COP3 : Sir Ken Robinson

TED Talk : Sir Ken Robinson

RSA talk : Sir Ken  Robinson




Notes :

Information is fed into children from every platform and as a result they get distracted and then they get penalised for it and get medicated. This is referring to kids of today, there is a lot of information for children to take in from the surrounding world so are bound to get distracted, people see this destruction and lack of concentration as an illness and so medicate the children.

ADHD has risen as has standardised testing in schools. Kids are given drugs to pay attention and also to calm down, that they are not stimulated at school compared to all of the other visual stimulation going on in the world.

– The arts of victims of this mentality as they address the idea of aesthetic experience which is where all senses of operating at their peak, present in that moment, excited fully alive. Anaesthetic is a shutdown of the senses, dead in yourself to what is happening and this is what is happening to drugged up kids. Getting kids through education by anethatising them.

Education should do the opposite, but put them asleep but wake them up to their abilities. Education is modelled on the interest of industrial revolution and in the image of it. Schools are operated on factory lines they have bells categories facilities batches date of manufacture (page) if the production line mentality. Everything is standardised tests, teaching, curriculum, go opposite to standardised education that is the changing of paradigm. All kids are not the same so why treat them that way.

Recent test into divergent thinking. divergent thinking isn't the same thing as creativity – creativity is – the process of having original ideas that have value. divergent thinking is an essential capacity for creativity, the ability to see lots of answers, lots of ways of interpreting a question, to think laterally, to think not just a linear or convegent ways, to see multiple answers not just one. Kids were tested using the divergent thinking test, and the results were that when the kids were tested at a younger age who are classed as genius at divergent thinking, the older the kids got the more disability disappeared.

In most cases of intelligence you get better as you get older. Not with creativity, we all have this ability that it deteriorated state education in standardising.

Research came from the book – breakpoint and beyond – look at it.

Further Notes:

I found this talk really interesting and agree with the points Sir Ken Robinson makes. I understand that high school has to be academic as that is where the majority of important academic learning is done, but primary schools seem to have more of a focus on academic learning rather then having an enjoyable creative learning environment. If kids in primary schools are fed heavily curriculum based academic learning they will miss out on chances of developing the power of thinking differently and connecting ideas to make new ideas, which is a very beneficial skill to have in society, although 'creative' thinking is often looked down upon it is a very powerful and often groundbreaking skill to have especially where science or inventions are concerned. This is why I think primary schools should have less of a focus on getting the correct answer to pass the tests that the government sets as you can teach anyone to pass a test it's a memory game and not that beneficial especially at such a young age as primary school as you will get re taught everything in high school.

COP3 : project outline

Project outline.

– Consider timing

– 12 weeks is the Countdown.

– consider holidays/work/life you need to be realistic about what you can do in these weeks.

– Think about the title and different component parts that need researching.

– Allocate timings to each

– draw up project outline based on the above.

– Allow generous time for reading and writing up.

– Factor in tutorials.

Project outline. 

There are twelve weeks until hand in which sound daunting but if you down it is a long time to go, but there are other things to consider. We have a lot of work on with our other module and it is hard to find the balance as I  don't want to fall behind with the other module, but I do see this module as being my min priority at the moment as it is in first and it is also something I find challenging. So it is frustrating, but the balance must be met. There are other things to take into consideration like christmas holidays. This is something which concerns me as three weeks is along time to be left as I do not trust my writing skills, it also concerns me how soon after we get beck to college the hand in is, and during that short period of time there will have to be final checks of dissertation , laying it out, bibliography, printing, binding, not forgetting the practical too. The module is going to be very tight time wise and organisation will be very important to keep on top of things . My plan so far is :

Before end of october:

- Have a structure that has been okayed by tutor

- Have a clear idea about which research methodologies I am using

- Begin primary research

Before end of November :

- Have a proper finalised structure 

- completed primary research / wait for results to come back in

- Clear idea / started practical element

- Began introduction

Before end of December :

- Finished and collected results for primary research

- started and well on way with practical element 

- introduction complete 

- Chapters started 

I also need to take into consideration reading time as I am a very slow reader. I feel I will be reading through to the end of this module as each book leads you on to another 10 etc so there is always something to be learning which will inform my COP module 

COP3: Topics of interest

Topics of Interest

From my presentation feedback it was clear that I needed to refine my topic, so I have written town a list of the main topic of interest that I would ideally and happily write about they are as follows :

– Process of creative thinking.

– The creative space.

– Creativity tests.

– Who is creative.

– Can anyone be creative/become creative.

– How the creative brain works.

– Creativity mental health.

– Where the world would be now without creativity.

– Differences between creatives are non-creatives. 

– Roots of creativity.

– Personality of the creative.

– Education creativity.

– Benefits creativity brings to society.

This list will probably need refining further but it helps seeing things down on paper and being able to decide which ones I want to write about in my essay. Looking over it now I can see that some of the topics are very similar if not the same so I will be able to tie them together and hopefully then decide my essay structure / title.

COP3 : Ethics evaluation

Ethics :

In the last lecture it was advised that we complete an ethics evaluation to make sure we are going about research / subject in the correct manner. The things we were told to consider are as follows :

Ethics:

consider the ethical implications of your project.

– Does the research involve human participants?

- Does the study involved the vulnerable or people who can't have a voice?

– Consent from people if they are involved

– are there issues of safety

– could it induce psychological stress, anxiety

– anonymity

– people have the right to withdraw.

The actual subject of my essay is not one that would cause ethical concern but through my research and practical piece there will be contact with people, so it is important that I outline ways I can make sure my project is ethical.

My research will involve conducting interviews with designers, questionnaires, and the participation with people during creativity tests. All this will involve working with people, so to make sure it is all ethically correct I will have to outline clearly what my aims are, what I am using the research for and how I am going to use it (if appropriate). After I have outlined my side of things I will have to seek connect,  this could be done through a form of just through the person actually participating it will outline they consent to me using it. Some people may not want to be names so I will have to factor in if they have wishes of anonymity. There will be no issues within my research or practical as far as I know to do with safety, but if something develops in  my project where there could be an element of danger or accidents I will have to address this and find ways of combating it or ensuring if there are people involved that they are ok with it and do hold the right to withdraw if they are not happy, but like I said at this moment in time there are no safety issues. My practical at the moment is all based around working with someone and conducting creative experiments / workshops and documenting it. The person I have in mind is onboard with this as I have spoken to them and explained if I am going to do this, how I would do it and what it would involve, but If I do go ahead with this practical I will put it out in writing exactly what I am going to do and check that my subject is ok for me to document it as it will end up online etc, and I will get the person to sign it as a record that they are ok and their are no ethical issues. 

As far as I can see I have covered all ethical issues that may present themselves during my project if anymore develop over the course I will address them.

COP3 : presentation & feedback

COP 3 Presentation Proposal :

This is the presentation that I gave proposing my COP3 project. It covers my working title as it stands and the research that I have completed so far into my research topic. It then goes on to talk about my preliminary chapter structure and the areas that I want to cover. The next section shows the primary research that I plan to undertake and the visual aesthetic of colour and playfulness that I want to explore. Another section is also just stating the secondary research that will be done. The last section is about my synthesised practical piece exploring my aims of answering the question can anyone be creative and applying the research I have learnt in a practical manner. (see previous post for more information regarding practical like context etc)

Feedback :

Notes:

The feedback I got was useful as I felt that my structure and essay title was condensed and focused enough but I discovered that it needs to be homed in even more so I will need to think in greater depth about more focused areas. I also discovered that the word 'creative' is a bit of a taboo, I personally do not have a problem with it and accept and see the bigger picture of creativity, but people in the room seemed to a have a great problem with the word and advised me to avoid it, although I agree that if this is the opinion of people then I shall avoid it when conducting primary research, I won't however avoid it altogether as through my essay I hope the person reading it will realise that creativity isn't just about painting and being arty, it is about the structure of your brain and the way ideas are generating, it is a way of thinking and can be applied to so many scenarios such as if you lock your keys inside your car and you don't want to pay to have the AA come out, you would have to think 'creatively' to solve that problem, this is the angle of 'creativity' that I am going with. Overall the feedback was positive with a few things to think about such as making my topic more specific, making sure that the person involved in my practical is ok with it (ethical issues okay'd).

ACTION -

Make more specific
re structure
okay practical
Look into work of Sir Ken Robbinson (education and creativity)

COP3 : Lecture 2

Lecture two -

organising your research project:

a good book to help you with your research is – doing your research – Judith Bell

quantitative/qualitative:

– decide what methodlogies suit your research project, if it is not relevant don't do it

– what are you going to research and how – what methodologies

quantitative – statistical data, numerical analysis, analysing trends. People's opinion on mass.

Qualitative – content, ideas, theory.

Which are most efficient and valid for your research project. What sort of data to you want to get.

Action research:

test our research in real life. Reflect, diary, blog and apply it to research. Again it must be relevant ask yourself this question each time.

Organising the project:

organised – detailed and clear project plan it covers all bases until 17 January.

– Write down all questions that you want to investigate through your project

– cluster all questions into focused groups

– focus, edit all this stage to gain focus.

– Right first fought sheet

– what is the purpose of the study? Is it researchable 

– why are you interested?

What to you want to do with it? What is the reason and purposeful looking at your chosen subject.

– What do you want to get out of it?

– Decide on a working title

– a bad title makes it difficult to write a dissertation, you need a focus in your title make sure you show your tutor the working title to okay it.

– Take questions and first thought sheet to tutorial.

Project outline.

– Consider timing

– 12 weeks is the Countdown.

– consider holidays/work/life you need to be realistic about what you can do in these weeks.

– Think about the title and different component parts that need researching.

– Allocate timings to each

– draw up project outline based on the above.

– Allow generous time for reading and writing up.

– Factor in tutorials.

Stick to what you agree with your tutor to benefit full capacity time.

Literature search and review:

– reading takes a long time so it is beneficial to learn how to read specifically what you need to know

– find key texts on your chosen topic

– focus your reading

– find key texts and plan to read fees

– find secondary source/criticisms of the essential texts (this will be good for triangulation) – use journals – J store.org

– use the given  grid to organise things. This will allow you to build a database of relevant texts on your topic which you can easily access.

Ethics:

consider the ethical implications of your project.

– Does the research involve human participants?

Does the study involved the vulnerable old people who can't have a voice?

– Consent from people if they are involved

– are there issues of safety

– could it induce psychological stress, anxiety

– anonymity

– people have the right to withdraw.

Referencing:

– complete bibliography as you go this will make life easier at the end.

– Include details name page etc

questionnaires:

– must be a reason for questionnaire, don't just do one for the sake of it.

– Is it the best way to investigate your topic

– word questions with tutor. Must be precise. No assumptions, avoid loaded questions.

– What sort of question, what type of question will you ask

– record responses as soon as you complete the questionnaire

– sample size is important to take into consideration higher numbers equal more validity of questionnaire

interviews:

– is this the best way to investigate your topic? Is it relevant?

– Same rules apply as with questionnaire

– plan the interview

– how to structure it, set questions, or free conversation.

– If you choose to record the interview you must introduce yourself and explain what you are doing.

– If you are according seek the permission beforehand.

Observation:

– what you need to know?

– Participant/nonparticipant – what role will you play in the observation.

– Seek the permission beforehand

– repair and plan

– check list/chart/grid

to make sure observation is relevant and the most beneficial

critical diaries/reflective log:

– what is the purpose, make sure everything you put up is relevant

– be disciplined, set time aside to do this

checklist:

– don't procrastinate

– plan research methods carefully

– select the most appropriate research methods for project

– complete an ethics assessment

– do a literature review

– document all stages carefully

– create detailed project outline

– get the most from supervision tutorials

COP3 : initial ideas and visual research for practical

Pratical -

Concept :

What I find really exciting about this cop module is the opportunity to do some action research, which would involve the practical element being intertwined into the learning and the outcome of the practical effecting the conclusion / direction of the written element.

As it stands my essay is about creativity and exploring if you are born creative and if it can be developed / how / can anyone be creative. In the library there are many books about how to improve creativity, improve idea generation, become more creative etc :

Buzan, T. 2002. The power of creative intelligence. [S.l.]: PerfectBound

Buzan, T. 2006. Mind mapping. Edinburg: BBC active.

Seelig, T. L. 2012. InGenius. New York: HarperOne.

Grivas, C. and Puccio, G. J. 2012. The innovative team. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

The above list is examples of books which are designed to improve your creative potential. I want to explore if books such as these actually work by taking someone who does not believe they are creative, and using the advise the the books give and applying it to my non creative subject. To validate wether the books are working I will use scientifically proven creativity tests which are used to test creativity such as the Torrance test of creativity and the Remote association test. These tests would determine if my subject has improved in creative thought. I want to examine if there is an improvement of creative though, whether this benefits their life day to day, as I want to explore the importance of creative thought within society not just within the arts. 

After collecting and documenting all this data from my subject(s) I want to propose an exhibition / event displaying their journey and exhibiting the potential of developing creative thought and the benefits it brings. 


visual research -

40 Days of Dating :

This is a project by Jessica Walsh where she documents 4o days of dating a friend. I think the way they document the journey works really well, it is interesting and very visual which act as a great way to hold peoples attention. This sort of documentation would be interesting to look into if I go ahead with my project of seeing if i can make someone more creative, I would document the journey online and then create an exhibition.

Ro&Co:

This is a subscription pack designed by Ro&Co. It works in an interesting way where you subscribe to 'subscribe' and they send you a package like this one. The themes change every time. This idea of a subscription is an interesting one which I will think about

Kokoro & Moi:

I really enjoy the work bellow by Kokoro & Moi, it has a very playful and approachable feel to it, which is achieved through colour and pattern. I like the idea of a pack of things, which could work well as a product of the exhibition a creativity pack perhaps.

Interactive :

I think that design that involves some sort of human interaction works really well. It gets the audience involved and causes them to relate to the design on a personal level. This sort of design would work well from me theme of creative thought, as the interaction could be a way of making the engage in a creative movement.

COP 3 : structure

Working question:  Is creative innate, can it be developed and what is its value?

Chapter One – What is the physiology of the creative brain?

Where is the creative part located?

Is there such a thing as a creative brain?

Is creativity something you are born with?

How does the creative brain work? (stimulation) (jazz musicians)

What is the process of creative thinking?

Is creativity something that can be further developed?

If so, how do we develop creativity?   (links with practice – experiment to see if creativity can be developed & how creativity can be developed)

What is the personality of a creative person? (generally speaking)

Chapter Two

What value does creativity bring to:

Design – form and function?

Teaching methods?     (more accessible – more interesting)

How necessary is the creative environment to other fields of work?  (indirectly nurtures ideas – different ways to think about things) -  (lateral thinking)

Chapter  Three

What is the value of the process of creativity to the person?

Can creativity be cathartic?

Does creativity improve mental health issues?

In conclusion, creativity is an essential component

Outsider Art & Art Brut

NOTES :

This is the first draft of the structure for my extended piece of writing. It cover all of the areas of interest that I have been researching. I have decided to explore the title Is creative innate, can it be developed and what is its value? As this is a question that can be fully explored and developed it is also something which I am interested in and from doing my research thus far I know there are many tests of creativity and way of developing creativity which I will be able to research into and engage with active research which is an important part to this module. Although my title does directly link to graphic design I think the fundamentally underpins graphic design and is what makes the difference between design that you pass everyday and forgot compared to design work that you see and it sticks with you and is innovative. The design world needs less rubbish that just gets filtered out of our heads and more exciting creative pieces. Through exploring this essay hopefully I will be able to comment on how creativity can be enhanced and harness and what value it can bring to graphic design but also to society in general too, as I think this is something which should be addressed as the word creative seems to just carry connotation of just applying to the 'arty folk' when actual fact 'creative' thought is beneficially and used in many professions such as science and this is something which should be considered.

Structure for intro :

This dissertation explores creativity, in order to identify whether creativity is innate and can be further developed.  It will also look at the value of creativity in relation to design, teaching and mental health issues.  A historical and contemporary approach will be taken and qualitative and quantitive research will be carried out through interviews and questionnaires.  

Reference will be made to the theories of……………………and …………………………..

Chapter One investigates………

Chapter Two addresses…..

Chapter Three looks at………..

(There will be a main focus on………)

COP 3 : design process in action

I have decided to approach the practical element on COP3 using the process's of creativity I have been researching. The process I will use was derived by Graham Wallas (1949) which is broken down into four stages. 

Stage one :

preparation. During the preparation stage you ask questions, gather research, and observe. This would be when all the bulk of research it undertaken. I have already completed this stage.

Stage two :

Incubation. During the incubation stage ideas start to form consciously or unconsciously and concepts being to knit together. This stage is closely linked to the third stage which is inspiration.

Stage Three:

Inspiration. The inspiration stage happens during the second stage and it is when you get that idea that seems to work best in your head and on paper and arrive at your concept.

Stage four:

Verification.This is the final stage where the idea then becomes the final product.


At the moment I would say I am currently in the preparation stage moving on to the incubation stage. I am still researching and gathering information but I am also generating concepts which form in the incubation stage

COP3 : Lecture one

Lecture one:

theory – action – reflection: Praxis

context of practice must indicate the synthesis between theory and practice .

You must record and document the process:

– it must be a cohesive research project, everything must fit and make sense

– an in-depth critical research project is, ideas need to be tested, developed, applied to theory

– there must also be analysis and evaluation.

Methodology:

– Method

a way of proceeding about something in a systematic or logical manner.

– Methodology:

the science of method applied/employed in a particular way.

2.5 hours support will be given. You must be prepared, send in drafts, prepare questions.

– This module is worth 40 credits which means you must spend 400 hours on it. It must be 6-9000 words.

Deadline is 17 January – 14 weeks

a draft must be submitted by Christmas to obtain feedback

ILO

6 a 1:

critical understanding, level of critique, critique of work, challenge, triangulated, evaluation.

6B 1:

evidence the ability to use logic. More marks given for primary research that blend the two.

6L 1:

practical and theoretical research, organised research.

6D 1:

organised plan and to communicate.

6 a 4:

evidence the synthesis, most important.

– Review proposal form

– we consider their viability of research

–heramanuetics square.