like bricks, rather than directly on each other, their wall would stay up? Play takes time, and the satisfaction they feel now as they quickly build a different castle is amazing! Just as Alexander Calder did, these kids are inventing for the fun of it, and not to impress me, their (allknowing) teacher. Personally, I like play, but not all kinds. I like word play and board games and 2-dimensional video games. I like pretend play, but it is more difficult for me to take on roles such as princess or Barbie. (I imagine that will improve when I have children of my own to practice with regularly.) I do tend to like play that has rules, however. I am the first one to grab the directions out of the box and figure the rules out for the group. I suppose I imagine myself to be more comfortable with Charles Dodgson's (author of Alice in Wonderland, as Lewis Carroll) logical approach, with productive play. He had an internal way of going about play, staying within his own rule framework. Playing within those rules allowed him to come up with amazing things. As a kid, I remember the joy in learning pig latin and playing with my brother for hours talking back and forth. I had word search books and logic puzzle books from the time I was about eight years old, although I've never felt I had the vocabulary for crossword puzzles and envied my grandmother for her prowess with them! My husband laughs as me sometimes when I get a kick out of a new word I hear. Although I laugh as him as well, because he has the ability to add the suffix -age to a word to change the meaning. "I'm so rightage." In fact, I think our approaches to play are very different. In Sparks of Genius, the authors encourage us to play by doing things we have been trained not to do, like stomp in the mud. This is my husband - playful and ready to figure out the world. I have learned a lot from observing him in the world, and I've lightened up a little, realizing that rules weren't always made to be followed! I try to have a playful spirit with my students during the school day and be supportive of their play as well. However, the constraints of the curriculum can always be felt. In a meeting with a couple other teachers this week, we were discussing writing, and the books In Pictures and in Words and Study Driven by Katie Wood Ray. It is the embodiment of the kind of teaching we would like to do - basically students study works of writing (not chosen by the teacher) and learn from the experts. The problem with this kind of teaching is that, up until now, we are totally GLCE-driven, and, as one coworker put it, "I don't have time to let my kids discover the GLCEs!" There isn't enough time to teach them to master the GLCEs and discover them all along the way! (Again, the Common Core Standards are going to free up a lot more time for project-based and inquiry learning.) I do have a feeling that we will always be limited by time and curriculum coverage, which is why I appreciate the quote in this chapter regarding musician Charles Ives and his father's approach to play, in which he could have his "boy's fooling" time as long as there was sense in it. TransformingTransforming is a creative thinking skill that builds on imagining. This leads to new thinking, which we call transformational. Transformational thinking also often occurs by groups working together on the same problem. It goes hand in hand with play because the person or group often tried several imaginative ways of approaching the problem. I've used some transformational skills in my own daily life. Sparks of Genius discussed mnemonic devices, which people invent to help remember things. I read this book, Student Success Secrets, in junior high, and still use some of the notetaking strategies and memory devices I learned. picture and sound card from Saxon Phonics Grade 1 The authors also point out that some mnemonic devices help make abstract ideas concrete "by superimposing them on the body." This reminded me of the Tucker Signs that we use in our classroom. Each sound is assigned a sign (some are similar to American Sign Language, but they are different.) During our daily practice of learning the letters and sounds, we make the motions with our hands and the children learn to associate the sign with the sound and therefore the sound with the letter. Then, when we are reading or writing, we can use the signs to help students solidify the concepts. See the video below. Sparks of Genius also discussed transformational ideas that were difficult for me. One example in the book was the transformation of a word to syllables and then the syllables to numbers. The final transformation of the numbers into a snake eating itself was confusing to me because I think that I should be able to trace back to the original idea from the final one (although I realize that someone who is more at ease with the word and its meaning would find more "sense" in this transformation.)
I realized as I read on that my discomfort with the above is because I expect the transformational ideas to be commutative, therefore having backwards validity. Some transformations do, but it isn't required. Transformational thinking comes from the curiosity and play with content and lends itself to cross-disciplinary thinking as well. Mathematical poetry, science fiction, and the relation of music to chemistry are all examples. This is definitely one of the putting it all together kinds of thinking strategies! |