The creative process extends beyond traditional ‘arts’ to areas such as design, architecture, landscape gardening and many more. The only limits are a person’s imagination and beliefs. An architect has to be able to see an empty piece of land and hallucinate a building in its totality. A gardener has to look at a bare patch of land and see a garden there.
To do this, your internal world has to supply variation. In other words, if you are going to be an interior decorator you have to have a reservoir of possibilities. This reservoir of possibilities can include things that you have seen before, things you know you could find, and things you could create or invent. The architect, systems theorist, author, designer and inventor Richard Buckminster Fuller was an exemplary example of creativity across multiple fields including architecture, design, geometry, engineering, science, cartography and education. Although best known for his geodesic domes, Buckminster held 28 patents, authored 28 books and received 47 honorary degrees for his creative work.(2) Much of the time it’s a case of starting with an idea of what you want and then following it to see if you can make it better on the outside, and the more you like it the more you do it and the less you like it the less you do it. So teach people to use their feelings as a guide to what they are creating.
If we teach children how to vary from one system or method, we are teaching them to think. We have to teach people 20 ways to remember, 20 ways to create, 20 ways to paint. Every time we have a different variation on these things we add the possibilities. If you have ever visited the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam you can see the way Van Gogh learned to paint in many different styles, including his ‘Old Dutch Masters’ period, his ‘Parisian’ period, and finally he found his own distinctive creative style.
First you can learn one way and then try another and another, blend all three in sequence and all three backwards. Creativity doesn’t come from having one mechanism working, it comes from having a variety. Creativity is about finding various combinations, so learners can do things that have never been done before. This way they discover which ones please them and which ones don’t.
Of course if you have to paint everything on the outside first to decide if you like it, it’s a lot slower than if you can do it on the inside first. That’s why people we consider to be real geniuses don’t seem to have a lot of poor output. Most of their output seems to be really good because they run through it first on the inside, find the best selections and then do it on the outside. This makes for efficient productivity.
The difference between human beings and inanimate objects is our ability to respond . The way that we as individuals work with clients is different from everybody else, and so it should be. The more variety of strategies and approaches we have to choose from, the more we can use them to alter the way things are for people, and this is very true for teachers. Teachers want to have lots of strategies available so that if somebody has trouble with one, they can offer another or take a step back and provide the precursor to the strategy.
Learning and teaching creativity is also about asking good questions. Rather than asking, ‘what is wrong with this?’ , ask ‘what would happen if I added this?’ If there is a picture inside your head, ask ‘well I’ve got a tree in mind, what would happen if I took the weirdest colour I could find and made the leaves that colour?’ Or ‘what would happen if I had a normal face on one side and I distorted the other as much as I possibly could?’ Anything that exists in normal reality can be altered in another reality, so teaching the ‘what would happen if’ question to your students develops creativity and imagination.
In schools, learners are sometimes admonished for not drawing what is on the outside. If a child draws an apple that is purple he may be told that he hasn’t got it right. On this basis, Picasso, Monet and Van Gogh would have all failed Art at school and only the people from the Renaissance who painted perfect three-dimensional images would have been considered artists. The truth is, creativity is having a sense of experimentation. Sit down and experiment to make colours; first you can match colours that exist, but then you want to make colours that are like the ones only you can imagine. If you start imagining and changing all the different tones, you can take a colour on the outside and think, ‘I like this blue, maybe we can make it into a tree’
summary
During this chapter we have outlined the basis for creativity in a number of different arts and forms. Within each strategy there are some consistent factors. First and foremost is the belief that the student is a creative person. Secondly, that the right states are created, not only to begin but to continue so that the more they create the better they feel. Thirdly, that a few helpful techniques will get people off to a great start and that is all they need to become creative. Next, ask the ‘what would happen if’ question and create on the inside as well as the outside of your mind and stretch your imagination muscles. And finally, remember that the more distinctions we can make in the creative process, the more we can unleash people’s creativity.
references
1. Sir Ken Robinson, 2010, Changing Education Paradigms, RSA Animate, www.thersa.org
2. The Buckminster Fuller Institute, https://bfi.org/about-fuller
activities
Activity 1
for yourself :
Decide on an area of creativity that you do not believe you are good at or have never tried. Sit quietly and imagine in every representation system yourself creating in this form. Notice the good feelings and spin them so they intensify. Add in some excitement and some tenacity. Then go out and have a go. Find a really creative person and ask some interesting questions, such as ‘how do you do that?’ / ‘How do you know when to start?’ / ‘How do you know when it’s done?’ Keep going until you have found one key part of the technique to add to your repertoire.
Activity 2
Design a list of questions to stimulate creativity with your students and build a lesson around creativity, whatever your subject.
Activity 3
for your students :
Write out an introduction to a session that convinces your students that they are creative. Use a journey where they relax and imagine themselves creating something wonderful and enjoying the pleasure of the process. Then teach your class and notice what is different (see Chapter 12 for more guidance on how to do this).
Extension activity
Build your introduction into a full lesson.
Here is the Poetry lesson plan and an example
of a mind map to guide you:
lesson
Focus: Year 1 class [Original] - Adapted for NLP Master Practitioner Students
Subject: English [Poetry Writing]
sucess criteria for progress :
Satisfactory - Use words from the word bank
Good - Choose own nouns/adjectives
Outstanding - Choose adjectives/verbs that are different, ambitious or sound effective, e.g. Verb continuous
introduction/Greeting:
Rapport: My name…My beach hut…My hobbies… [writing at my beach hut] Create beach scape while talking…sea, sand, shells, etc.
Hook: Invitation to come with me on a magical journey to inspire our imaginations for writing
lesson format :
Episode 1: Generate vocabulary & creative states [Process: Guided meditation to ’sea’ music using artfully vague language to enable the learners to choose their subject and language]
Episode 2: Model writing process [Talk for writing: Describe what it was…Say how it moved…]
Episode 3: Learners to innovate their own poetry lines/verses ending…” Down at the beach”
Episode 4: Combine ideas, evaluate and rehearse.
Plenary - Perform and celebrate!
This eBook is licensed to Dominic Luzi, [email protected] on 10/18/2018
part 3
Highly Effective
Classroom Teaching
This eBook is licensed to Dominic Luzi, [email protected] on
10/18/2018
chapter 9
What makes a
Highly Effective Teacher?
Scan this to see the video
‘The last of human freedoms - the ability to choose one’s attitude in a given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.’ (1)
Victor E Frankl
In this chapter
Discover the core beliefs that Highly Effective Teachers hold true
Translate these beliefs into effective behaviours in the classroom
Develop the 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teachers
We don’t believe our students get up in the morning wanting to screw up our day. It might feel like that sometimes, but it’s not a helpful belief to have and it’s not true. However, one teacher on a seminar we ran protested, ‘you haven’t met my Wednesday afternoon group. I KNOW they get up and plan how to screw up my day!’ It wasn’t at all surprising to discover that this class succeeded in screwing up this teacher’s day every Wednesday, for this is what he expected them to do, and they obliged.
As a teacher, you may be familiar with the Pygmalion or Rosenthal Effect.( 2) Robert Rosenthal and Lenore Jacobson informed teachers that, following progress tests a number of students were showing great promise and were expected to ‘spurt’ in their development over the following terms. In fact, these children were a random selection and showed no such particular promise over other students. The ‘prophecy’ was self-fulfilling; the study showed that if teachers were led to expect enhanced performance from certain children, then those children did indeed show that enhancement. It became clear that the children were not responding to the expectations of the teachers directly, but were responding positively to the behaviours and attitudes of their teachers, who in turn believed that these children were of higher intelligence.
Teachers are powerful influencers, and when we carefully choose our beliefs or assumptions about our students, to a great extent those assumptions will manifest in our students. The premise is simple - what the thinker thinks the prover prove s.(3)
When your mind holds a belief, it biases and filters all incoming data to substantiate and support that belief, and we can use this to powerful effect in the classroom.
Highly Effective Teachers choose useful beliefs that support learners as individuals and learning as a process. In teaching, as in all other areas of life, our beliefs drive our behaviours, so any decision to act or behave in a certain way is based on the beliefs we hold at that moment in time.
Most of us probably only spend time thinking about what we believe in relation to the very weighty questions, such as our religion or values. Beliefs are by their very nature not ‘true’. If they were true they would be facts, not beliefs. Some of our beliefs are extensive, like breathing is a good thing! Other beliefs evolve and change as we grow and learn, such as a belief in the tooth fairy. Just as our beliefs change and develop over our lives, you can adopt helpful and supportive beliefs in relation to your students.
The beliefs of Highly Effective Teachers correspond to many of the basic assumptions or presuppositions of NLP, which in turn form the basis of NLP interventions. Deciding in advance to ‘pre-frame’ or presuppose success in ourselves and in others ensures that we think ourselves and our students into successful outcomes. The assumptions of NLP provide operating principles that are conducive to motivated, resilient and tenacious teachers and learners.
Some of the presupposed beliefs of Highly Effective Teachers include:
My students are doing the best they can at this moment in time
My students are making the best choices with the resources they have
Given better options, the students will make better choices
There is a positive intention behind their behaviour – they may just not have the right strategy to achieve what they want
Failure is a result. All results are outcomes, whether or not they are what was intended
Some people may think that beliefs don’t change–‘I can’t help it, I’ve always been like this!’ However, even pervasive beliefs can and do change and we are all able to choose our attitude at a given time when we start to think on purpose.
Of course you are not responsible for a student’s experiences prior to your meeting them, and one of your first jobs may be to help them to change some of their less helpful past learnings. They may have beliefs about being stupid, being unable to learn, or that learning serves no purpose for them. Fortunately, you can be proactive in changing your students’ minds. Consider the following behaviours used by Highly Effective Teachers:
1. highly effective teachers are systematic in their behaviours
The reason for carefully choosing the beliefs that support and sustain learning is that our behaviours will follow directly and be driven by our beliefs. Whatever a highly effective teacher does, s/he does it in a systematic and consistent way. They base their decisions to act on the operating principles they have adopted and they engage in certain behaviours as a habit. NLP is a systematic field; it is not based on intuition, charisma or other innate qualities. The skills of NLP can easily be learned and transmitted to others.
2. highly effective teachers are proactive and outcome-focused
In some languages such as Welsh, Serbian and Maori, the word for‘teaching’ is the same as the word for ‘learning’. In English, we couldhave ‘tearning’, which is probably better than ‘learching’! Even in some English dialects, the word ‘learn’ is used rather than ‘teach’, for example, ‘she learned me to ride my bike’ . This shift in focus reframes the concept of teaching. When we begin to take responsibility for our students’ learning processes, we move the focus from the teaching to the learning. The key approach here is to keep your eye on the prize (the outcome you want for your students) and be proactive in finding creative ways to achieve the outcome with the student.
Have you ever heard, or even said, ‘I taught them X last week/month/year – they must know it!’ ? And the students’ response is a blank or confused stare? You know you taught this subject, but you don’t know the students learned it. This common misunderstanding about learning suggests that the responsibility of the teacher has been discharged at the point of delivery. However, the reality is that if they haven’t learned it, we haven’t taught it! If you are not getting the response you want, then it’s time to change the way you communicate. This requires the teacher to be a great learner and to look for new ways to understand what works - and what doesn’t work - for a student. One NLP assumption - the meaning of the communication is the response you get - puts the learner at the centre of the learning and the teacher in the driving seat of being ‘response-able’.
Simply put, if the way you are explaining or teaching isn’t working – try something else!
3. highly effective teachers see problems as challenges and opportunities to learn
Students are making the best choices they can with the resources they have right now. Making this assumption provides the opportunity to resolve challenges rather than simply accept that this is the way they are. For example, when we believe that everyone gets up in the morning wanting to do their best and a student does something we don’t like or is inappropriate, we can then ask ourselves, ‘what is the student trying to achieve with this behaviour that isn’t working for them?’ This question provides a direction, so we can then ask how we can help them to find a better way to achieve what they want. When people are given better options they make better choices .
You will have heard teachers say, ‘Oh, that student is just attention-seeking’ Well, guess what - they are! Attention-seeking behaviour meansthat the student wants attention. There is nothing wrong with that;everyone wants attention, especially when they are young. The problem is, the behaviours they use to get attention may not be appropriate in that context. We can show that young person how they can get the attention they want through more appropriate means. The behaviour that isn’t getting a student what they want is not a ‘bad behaviour’;
it just doesn’t fit within the context. We can help students to either find a more appropriate behaviour, or find a context where that original behaviour is acceptable. Some years ago there was a scheme on a rundown housing estate just outside Manchester, where tutors worked on the streets with boys who had been excluded from school. Most of these teenagers had police records and probation officers. Despite an inability to work independently, they were exceptionally good at working together as a group. This wasn’t really surprising considering how they spent their spare time. This group could steal a car and strip it of everything that was of value in minutes, one big lad removing each wheel and propping the car up on bricks, the smallest boy inside the car removing the radio while someone else acted as lookout and the most athletic boy was the runner. Within 4 minutes, the car was stripped of everything of value, and within hours most of it had been sold.
Obviously, we are not condoning this activity. However, think for a moment of the behaviours and activity in a different context, focusing on the process, and it’s clear these young men had Formula 1 racing pitstop skills. These young men had developed team-working skills, communication skills, dexterity, business skills, and physical prowess. It was not a question of re-training them in something useful; it was a case of moving their skills into a different context so their skills could be recognised and respected - hopefully keeping them out of jail in the future!
Teaching Excellence Page 13