When teaching creative problem solving, it is important that students develop flexible thinking, the ability to come up with a variety of categories for potential answer In creative problem solving, a student who demonstrates flexible thinking is one who can group ideas into different categories. If a student can generate ideas that fit into many groups, that student is a flexible thinker. After learning fluency which is the ability to generate ideas, students should be able to categorize those ideas. Flexible thinking is an important part of creative problem solving, because problems are often solved by looking at a variety of sources. Solutions come from unexpected directions, and students should be encouraged to think flexibly -- in a variety of categories -- when solving problems. Teaching Flexible Thinking in Elementary Gifted Classrooms Before learning flexibility, students should have a good understanding of fluency. Teachers should either have students generate lists of ideas, or have lists of ideas available to students. At the elementary level, it is important that teachers introduce students to flexible thinking using concrete ideas. Abstract concepts are hard to categorize, even for gifted students. Because abstract reasoning develops at different rates in children, handing a gifted child a mixed list of concrete and abstract ideas may prove to be more frustrating than productive. A Flexible Thinking Activity for Elementary Students Instruct students to bring pictures of pets or magazine cut-outs of animals. The teachers should also have an assortment of animal pictures available. As a class, generate a list of types of animals based on the pictures. Then, have the students individually categorize the list. Some students might be limited to listing animals such as dogs, cats, and fish. Other students might have more categories, and some animals might fit into multiple categories. A student might have mammals, large animals, pets, and animals with tails as categories. A horse would fit into all of those groups. That student would be using flexible thinking. Teaching Flexible Thinking in Middle School Gifted Classrooms Middle school gifted students are ready to tackle abstract concepts as they learn creative problem solving. Although flexibility should be introduced using concrete examples, middle school students will be able to incorporate additional layers with abstractions. In the animal example, teachers might want to include mythical creatures, which would bring in a layer of imaginative thinking. A Flexible Thinking Activity for Middle School Students Even though middle schoolers have outgrown many childhood toys, most middle school students have a childhood toy that they will enjoy bringing to class and sharing. It is important that they bring a toy that they do not mind letting other people touch. Teachers should have additional toys on hand in case some students do not bring them. Students should describe the toy to the class, and the class can make a master list on the board. The list should include features of each person's toy. Some features might include the number of parts, functionality (example: it is an indoor or outdoor toy), if it makes noise, and the materials the toys are made of. After the students have generated a list (fluency), they should individually group different toys into different categories. Grading Flexible Thinking Students should be able to put a large list of ideas into a variety of groups. If a student has trouble categorizing ideas, the teacher first needs to make sure that the original list had obvious groupings. If the list did not lend itself to flexible thinking, a low number of groups would be acceptable. If the list had a variety of different options, teachers should expect a higher number of groupings. Flexible thinking takes time and practice to develop. Grades should reflect growth in ability, rather than meeting a set number of groups. Once students master fluency and flexibility, they are able to generate lists of potential solutions for given problems. These are foundational steps for creative problem solving, and they give students the luxury of having many options to choose from when determining the best answer. Originally posted on Suite101 on October 8th, 2008
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When teaching creative problem solving, it is important that students understand the concept of fluency, the ability to generate a lot of ideas on a given topic. In creative problem solving a fluent student is one who can list many potential solutions to a problem. Some potential solutions may just be idea fragments, or they may be too "out there" to be practical. In fluency, quantity is more important than quality, because students will later reflect on their responses and decide which ideas are worth keeping. In creative problem solving, impractical ideas are valued just as much as practical ideas. Solutions come from unexpected sources, and students should be encouraged to look at all possible sources in the initial stages of solving problems. Teaching Fluency in Elementary Gifted Classrooms Students are ready to understand fluency and use it in basic problem solving in elementary school, but they need to be able to write or type for 10-15 minute stretches. For this reason, fluency may be a good activity for 4th and 5th graders rather than earlier elementary, but like so many things in gifted education, it depends on the student. It is important that students understand why they are being asked to write in such great quantities... teaching fluency might be as simple as giving students a topic and asking them to list possibilities. For example, ask students to list things that are green. One word answers are fine. The students should give as many answers as possible in the given amount of time, perhaps 10-15 minutes. It is important that teachers tell students spelling is not an issue. They are simply recording their ideas and writing them to avoid repetition. Teaching Fluency in Middle School Gifted ClassroomsMiddle school students love the game Scattergories, and it is an excellent introduction to the concept of fluency. To understand how fluency relates to problem solving (as opposed to idea-generation for brainstorming), students should be given a simple problem and asked to fluently list all the possible answers. Spelling, grammar, and mechanics are not priorities at this stage, because the goal is idea generation, and pausing will hinder progress toward the goal. Middle school students tend to be competitive and this is a good activity for competition if the question provides a level playing field. Problems with Repetition A question such as "Why do cats have claws" will generate a lot of ideas and it is a topic on which everyone can contribute answers. Sometimes students are tempted to hide behind repetition, because those words will fill lines on the paper. For example, using the cat-claw question, a student taking refuge in repetition might write:
Grading Fluency Being able to provide a coherent answer to the question is one strategy for evaluating answers, but it is not the goal in the first stage of learning fluent thinking. Students should be able to say, "Cats have claws in case they need to climb trees." It is a coherent answer to a simple question based on idea generation. It is tempting to have a partner just check off answers as they are said instead of writing them down. Unfortunately, that makes it tricky to avoid repeating ideas and the work is then unable to be re-used to teach flexibility and frequency. However, if students have ideas listed, the lists can be used later in other creative problem solving activities. When teachers move on to the next step in teaching creative problem solving, flexibility, the students will see that their fluent answers did were inflexible and could not fit into many groups. In fact, the student was being fluent in generating types of trees, not generating reasons why cats have claws. Originally posted on Suite101 on October 8th, 2008 Gifted students crave creative problem solving experiences. The gifted classroom can be a problem solving playground where students discover problems and solutions.
Offering gifted students problems to solve with fluent, flexible thinking is an important element of gifted curricula, especially at the middle school level and beyond. Students are ready for abstract thinking, and many students are aware that the "real world" is full of abstract problems. In creative problem solving, a students learn apply divergent thinking and "out of the box" ideas to solve real problems. Teaching Creative Problem Solving by Explaining What Questions are Asking The first phase of creative problem solving is understand what type of answer a question is truly seeking. Providing students with a list of question terms and the type of answers they require will offer clarity throughout the unit. Having such a list not only helps students answer questions, but it will help them phrase questions more correctly. The following list should be provided to students and posted in the classroom. It is not necessary to make students memorize the list; gifted students will likely pick up on these standards innately.
There are several sources to find problems that students can use fluency and flexibility to answer. One ready and willing source is parents. Teachers can use a newsletter to contact parents and request real problems that require creative solutions. It is important to note that the parents do not have to have a solution; the students will be coming up with solutions to offer. Parents should submit problems they encounter during daily life, from difficulties parking at the soccer field to interesting problems at work, or even national issues to which there seems "no answer". Including parents in question gathering has the bonus effect of increasing parent involvement. An Activity to Generate Creative Questions and Answers Gifted students tend to read at a higher grade level than their peers, and the gifted classroom can utilize that high reading level by offering a variety of "odd news" articles. Secondary students may want to research their own articles, but upper elementary and younger middle school students should have articles provided to them unless the class is also learning research skills. Students should choose an "odd news" article, and read it quietly. Then, students should come up with as many questions as they can based on the article, using the different question terms of how, what, when, where, who , and why. Not every news story will lend itself to every term. After the teacher has proof-read the question, the student should write down each question on a card. Without knowing anything about the news articles, other students in the class (or other classes) should draw out questions and try to answer them. They should use fluency to come up with a list of potential answers, and they should use flexibility to have a variety of categories of answers. Then, after reviewing their answers, students should write the most practical or likely answer on the back of the card. Grading Creative Problem Solving At the end of a creative problem solving activity, students should be have an answer to the problem. The quality of the answer is subjective, but any answer is a start. As students are offered more opportunities to solve problems, teachers should raise their expectations on the quality and quantity of answers. Grading in the gifted classroom is different than other classrooms, because the problems students face are often subjective. Creative problems solving lessons need clear grading standards. At the end of a creative problem solving unit, students should be able to face a variety of problems with confidence. They should be able to come up with a variety of responses, and some should be unique, while others should reflect popular thinking. If questions are well-phrased well, students are well-prepared, teachers should have high expectations for their students to solve a variety of problems in a variety of ways. Originally posted on Suite101 on October 8th, 2008. Halloween at the middle school level is different from elementary school, but teachers can offer seasonal activities that help students reflect on first quarter learning. Middle school students will push boundaries on dressing up for Halloween, so schools rarely allow costumes at school. Even if there was time for a class party, a teacher can't host parties in all day. Students would end up attending six different parties, eating junk food, and never break out a pencil. Instead of following the elementary lead of costumes and a short party, it is more appropriate for middle school teachers to use Halloween as a time to improve classroom dynamics. Students can have fun and do a little bit of learning, too. Preparing Students for Halloween at the Middle School Level Teachers need to stress the change in routine for middle school students. After years of dressing up and having parent-hosted parties, it may not occur to students that secondary schools follow handle holidays differently. Teachers should explain that they are in a larger school, and not all students are comfortable with the scary side of Halloween, but other students are bored of the childish side of Halloween. Then, teachers should help students understand that middle school schedules are not designed to be as flexible as they are in elementary school. At this point, students will be desperate to hear a magical "however" so they can be assured of having a little fun on the first big holiday of the school year, and teachers should say, "However, we will still be doing something special because we are just finished with the first quarter of school." Decorating Classrooms and Hallways with Student Work Because of the number of students, teachers cannot hang up 120 Jack-O-Lanterns, but teachers can have small pumpkins, leaves, bats and other fall/Halloween symbols and use them to decorate classrooms. Doing a search for "Halloween coloring sheets" or "Halloween printables" will lead to usable results. Familyfun.com's Halloween ideas. Teachers can create bulletin boards or hallway signs that allow the images to be grouped and displayed. Suggestions for Using Halloween Templates Using the patterns, students simply write something they have learned about in class that fits the theme of the picture. For example, a teacher could create a bulletin board that says, "Ideas that Fly". Students could use bat, witch, or ghost pictures and write one thing they learned in class so far that they would want to learn more about. Here are additional ideas:
Optional Halloween Classroom Activities If there isn't time in the day to offer activities, teachers might want to offer some holiday-inspired fun sheets for students to use when they are done with assignments. Even though students are older, they still enjoy word-searches, crosswords, and other "fun-day" activities. Discoveryeducation.com allows teachers to make customizable printouts, and teachers can decorate the copies with Halloween decorations. Originally posted on Suite101 on October 19th, 2008 Teachers can create school supply lists for students and parents on Amazon.com. The obvious advantage is that parents could order supplies directly from Amazon, but the lists can also be printed and taken to the store during back to school shopping. The site has two sides: the parent list to search for school supply lists, and the the teacher side to create lists. Start by choosing "Start a new list" on the Teacher side. Amazon will prompt you to sign in, and then you can create a book list or school supply list for your classes. You can also copy the list and edit your choices, so I can make a list for my Comp 1 class and use the same list for Comp 2, only changing the textbook. Choose "editlist" on the far left, and then fill in the details. If you teach college or are using the lists for a workshop, homeschool group, camp, or professional development, you can choose "other". The only difference will be that your list will not be found through the parents' side of the search list, and you will need to give out the URL. Fill in your details, and press save. Amazon will walk you through the steps of editing your list, adding items, and editing those items so that students know if they are optional and if other verisons are acceptable. On the last screen, you will have the choice to print off a list or give students and parents a URL. I put all of my steps in a collection below, and you can see the my test collection of an Amazon school supply list here. Remember, if you are a camp, college, or homeschool, choose "My school is not listed" so that you can add it in. If you are in a k-12 school, you should be able to find your school on the drop-down list and add your list to that school, so it will be found when parents look it up on Amazon. Successful teams, whether sports, academic, or otherwise, start before a single team member is placed. Team-building begins when coaches decide on appropriate goals for the team. With a goal foundation in place, coaches can then design try-outs that will bring in team members capable of meeting the team's needs. Goals for Quiz Bowl TeamsAcademic team coaches know that they will need to have students strong in a broad knowledge; all scholastic quiz bowls meets are designed around trivia. However, there are other questions that a coach needs to address before try-outs. When will the team practice? Try-outs should be the same day and time as practice. If potential members can't make it to tryouts, they probably will not make it to practice. How many members will be allowed on the team? The number of open spots will determine how well-advertised the try-outs are. If coaches are looking for a few kids, then getting the try-outs notice on the daily bulletin and putting posters up will be enough. If coaches are creating a team for the first time, it might be necessary to have skits and mini-tournaments at lunch to generate interest. What level of competition will the team face? If the team is a young middle school or junior high team, a coach might have a goal to offer quiz bowl exposure to the students and not focus on winning. A more experienced team might have more competitive goals. Try-outs should be geared to getting the type of students who meet team needs. Advertising Tryouts All students should have a chance to try out for the team. Coaches should make sure the tryouts are well-advertised in the bulletin, school newspaper, hallway posters, and other communication. Coaches should note how often practices and competitions are held, so that students can assess if the being on the team fits into their lives. Coaches should have a sign-up list so they can adequately prepare for the number of students intending to tryout. Preparing Questions for Tryouts Coaches should have a written test; buzzer skills can be built during team-practice.A shy student should not be excluded from the team, because confidence can reduce shyness. If possible, using real questions from competitions is the most fair and accurate way to assess qualified team members. Create quiz bowl questions that are similar to competition questions will also suffice. Coaches may also want to test the questions on students who can be trusted not to reveal the questions to people trying out. If the questions can be tested, the coach can determine if the questions makes sense to teenagers, and also determine how long the test takes. Sometimes tryout tests take much longer than a coach estimates. During Tryouts Coaches should have sharpened pencils and paper available for the students, and enough tables and chairs or desks for everyone. The coach should introduce herself and announce the goals for the team, giving estimates for practice times and competition times. Current team members might help by passing out papers and pencils. It is important that the coach makes the students aware of when and how the results will be given; it might be necessary to get student schedules so the coach can have notes delivered. Plan to help students keep calm; trying out is unnerving. Determining Who Makes the Team Coaches should check the tryout answers and take the top students for however many spots need to be filled. Students who qualify should be congratulated and told of the next meeting date, as well as informed in writing of what is expected of team members: behavior requirements, grade point averages for eligibility, and attendance concerns. Coaches should make their standards clear from the moment students are placed on the team. Being on a scholastic bowl is a rewarding experience for students, but the process of trying out is rewarding as well, even if the end result is rejection. Coaches should send notes to everyone who tried out, thanking them for their interest in the team. Students who tried out but did not qualify might be used as substitutes, timers and score-keepers during competition, or as a practice team for the official team. Including students who did not qualify demonstrates that the coach appreciates the risk and effort taken in trying out for a team. Originally posted on Suite101 on October 10th, 2008 The opportunity to work on the yearbook attracts a lot of student applicants. The idea of making a giant scrapbook is alluring, and sponsors need the right people. All students want to be involved with the yearbook. They want to be in the yearbook, they want to use the cameras, computers, and other equipment, and they want to be involved with deciding what moments are declared "yearbook moments". Sponsors have a responsibility to the students and parents who pay for the books to find the best people for the job. Often, this can become an after school activity for gifted students. Size of the Yearbook Staff The size of the staff will depend on the size of the book, the size of the school, and the age of the students involved. A sponsor should have at least one editor assigned to "mugshot photos" - the small school pictures appearing in the book. One editor should be assigned to sports, one editor assigned to clubs, and one editor assigned to after school activities. Each grade should have at least one editor to cover in school activities, and depending on how active the school is, there should be an editor to cover guest speakers and whole-school presentations. This means that the yearbook staff of an average high-school will have a minimum of 8 students, because the same students who edit can also take pictures and write for the other sections. Roles of the Yearbook Staff Yearbooks come together much like a quilt -- students gather pictures, ideas, quotes, and stories, and periodically through the year the staff sews the book together. General roles include: Editors These students are responsible for specific sections of the book. Editors make sure page layouts look profession, words are correctly used and spelled, and that stories, pictures, and quotations fit the theme and goal of the yearbook. Editors help establish story ideas, including scheduling surveys and mining for quotations. They may have to learn software such as Josten's Yearbook Avenue. Photographers These students are responsible for gathering pictures for the yearbooks. They must be willing to attend after-school activities, including club meetings and presentations, to get pictures. They must be friendly, outgoing, and respectful, and they should have a sense of balance in photography. Writers/Reporters These students are responsible for collecting surveys, conducting interviews, and writing stories. These are students who will be capturing the story of their school, so they should be able to write clearly and in a voice that appeals to students and the adults who pay for the yearbooks. They should be able to avoid cliches and other common writing mistakes, and they need to stay motivated to write. Students need to cover multiple roles, because a yearbook staff does not need to be overpopulated. Once mugshot names are edited, that editor is available to help other editors with their sections. When sports are not in season, that particular student can help in other areas. Roles blend into one efficient team. Finding a Yearbook Staff It is important to hold a meeting about the yearbook at the same time that the yearbook staff will be meeting after-school. Sponsors should explain the goals of the yearbook and what qualifications he or she is looking for in staff members. If students need to have internet access outside of school, access to a specific level of hardware or camera, or be available at certain times after school, the sponsor should stress that before taking applications. The sponsor should then have students submit an application explaining why he or she wants to be on the yearbook staff, including samples of writing or photography. Creating a yearbook is stressful, busy, and rewarding. Yearbook advisers should take the time to find the best students to wear the many hats involved in creating the yearbook. Finding the right staff and keeping the staff to a reasonable size will reduce the stress, manage the work, and increase the rewards. Originally posted to Suite101 in October 2008. Using computers to communicate means more than student email or instant messenger. Teachers can expect their students to work together in a meaningful way with some free tools available online. The mindset of computer usage is toward and understanding of Cloud Computing- working, sharing, and collaborating. Schools can reflect this mindset by incorporating collaboration in the computer lab and beyond. Understanding Forum Options Forums, also called message boards or bulletin boards, are built on group communication and collaboration. Generally, one person posts a topic, and other people build on it by offering comments and information that can be read by the whole group. Sites offer different levels of access, and the teacher would want to be the exclusive moderator, to maintain control over topic creation and comments. If a teacher simply wants students to be able to communicate and discuss in an online forum, a simple message board will be sufficient. If a teacher wants students to share files or work on a topic and add information collaboratively, online web applications, such as wikis, might be more useful. Creating a Class Message Board Many teachers and students already use Nicenet, a free, simple forum that does not have advertising. The site is reliable and powerful, and offers a secure forum for group conferencing, personal messaging (which teachers may want to disallow), and document sharing. How to Create a Nicenet Forum for a ClassSetting up a Nicenet forum with topics will take a minimum of 20 minutes, so teachers need to have a block of uninterrupted time available.
Nicenet will give each class a "Class Key" which is needed to join classes. This tool makes Nicenet secure and private. If the teacher wants to create additional forums, he simply click on "create a class", but it is important to continue using the established user name. How Students Join and Use a Nicenet Forum
Teachers need to take students on a tour of Nicenet, showing them how to post messages in the conference area and post documents on the document section. Explain the teacher's policy on messaging (some teachers do not allow it; personal private messages are counter-intuitive to group collaboration). HTML is available on Nicenet, but tends to slow down the site. How to Create a Class Wiki A wiki supports the curriculum by giving students shared online workspace. There are multiple sites available for class collaboration, such as class-wiki.intodit.com, PBwiki (which offers password protection) and the extremely powerful Google Apps (which may be too powerful for simple class communication purposes). One excellent wiki site for teachers is Wikispaces, which has a special section for educators. Once a teacher has selected a wiki or other collaborative-writing and working application, the steps to creating an online workspace for students is similar other forum set up procedures. Again, teachers will:
Once students are working as a group, new opportunities and challenges will present themselves. Students will be able to create online projects, but some may be frustrated by the lack of fanciness that a hands-on project can offer in the classroom, with glitter, markers, and colored paper. Although new leaders will emerge in a technology-based project, the same headaches that come with any group work will appear in collaboration, although the beauty of message boards and wikis is that the teacher can truly determine "who said what" first. The end results are impressive, do not use up classroom supplies or space, and can be shared with parents from home. Other classes can see work examples, and students in other classes can build on each other's work. The positives of working in collaboration online far outweigh the negatives. Although some school districts are exceedingly restrictive in approved internet sites, there are some sites that have established their safety and reliability, and they are popular with teachers and students. Originally posted on Suite101 on November 29th, 2008 There are two tools I like to use when reading in the Safari web browser on my iPad, especially if there are a lot of ads on a page. This is good information for personal use and for teachers to share with students in the classroom. When there are four lines on the top left corner of your browser, clicking those moves the screen into a reading-friendly view. By clicking on those lines, you launch the Reading View, and the four lines turn black. Additionally, there is an aA in the corner, indicating readers can change the fonts and font size. Images that are included in the article remain, but ads and formatting that can seem cluttered on a small screen disappear. In the following examples, notice how the Wikipedia notice disappears, and how the screen color and font size and type is adjusted. Easier reading is just a few clicks away!
have taught students in sixth grade through college, and the Six Traits of Writing* adapts to every level. This semester I am teaching Comp 1 and I found a great resource for teachers who use Six Traits in Zane Bloser. I have used their PowerPoints in the past, and they are adaptable so I made them more college friendly by strengthening the examples and using text sets from They Say, I Say. I have no affiliation with the company, I just like their materials and recommend them to other teachers. The Zane Bloser presentations are loveable because:
It is actually tricky to highlight in PowerPoint, so it is nice to have a pre-made presentation. In order for the highlighting to stay consistent, however, I had to copy and paste the theme into the current presentation. To do this, copy the original slide, and then move into your new presentation. Right-click on the slide right before you the place that you want to insert your new slide, and choose the middle paste button that says "Keep Source Formatting". * I know it is more precise to say 6+1 Traits, but I am used to the old school wording. Also, writing out numbers feels right.
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AuthorAlly Sharp is a teacher, writer and editor, and technology trainer. Archives
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