Final Glossary and Reflection

 

Image: https://teach-now.co.uk/the-role-of-creativity-and-innovation-in-teaching

 

Final Glossary and Reflection

 

1.      Innovation:

Innovation is an intentional process of improving or adding something new to an existing product, process (Badran 2007) model, knowledge or ways of working (Taylor, 2017) to create value in a practical and sustainable way. Innovation takes creative concepts to solutions.  Creativity is a central plan of innovation.

 

Reflection:

 

I arrived to my first definition after reflecting on Bradan’s reading, which highlights that an innovator is not a simply dreamer but a person who sees the potential of an idea, promotes it and has profit in mind. Throughout the modules I recognized that innovation is not merely adding something novel, but adding something valuable that makes best use of resources. Especially, after completing the modules, I understood how innovations in education have evolved from focusing on curriculum design to include more psychological aspects (learning efficiency, creativity, student’s wellbeing), and societal value (ethics, social justice, decolonization) (Taylor, 2017).  It will be very interesting how new technologies and the current global trends continue to shape innovations needed the education field.

 

Likewise, after reading my peers comments I have realized that we all find innovation to be an intentional process that should be planned and promoted constantly, and as the readings discussed it flourishes in environments that provide freedom, support, competition, pressure of necessity, initiative, self-realization drives, wealth building, and that it has a multiplying effect on society (Badran). I am able to see now how innovation in education needs similar environments to flourish and multiply and how innovation in education is not only applying new approaches, but revisiting old ones and considering new challenges.

 

For me the most valuable lessons is to continue to learn more about the past (history and philosophical approaches) through curated materials and our current situation (globalization, new technological and educational trends, mental health, etc.) though my PLN to better evaluate which areas of my teaching need to be improved.

 

Creativity

Creativity is the ability to generate new ideas, concepts or solutions that are original, imaginative and valuable.  It involves departing from facts or norms, finding new ways to solve a problem or to think about an idea/concept, making unusual associations between seemingly unrelated ideas and expressing oneself in unique ways.

Reflection:

I arrived to my first definition after completing the readings, which changed my perspective on the concepts, moving it from “esthetics and discovery” to a “high-level/intelligence ability” that linked to effectiveness and ethics. After reading my peers comments, I realized that we all still find it difficult to separate the concepts of innovation and creativity, and that perhaps creativity not always results in something valuable to all, but that the process of creativity will always challenge our ways of thinking and develop the skill. I do agree with the readings that contrary to the common belief that creative solutions are shaped suddenly, studies suggest that creative solutions involve systematic planning and analysis (Lavric, 2000) and like innovation, creativity is not only the result of a personal ability but a social phenomenon facilitated and inhibited by social factors (Cropley 2019).

 In this sense, as educators we need to seek ways to develop creativity skills throughout the curriculum with assignments that emphasizes the systematic process of creativity. The modules also providing me with a deeper understanding of different creativity bias, and made me more aware of how we often reject creative ideas and people (not openly as we feel the social pressure to be open to creativity) because we want to keep the status quo (and avoid uncertainty) (Mueller, et.al 2012). Likewise, how we tend to not pay attention to creative ideas that come from people with different backgrounds and challenge our existing privileges or status quo. And how we discourage creativity in the classroom as often times this implies more effort and work. After reading and engaging in discussions, I can see now that creativity needs to be recognized, developed and rewarded and that as educators we need to be creative if we want our students to replicate the same behavior. 

2.      Teaching

Interactive process to facilitate knowledge and skills, foster values, beliefs and attitudes. An effective teacher facilitates an environment in which students can relate and engage with the content, develop critical thinking and other academic and life skills by being empathetic, engaged, committed to the intellectual and personal growth of students and open to feedback.

Reflection:

While reviewing teaching definitions and reading my peer’s comments, I changed my definition of teaching to one that sees teaching as an interactive process that requires constant feedback, flexibility and improvement if we want it to be effective. It was valuable to realize how my peers defined teaching and teacher’s attributes based on their own experiences, while different attributes were highlighted, we all agree that an important task of a teacher is to nurture values, beliefs and attitudes. We discussed this further when we review philosophical and historical foundations of teaching and learning, a module that I truly find valuable, especially amongst those like me who lack educational training or are teaching at higher-education settings where we educators tend to take the main stage and focus on lecturing.

Likewise, module 3 and my peer’s comments reinforce the notion that teaching should develop life skills to prepare learners for both academic and personal success in today’s world. After reviewing the content and discussion forum of module 4, contemporary issues in innovation, teaching and learning, I realized the importance of transforming the curriculum and the classroom setting to a more inclusive, relevant, responsive one that considers students from all different background. Without doing this we can’t be effective teachers and we are missing great knowledge and practices from diverse people. Finally, after reading my peer’s comments, and perhaps the most valuable lesson for me is to realized how as educators we should be more aware of our responsibility in changing or perpetuating thoughts, behaviors and attitudes. We should consider ourselves as agents of change, take responsibility and act accordingly.

3.      Learning

Ability of acquiring, interpreting and applying knowledge, skills, behaviors, attitudes, for academic/professional and personal growth as well as adaptation to the external environment.  Learning requires understanding, change and application of usable knowledge. Learning happens with instruction, study, observation and experiencing in formal and informally ways.

Reflection:

I first wrote my definition of learning after completing the readings in this course and later made it more concise by reflecting on key points highlighted by my peers during the discussion forum. Many of us agree that the definition of learning has evolved through time and that nowadays an important element of learning is the ability to relate to theory in a personal way, applying concepts and theories to real-life problems or situations and reflect on the learning experience. After reviewing all modules, I could recognize different challenges that prevent effective learning, such as curriculum design, lack of connection/understanding between instructors and students, especially those who have a different background, learning environment conditions and even the living environment of students.  However, it was encouraging to see how my peers are committed to improve learning and read about their own experiences.

Thorough discussions, I can see that my peers also agree that effective learning in the classroom happens when students are able and motivated to transform information and experience to usable knowledge and actions, shifting importance of grades and test proficiency to the development of values, attitudes and soft skills.  The most valuable lesson for me was understanding that to improve effective learning, we need to understand what motivates and makes students engaged despite of all challenges and that we should continue to explore innovative teaching and learning methods and strategies that make the best use of technology and current trends. The development of my PLN and attendance to my personal development activity motivated me to keep on learning and improving to transform the learning experience in my classrooms.

 

 

Sources:

 

Badran, I. Enhancing Creativity and Innovation in Engineering Education” (2007).

S.P. Taylor, University of Cumbria, “What Is Innovation? A Study of the Definitions, Academic Models and Applicability of Innovation to an Example of Social Housing in England” (2017),

https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation?paperid=80628

Bransford J.D., et al., “Brain, Mind, Expereince and School: How People learn”, 201https://www.sdcoe.net/ngss/evidence-based-practices/key-findings-from-how-people-learn

Cropley, A. Academic Press Chapter: “Definitions of Creativity” in book Encyclopedia of Creativity (pp.315-322), 2019. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/266031380_Definitions_of_Creativity

DeHouwer, Jan, PubMed“What is learning? On the nature and merits of a functional definition of learning”, 2013, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23359420/

Fromm, Erich, Harper & Brothers, Book “The Art of Loving”, 1959.

Labric, A.. “Differences in working memory involvement in analytical and creative tasks: and ERP Study”, (2000)

Martin, Jane R, “There’s Too Much to Teach: Cultural Wealth in an Age of Scarcity” (1996)

Mueller, et.al., “The Bias Against Creativity: Why People Desire but Reject Creative Ideas” (2012)

Rajagopalan, Isola, Shanlax International Journal of Education, “Concept of Teaching”, 2019. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332527343_Concept_of_Teaching

Washburne, J. N., Journal of Educational Psychology, “The definition of learning”, 1936. Journal of Educational Psychology,  https://doi.org/10.1037/h0060154