Zen and the Art of Professional Learning Communities

As I was reading about simplicity in my morning meditations, I was struck by how PLCs bring simplicity and clarity to teaching.

• There is no teaching without learning.
• Clarify:  What must our students know and be able to do?
• How do you know if students know it and can do it?  This doesn't have to be a heatmap or a pivot table.  Just ask yourself, "How do you know?"
• Can you show us how you know?  Otherwise it's not knowledge - it's faith.
• What do you do when students don't know?  Stop using the schedule as an excuse.
• What do you do when students already know?  If students already know, then you're not teaching, because they're not learning.

Furthermore:

• Do you average grades?  That means that you think that penalizing early failure is more important than mastery.
• Do you give zeroes?  That means that you think that "work ethic" is more important than content.  You are free to believe that, but you should report that separately.  Content mastery and compliance should not be co-mingled in the same grade.  
• Do you give homework to parents?  You know what I mean - projects that require trips to the office supply store, reading logs, practice cards, etc.
• Do you work in isolation?  That means you think you have nothing to learn and nothing to share.  That means you divide the world into "my kids" and "their kids."

PLCs are difficult because true simplicity is difficult.  However, the premise is above reproach. 

Clarify expectations.  Monitor results.  Adjust instruction and support.

That is all.  What else could there be?

Does your school need a school improvement plan for creativity?

Does your school need a school improvement plan for creativity?

Spoiler Alert:  yes.

In their Newsweek article "The Creativity Crisis," Bronson and Merryman cited a poll that indicated that creativity is considered the critical leadership competency by CEOs (http://www.newsweek.com/creativity-crisis-74665).

Dan Pink wrote a blog post about how China is embracing creativity in education (http://www.danpink.com/2010/07/quote-of-the-day-the-real-reason-china-is-laughing-at-the-us/). He posted about the misalignment between business and school superintendents regarding the most important elements of creativity (http://www.danpink.com/2009/01/the-problem-with-problems/).  He also suggested that the Great Recession might have been due in part to the actions of people who lacked long-range, empathetic, or imaginative thinking (http://www.danpink.com/2008/10/too-many-left-brains-spoil-the-pot/).

Let's pause for a moment.  These are not calls for personal expression and fulfillment from the hippy-dippy crowd.  These are arguments for creativity that are rooted in economic development.

Then, let's acknowledge that there are many who consider the economic justification of education anywhere from short-sighted to nefarious.  For many, education is about the development of the whole person in order to lead a more fulfilling life.

Everywhere you look, creativity is cherished.  And yet, it is systematically excluded from school improvement plans, primarily due to lack of accountability pressure via standardized testing.

Do we measure what we treasure, or vice versa?

The PLC process does not need to be the enemy of the fine arts.  Robert Eaker published an article about including art in school improvement plans (http://www.allthingsplc.info/files/uploads/ArtEducationAndTheEffectiveSchools.pdf).  I say, if it's important enough for one of the primary PLC authors, it's important enough for your school.  Let's move past school improvement plans with two goals.

Stop using SMART goals, PLCs, and standardized testing as excuses to marginalize the arts. We can make this work, but only if we acknowledge its importance.

Teacher Evaluation and Creativity

We've all seen the posters.  Music is math, music is reading, music is history, etc., but most of all, music is music.

Why put the most important thing last?

Fine arts educators have to admit some culpability here.  Because we are not regarded as a core subject by the average person, we have worked hard to advocate for ourselves.  That often includes attempts to highlight the non-artistic benefits of arts education.

Unfortunately, some educators are reaping what we have sown.  After decades of comparing the arts to so-called academic subjects, fine arts teachers are now being evaluated on reading and math.  These teachers often feel de-valued, and are rightfully concerned about the validity and reliability of such measures.

We need to refresh our efforts, and we need to Start with Why.

The purpose of the fine arts is not to improve literacy and mathematics.  Indeed, visual art was often used to convey ideas to pre-literate citizens.  One purpose of art is to create works in a medium that embody feelings.

The Why has three parts:  creativity, the medium, and feelings.  If this is Why we have fine art, then these elements should drive instruction.  Teacher evaluation should examine the effectiveness of this instruction - not literacy and mathematics.

Many Professional Learning Communities get caught up in the wrong Why by assuming that creativity cannot be assessed.  This leads these PLCs to rely on standardized literacy tests to evaluate fine arts teachers.  However, we can clearly assess whether something is novel, expressive, or engaging.  We do it all the time in our daily life.

While there are many technical papers about the assessment of creativity, fine arts educators might have better luck citing Grant Wiggins when trying to convince PLC administrators of this point.  Wiggins is the co-author of the widely used Understanding by Design framework, and he is a known and respected name in the field.  Wiggins states simply that we can assess creativity, and we should assess creativity.  Check out his outstanding article at http://grantwiggins.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/on-assessing-for-creativity-yes-you-can-and-yes-you-should/

Fine arts educators have always needed to educate stakeholders about the value of our work.  However, we are now seeing the dark side of over-selling arts education.  Let's redouble our efforts, but let's stay focused on the right Why.  It's the only way to have genuine advocacy.

Teacher Evaluation - Start with Why!

Welcome back to Round Pegs!  We took a bit of a summer break.

Teacher evaluation came up again.

"High stakes tests are fine for tested subjects.  What about fine arts, technical arts, or physical education?"

The stock answer:  "Everybody is a literacy teacher.  Evaluate teachers on literacy."

If the feelings embedded in the fine arts could be expressed in words, we would have no need for the fine arts.  Stravinsky once said that "music means itself."  The arts can produce a visceral response that a description of the arts cannot.  But we can even make a distinction between artistic writing and descriptive writing.  John Ciardi wrote How Does a Poem Mean because the question "What Does a Poem Mean" is silly.  As if Emily Dickinson couldn't express herself cogently, so we need a professor to translate for us.

To be fair, I want literate citizens, and reading and writing are among the Mother Subjects.  But when we evaluate fine arts teachers on literacy outcomes, we start with the wrong Why.  "Because We Don't Have Standardized Arts Tests" isn't a good reason to hold teachers accountable for literacy.

But what happens if we meet the CCSS crowd half way?  Let's say that everybody is responsible for every student's literacy score.  What portion of student growth would you attribute to the high school band director?  What portion goes to the 8th grade visual arts teacher?  How about the 5th grade theater teacher?

Here's the answer:  none of the above.  This level of confidence in statistics is pure hubris.  But don't take my word for it.  Read https://www.amstat.org/policy/pdfs/ASA_VAM_Statement.pdf to see the position of the American Statistical Association.

Start with Why.  Why do we teach the arts?  The answer is not to improve literacy.

For more information, check out Simon Sinek's TED talk at http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action

Arts Education and A More Beautiful Question - A Masterclass with Warren Berger, Part 2

This is the second post in a series about the best-selling A More Beautiful Question and its lessons for fine arts education.

Warren Berger gives us a three-part framework for improving innovation:  ask why, what if, and how.

Imagine how our classrooms might be transformed by starting with why:

Why did the composer mark these notes staccato? 

Why did Shakespeare choose these words? 

Why did Ansel Adams photograph in black and white? 

Why does (or doesn't) this choreography capture the mood?

Questions drive creativity and innovation.  As arts educators, we are in the creativity business.  We must keep the spark of inquiry alive in our students.

The new National Core Arts Standards (www.nationalartsstandards.org) are written with Essential Questions for each Anchor Standard. Using these questions effectively can promote engagement, and they can enable students to transfer their learning to other situations or disciplines (Wiggins and McTighe, 2005).  Since information is a Google search away, and modern problems require creative solutions, the concept of transfer is critically important to the future of education.

But don't take my word for it.  John Hattie conducted synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses of educational research.  Creativity programs have a high effect on achievement (d=0.65), as does questioning (d=0.46).  Inquiry-based teaching has a medium effect (d=0.31).

Unleash the creative power of your students by questioning rather than answering!

References

Berger, W. (2014). A more beautiful question: The power of inquiry to spark breakthrough ideas. New York, NY: Bloomsbury

Hattie, J. (2009). Visible learning: A synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses relating to achievement. London, UK: Routledge

Wiggins, G. and McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design. Alexandria, VA: ASCD

Arts Education and A More Beautiful Question - A Masterclass with Warren Berger, Part 1

Warren Berger's brilliant book A More Beautiful Question is a hit on the creativity and innovation scene.  It currently has an Amazon rank of #8 in neuroscience, #14 in decision-making and problem solving, and #23 in entrepreneurship.

Credit:  warrenberger.com

Berger seems to have a kinship with the arts - the title is taken from a line by the poet e.e. cummings.

The premise of the book is disarmingly simple but profound in its implications:  If questioning is the engine of innovation, why aren't we doing more to develop that skill?

His answer is spot on.

"To encourage or even allow questioning is to cede power - not something that is done lightly in hierarchical companies or in government organizations, or even in classrooms, where a teacher must be willing to give up control to allow for more questioning" (2014, p. 6).

Berger developed a three part framework - Why/What If/How - to guide us through the stages of inquiry.  He defines a beautiful question as "...an ambitious yet actionable question that can begin to shift the way we perceive or think about something - and that might serve as a catalyst to bring about change" (2014, p. 8).

Berger explores school's dampening effect on productive inquiry.  Fortunately, a solution is at hand, if only educators will take full advantage of the methodology.  Wiggins and McTighe used research about expert understanding to develop a revolutionary approach to unit design.  Understanding by Design starts with the Big Ideas that distinguish expert understanding from a mere accumulation of factoids.  They describe the Enduring Understandings that are necessary to grasp those Big Ideas.  But perhaps most importantly, they describe Essential Questions that serve as "hooks" to engage student interest and provide entry paths into the Big Ideas (Wiggins and McTighe, 2005).

A serious and sustained application of the principles of Understanding by Design could go a long way in closing the gap that Berger has exposed.

Let's follow Berger's lead for a moment.  Why do arts educators - especially arts educators in a PLC - care about this issue?

Arts educators can feel comfortable developing a questioning environment because we work in a discipline where there is usually more than one "right answer" - if indeed one exists. Arts educators in a PLC know our work is driven by questioning - specifically the four questions of the PLC process:

1. What knowledge, skills, and dispositions do our students need to have?
2. How do we know if they have acquired them?
3. What do we do if they have not acquired them?
4. What do we do if they have already acquired them?

One of the skills and dispositions that our students need to have is questioning.  Arts educators can include that in our curriculum.  We can teach for it, we can assess for it, and we can support students who fall short of our expectations.

What if arts educators used questioning to drive learning?

How can we do that?

The answers are the keys to the kingdom.

References

Berger, W. (2014). A more beautiful question: The power of inquiry to spark breakthrough ideas. New York, NY: Bloomsbury

Wiggins, G., and McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design. Alexandria, VA:  ASCD

An Arts Education Hippocratic Oath - Do No Harm!

This is the final post in a series about lessons to be learned from innovation expert Teresa Amabile.

In Growing Up Creative, bestselling Harvard professor Teresa Amabile has a chapter called "How to Destroy a Child's Creativity."  Arts educators should heed these suggestions in the same way that doctors pledge to do no harm.

Amabile cites the following problems as creativity killers:

1. Teacher attitudes:  controlling teachers or teachers with low expectations 
2. Rote learning
3. Fear of failure
4. Conformity pressure
5. "The system" (1989, pp. 87-89)

"The system" refers to the inverse relationship between years in school and creative self-concept.  Many speakers and writers have discussed schooling's apparent negative effect on creativity.  The most popular of these speakers is currently Sir Ken Robinson - his TED talk on the subject is the most viewed video on the TED website (http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity).

While there is no doubt that the fine arts require that specific knowledge, skills, and dispositions need to be mastered, the timing and nature of critical feedback is important. Arts educators must walk a fine line between guiding students and killing creativity.  To make things more challenging, this line is always moving.  Every student has a different line, and even that line may change from day to day based on the student's emotional state.

Professional Learning Communities can play a critical role in helping teachers find this line. Collaboration helps us in at least two critical areas:  it gives us a bigger back of pedagogical tricks, and it helps us know our students better.

Arts educators, let's work together to follow an Artistic Hippocratic Oath.  Let's learn from each other so that we never destroy creativity!

References

Amabile, T. (1989). Growing up creative: Nurturing a lifetime of creativity. New York: Crown Publishers

An Encore with Ed Catmull and Pixar-Unleashing Creativity

Ed Catmull, president of Disney Animation and Pixar, has written a new creativity book that is lighting a fire.

I have nothing to add to Tavis Smiley's wonderful interview with Dr. Catmull, but I would like to highlight a phrase that Catmull uses near the end:  "In spite of the words we use..."

Catmull touches on something here - we give lip service to the idea of making it safe for risk and failure, but most of us fail to live it.  We need to live our words.

Give yourself the gift of fourteen minutes of interview time.  You, your students, and the fine arts profession will be the better for it.

http://www.pixarpost.com/2014/05/ed-catmulls-pbs-interview-with-tavis.html

References:

Catmull, E. and Wallace, A. (2014). Creativity, inc.: Overcoming the unseen forces that stand in the way of true inspiration. New York, NY: Random House.

Motivation! - Creativity Lessons with Teresa Amabile, Part 3

Creativity and innovation expert Teresa Amabile has much to offer Fine Arts Professional Learning Communities.  In Growing up Creative, she describes creativity as a fine soup. Domain skills are the stock, creative thinking and working skills are the seasonings, and intrinsic motivation is the fire (1989, p. 46).  Dr. Amabile understands that motivation is both essential and undervalued, so she devotes an entire chapter to this element of creativity.

Amabile contends that "people will be most creative when they feel motivate primarily by the interest, enjoyment, satisfaction, and challenge of the work itself - and not by external pressures" (1989, p. 51).  Intrinsic motivation is personal.  there are no intrinsically interesting activities - there are only activities which might be interesting for a particular person at a particular point in time (1989, p. 54).  Amabile describes the hallmarks of intrinsic motivation as interest, competence, and self-determination.  She goes on to cite several studies in which creativity was enhanced under conditions of intrinsic motivation.  It turns out that extrinsic motivation will usually compel us to take the safest path, the simplest routine, or the proven algorithm.  This does not encourage innovation.  The pressure of extrinsic motivation can also cause stress, or it can cause us to prematurely criticize potential solutions.

Fans of Daniel Pink will find this to be very familiar.  His book Drive describes autonomy, mastery, and purpose as the formula for motivation.  For those not familiar with Pink's work, his TED talk is a great introduction (http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation).

Fine arts educators must be mindful of the balance between content standards and intrinsic motivation.  We must interpret the standards broadly, with the best interests of developing creative students in mind.  We must design activities and assessments with the goal of improving creative behavior.

We must also be wary of the effects of extrinsic motivation.  This is particularly dangerous in the field of music, where large-group competitions have become the measuring stick for success in many parts of the country.  These competitions may develop or promote many fine qualities in our students, but we need to be clear-eyed about the fact that individual creative thinking is probably not one of them.

How does collaboration play a part in all of this?  We can hold each other accountable to make sure we design assessments and activities that maximize intrinsic motivation. Sometimes we don't know what we don't know, and it takes an open and honest team to keep us on the path to creativity.

Let's band together to make every schoolhouse a more creative place!

References
Amabile, T. (1989). Growing up creative: Nurturing a lifetime of creativity. New York, NY: Crown Publishers.

Pink, D. (2009). Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us. New York, NY: Riverhead Books.

Creativity Lessons with Teresa Amabile, Part 2

Best-selling author Teresa Amabile describes three major ingredients for creativity:  domain skills, creative thinking and working skills, and intrinsic motivation.  Each of these is essential in order to produce original ideas or products that have value.

In today's standards-driven educational environment, fine arts educators can get caught up in teaching content to the detriment of teaching process.  This can be harmful to the development of creativity.  Amabile writes "There are some special working styles, thinking styles, and personality traits that enable people to use their domain skills in new ways" (1989, p. 46).  She suggests that originality is improved when one consciously sets out to do something out of the ordinary.

In addition to a conscious effort to develop an original idea, a respectful attitude of craftsmanship is helpful.  Amabile asserts that this working style is marked by:

1. a dedication to doing the work well
2. an ability to concentrate effort and attention for long periods of time
3. an ability to abandon unproductive ideas and temporarily put aside stubborn problems
4. a persistence in the face of difficulty
5. a willingness to work hard (1989, p. 47).

Thinking styles are also important.  Amabile observes that many creative persons have several of the following thinking styles:

1. breaking set patterns of thinking
2. understanding complexities
3. keeping options open
4. suspending judgment
5. thinking broadly 
6. remembering accurately
7. breaking out of scripted habits of acting
8. perceiving freshly
9. using tricks to help think of new ideas (1989, pp. 48-49).

These process-oriented goals are more subtle than content standards.  They are harder to measure, and therefore, are harder to demonstrate to an evaluating administrator.  

That doesn't make them less essential.  

A fine arts Professional Learning Community could function as a support network to help educators keep these processes on their teaching radar.  PLC work sessions could start with questions about how you supported creativity this week.  Collaboration can help us stay on track the same way that a workout buddy can hold us accountable for our physical fitness goals.

Creativity is the nexus between the core of our domain and the needs of society at large.  Let's keep these creative processes at the forefront of our curricula.  Let's think carefully about how we will know if students are learning these skills and dispositions (PLC Question #2).  Let's collaborate to find solutions when students don't learn these essential skills and dispositions (PLC Question #3).  

Finally, let's collaborate to support each other and advocate for our discipline.  Society is desperate for creative work, and we are the resident experts in every schoolhouse in the country.  Be proud, and be important!

References
Amabile, T. (1989). Growing up creative: Nurturing a lifetime of creativity. New York, NY: Crown Publishers

Creativity Lessons with Teresa Amabile, Part 1

Teresa Amabile is currently a professor at the Harvard Business School, where her research includes individual productivity, team creativity, and organizational innovation.  Her book The Progress Principle is an Amazon top 100 seller in both Organizational Learning and Creativity.  She has numerous publications on creativity, including Creativity in Context and Growing up Creative.  Her research yields practical recommendations for arts educators.

In Growing up Creative, Dr. Amabile describes three ingredients for creativity:  skill in the domain, creative working and thinking skills, and intrinsic motivation.  These ingredients correspond closely to Professional Learning Community Question #1:  What knowledge, skills, and dispositions do our students need to have?

Amabile correctly points out that we sometimes overlook domain skill, because we take it as given.  However, it is the prime requisite for creativity.  One cannot be creative in a domain in which one has no knowledge or skill.  Einstein's remarkable creativity in physics and his average skill on violin do not imply any particular advantage as a dancer.

Arts educators are sometimes hesitant to prescribe specific knowledge and skills on the basis that prescription inhibits creativity.  In fact, the opposite is true.  We must not shy away from the fact that we must provide foundational training.  We must decide on the particular mix of knowledge and skills that students must have, and we must collaborate so that students receive those foundational skills, regardless of who is teaching the course.  Because these skills are foundational, we must have evidence about whether each student has mastered them, and we must pledge extra time and support to students who have not yet attained mastery.

And yes, this means that we assess learning and use that evidence to guide instruction.  Amabile has recommendations for assessment in art, which will be explored in a later segment.

Happy Independence Day!

References

Amabile, T. (1996). Creativity in context: Update to the social psychology of creativity. Boulder, CO: Westview Press

Amabile, T. (1989). Growing up creative: Nurturing a lifetime of creativity. New York, NY: Crown Publishers

Amabile, T. and Kramer, S. (2011). The progress principle: Using small wins to ignite joy, engagement, and creativity at work. Boston, MA: Harvard University Press

"Secrets of the Creative Brain" and Fine Arts PLCs

Nancy Andreasen's Secrets of the Creative Brain article in The Atlantic (http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/06/secrets-of-the-creative-brain/372299/) was widely posted on Twitter this week.  Dr. Andreasen is one of our most respected creativity researchers, with expertise in creative writing, psychology, and neuroscience.

By her own admission, Andreasen studies what she calls Big C creativity - the processes and products of our most distinguished creative geniuses.  This is in contrast to Little C creativity, which might be described as the creativity inherent in all of us.  Andreasen is also unusual in the field in that she writes extensively about the role of mental illness in creativity.  This article delves into that topic, and interested readers can find an even more thorough treatment of the subject in Andreasen's The Creative Brain:  The Science of Genius.

As a fine arts educator, I am skeptical about making a qualitative distinction between Big C and Little C.  I'd like to think that creativity lives on a spectrum, and that Big C geniuses are simply better at creativity than average people.  I am sympathetic to Sir Ken Robinson's contention that creativity is the exclusive province of neither special people (such as geniuses), nor special activities (e.g., the arts).  I'd also like to believe that educators can enhance creativity without bringing on mental illness.

I am concerned that by focusing on genius and insanity as creative necessities, we reinforce the Muse myth.  In The Myths of Creativity:  The Truth About How Innovative Companies and People Generate Great Ideas, David Burkus disabuses us of many traditional notions about creativity, including the divine inspiration myth.  While I am aware that creative geniuses often describe their process as something like an out-of-body experience, I am reminded of the quip that artists are never more creative than when they are writing their autobiographies.

So, what can fine arts educators learn from Andreasen's work?  To be fair, The Creative Brain includes a chapter called "Building Better Brains," and musical study is included in her recommendations.  While Andreasen is focused on Big C, she is also aware that education can improve Little C.  In Secrets of the Creative Brain, Andreasen also asserts that "creative people are better at recognizing relationships, making associations and connections, and seeing things in an original way - seeking things that others cannot see."

Fine arts education can enhance these abilities.  Effective arts instruction develops imagination.  It teaches the elaboration of ideas.  It requires persistent problem solving.  It can focus students on those things that Andreasen finds essential to creativity - relationships, associations, connections, and originality.

By all means, let's study and celebrate our creative geniuses.  But we do our students and our society a great disservice when we paint a picture of creativity that requires muses and mental illness.  We can teach creativity, and we must teach creativity.

References:

Andreasen, N. (2005).  The creative brain: The science of genius. New York, NY:  Plume Books

Andreasen, N. (June 25, 2014). Secrets of the Creative Brain. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/06/secrets-of-the-creative-brain/372299/

Burkus, D. (2013). The myths of creativity: The truth about how innovative companies and people generate great ideas. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Robinson, K. (2011). Out of our minds: Learning to be creative. Chichester, West Sussex, UK: Capstone Publishing.

A Master Class with Pixar, Part 4 - Hindsight is Not 20-20

We've heard it a thousand times.  Hindsight is 20-20.

Edwin Catmull.  Photo by Deborah Coleman, Pixar

Ed Catmull, co-founder of Pixar, disagrees.  "Hindsight is not 20-20.  Not even close.  Our view of the past, in fact, is hardly clearer than our view of the future" (2014, p. 177).

Catmull describes the cat who no longer sits on a hot stove - but no longer sits on a cold one either.  We tend to over-generalize our learning experiences.  We also have selective memories.  "And we do not always make the right selections.  We build our story - our model of the past - as best we can.  We may seek out other people's memories and examine our own limited records to come up with a better model.  Even then, it is still only a model - not reality" (Catmull, 2014, p. 178).

How many times have we defended the Professional Learning Community process against the past?  Education does have a reputation for being a swinging pendulum.  However, I think Catmull is right in that we keep the memories that reinforce our story. 

I was talking to a veteran teacher about SMART goals, and she made a reference to how "we were doing this thirty years ago."  Her model of reality is that of the reform-weary veteran.  I do not agree with her assessment.  Goals and objectives might date back to Madeline Hunter, if not earlier, but education was famous for having a fixed-time paradigm rather than a fixed-learning one.  Phil Schelecty said that "it used to be that dropouts weren't a problem.  They were a solution.  School ran fine if the right kids dropped out."  Perhaps my hindsight is faulty, but I don't recall that once upon a time, schools were committed to all kids learning at high levels, and provided time and opportunity if they didn't hit the mark right away.

We also suffer from poor hindsight in matters of student discipline.  I often find that punishment proponents have a "heads I win, tails you lose" approach to evaluating the effectiveness of punishment.  If a student is punished, and behavior improves, the cause is attributed to punishment.  If the student doesn't improve, the cause is rarely attributed to the failure of punishment - it is usually attributed to the stubbornness of the student.

What if we took Catmull at his word and acknowledged that our hindsight is faulty?  Wouldn't that change the tone of our school improvement discussions?  Imagine a school improvement presentation that opened with the power of the magician.  Illusions work because our brains fill in the gaps.  We do the same thing with hindsight.  When we acknowledge that everybody's hindsight is faulty, we can have productive conversations about the good old days.  Better yet, we can put the good old days to rest, because we are not moving backward in time.  Today's students don't need yesterday's solutions, and we don't know what tomorrow's solutions are.  All we can do is tap everybody's ideas to maximize creativity, because the future hasn't been made yet.

References
Catmull, E. and Wallace, A. (2014). Creativity, inc.: Overcoming the unseen forces that stand in the way of true inspiration. New York, NY: Random House

A Master Class with Pixar, Part 3 - Using Creativity and Progress to Sell the PLC Process

Who wouldn't want to work at Pixar?

Ed Catmull, Pixar's co-founder, tells us "...we value self-expression here.  This tends to make a big impression on visitors, who often tell me that the experience of walking into Pixar leaves them feeling a little wistful, like something is missing in their work lives - a palpable energy, as feeling of collaboration and unfettered creativity, a sense, not to be corny, of possibility" (2014, p. x).

The Professional Learning Community literature is replete with articles, presentations, and books about motivating reluctant educators.  What is Pixar doing that schools are not?

School improvement must become creative work.

America has a long tradition of educational crisis - real or imagined.  From Sputnik to the Common Core State Standards debate, our educational system is defined by a swinging pendulum of policy and a stalled car of progress.  Student achievement has remained stubbornly mediocre through all the tempests.

No more.  We must issue a clarion call, and arts educators must take a leadership role, because only creative problem solving will overcome educational inertia.  

Catmull teaches us that "If there are people in your organization who feel they are not free to suggest ideas, you lose.  Do not discount ideas from unexpected sources.  Inspiration can, and often does, come from anywhere" (2014, p. 316).

I suspect that arts educators are among the silent geniuses of their buildings.  The arts are engaging and effective.  Students connect to school through the arts.  They find their niche and their voice.  And yet, this is not mere entertainment.  Arts educators teach valuable knowledge, skills, and dispositions.  Students become skilled in a medium.  They learn persistent problem solving.  They learn confidence.  However, because they do not teach math and English, they are not always welcome at the curriculum table.  The fact of the matter is that the "core" subjects would do well to emulate the arts rather than the other way around.

Some schools are turning the tide.  Milwaukee realized that it cannot teach empty chairs, so it decided to return the arts to its schools.  Check out the NPR story at http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/2014/06/23/323033486/to-boost-attendance-milwuakee-schools-revive-art-music-and-gym. (Misspelling of Milwaukee is in the actual URL).

I believe educators want all students to learn at high levels, but they play the blame game when they become disenfranchised.  Creative organizations avoid this.  Catmull teaches us that "If there is more truth in the hallways than in meetings, you have a problem" (2014, p. 317).  Let's re-frame our work as creative problem solving and marshal all our resources.  According to Teresa Amabile, steady progress  on meaningful work is what really motivates people.

Tomorrow's problems won't be solved by yesterday's answers.  Creativity is required.  Arts educators, let's lead the charge to bring creativity to the school's meeting rooms and let's empower our students to be creative so that we may hand them the torch when our time has passed.

References

Amabile, T. and Kramer, S. (2011). The progress principle: Using small wins to ignite joy, engagement, and creativity at work. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press

Catmull, E. and Wallace, A. (2014). Creativity, inc.: Overcoming the unseen forces that stand in the way of true inspiration. New York, NY: Random House

A Master Class with Pixar, Part 2

One of the big ideas of Professional Learning Communities is that a collective effort is required to create a system that guarantees that all students learn at high levels.  Another big idea is that PLCs measure their success with evidence of learning rather than good intentions.  This inevitably results in a focus on data.  This is all well and good, but educators must not lose sight of the power of collaboration to unlock creativity.  As the school's resident experts in creativity, arts educators can play an important role in unleashing the creative power of students and fellow educators.

Pixar co-founder Ed Catmull writes poetically about the whimsical atmosphere at The Steve Jobs Building, but he also claims that the atmosphere is not what makes Pixar special.

"What makes Pixar special is that we acknowledge we will always have problems, many of them hidden from our view; that we work hard to uncover these problems, even if doing so means making ourselves uncomfortable; and that when we come across a problem, we marshal all of our energies to solve it" (2014, p. x)

Does your PLC have this level of persistence when solving problems?  If not, it's time to light a fire.  We need this level of cooperation to make films and raise barns.  Surely we need the same kind of collaboration to educate our children.

Catmull teaches us that we need to value our people in order to develop this kind of teamwork.  At Pixar, "We start from the presumption that our people are talented and want to contribute.  We accept that, without meaning to, our company is stifling that talent in myriad unseen ways" (2014, p. xv).

What a powerful statement!  Does your leadership acknowledge that the school system stifles your teaching talent?  How could schools tackle this problem?  Catmull believes that "When it comes to creative inspiration, job titles, and hierarchy are meaningless" (2014, p. 4).

Does your school have brilliant educators who seem to have no voice?  What is the human cost of that silence?  Arts educators understand the power of the round table as a symbol of collaboration.  We need to take a leadership role in breaking down the barriers that leave great ideas in the drawer.  Our students deserve no less.

References

Catmull, E. and Wallace, A. (2014). Creativity, inc.: Overcoming the unseen forces that stand in the way of true inspiration. New York, NY: Random House

A Master Class with Pixar, Part 1

Pixar is responsible for some of the most creative film making in recent history.  Pixar's co-founder Ed Catmull recently released a book about developing creativity and nurturing creative cultures.  The book has won praise from authorities such as George Lucas and Jim Collins.  Bob Sutton calls it "the best book ever written on what it takes to build a creative organization."

As always, the challenge for arts education PLCs is bringing expert wisdom to the classroom level in a way that impacts student achievement. As Rick DuFour often says, the purpose of school is learning.

On the first page of the introduction, Catmull describes The Steve Jobs Building:

"It has well-thought-out patterns of entry and egress that encourage people to mingle, meet, and       communicate...the unifying idea for this building isn't luxury but community.  Steve wanted the building to support our work by enhancing our ability to communicate" (2014, p. ix).



If Pixar needs collaboration in order to produce a movie, how much more important is it that educators collaborate in order to educate our children?

One of the things that makes Pixar's work effective is the authenticity of the collaboration.  Informal communication is part of the design.  Contrast that with the structure of many PLCs - formal meetings, agendas, mandatory written reflections, reprimands for tardiness to meetings, and so on ad infinitum.

To the extent that we can be more like Pixar and less like a Senate hearing, to that extent we can develop creative solutions to our students' most important learning challenges.

References:
Catmull, E. and Wallace, A. (2014). Creativity, inc.: Overcoming the unseen forces that stand in the way of true inspiration. New York, NY: Random House.

The Flipped Bandroom

Flipped classrooms have been getting a lot of attention in the last few years.  The idea of posting lectures online in order to free up classroom time for discussion and support makes a lot of sense, and many teachers are reporting good results with this model.

Flipping a performance class is somewhat different.  A lecture is basically the direct transmission of information from the teacher to the student.  Many directors function in the same way:  "Clarinets, you need to play louder at letter B.  Trombones, A-flat is played in third position.  Saxophones, staccato means short.  Play the notes short."  And so on, ad infinitum.

However, directors respond to the ensemble's performance.  Posting rehearsal instructions on a video would be meaningless.  So what's the connection?

In both lectures and traditional rehearsals, the teacher owns and transmits the information.  Flipped classrooms put more responsibility on the students to do the thinking and the problem-solving.  Can we do that in a rehearsal?  Absolutely!

Let's take expressive markings.  Directors rarely ask students about the mood they are trying to portray and the effectiveness of different expressive techniques to achieve that mood.  Is the music playful?  What effect does note length have on that mood?  Are we playing softly enough to achieve the misterioso marking the composer indicated?  How fast is too fast for maestoso?

If I had a TARDIS, I'd go back to my classroom and have students make more creative decisions.  I wonder what would happen if I assigned students to take an unmarked melody and add expressive devices to achieve an effect of their choice.  Daniel Pink reminds us that autonomy is a major driver of motivation (http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation).  Is there any reason we couldn't ask our students to select a mood and select the musical means by which to achieve that mood?

The flip occurs when we ask questions rather than give answers.  Start with the aesthetic goal and move toward the technicalities rather than the other way around.  Start with why, and let the students work through how.

For more on starting with why in all aspects of leadership, check out Simon Sinek's great TED talk at http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action

Should You Hold Your Next PLC Work Session at Starbucks?

This is the fourth in a series about collaboration and PLCs.

Ideas are fertile.  They need to interact in order to be fruitful and multiply.

Steven Johnson's remarkable TED talk (http://www.ted.com/playlists/20/where_do_ideas_come_from) highlights the importance of collaboration in the development of great ideas.  It has been said that artists are most creative when writing their autobiographies.  We love the story about the genius who experienced an Eureka moment.  We love the story about the muse whispering into our ear.

The problem is that it is very likely a myth.

The coffeehouse culture spawned much of Western civilization's greatest thinking during the Renaissance, Baroque, and Classical eras.  The combination of the stimulating beverage and the even-more-stimulating environment of the coffeehouse itself yielded a cross-pollination of ideas that propelled Western civilization forward.  This phenomenon was so powerful that Bach himself wrote a Coffee Cantata.  In order to maximize our creativity, our meeting places need to look less like this:

And more like this:

Richard DuFour writes about a loose/tight culture where administrators are tight about results but loose about how they are achieved.  Unleash the creativity of your PLC by shelving the time clock and looking for results - no matter how those results are achieved!

Common Core or Not, the Arts Have This Covered!

Maybe I should have titled this post The Swinging Pendulum.  Anybody who has been in education more than five years knows what I'm talking about.

The old news is that everybody was jumping on the Common Core State Standards bandwagon.  Today, Indiana, South Carolina, and Oklahoma have repealed the standards, and legislation is pending in many states.  Whether or not you like the standards, it is clear that the debate is increasingly political rather than educational.

Educators have to rise above the politics.  PLC Question #1 asks, "What knowledge, skills, and dispositions do our students need?"  The Common Core may answer some of these questions well.  Certainly, many of our state and national standards documents answer this question well.  We had high-quality curricula that answered this question well before the standards movement began.  Plato answered this question well.

Regardless of where your state lands, arts educators can be confident that our best practices will support any initiative that is delivered from your capitol steps.

The College Board created a comprehensive alignment document that is a must read for all arts educators (http://nccas.wikispaces.com/file/view/Arts%20and%20Common%20Core%20-%20final%20report1.pdf/404993792/Arts%20and%20Common%20Core%20-%20final%20report1.pdf).  There are dozens of charts showing the alignment between the arts and the CCSS, but a few highlights are worth pointing out.

The arts use at least four major creative practices:  imagining, investigating, constructing, and reflecting.  These practices are found everywhere in the English Language Arts standards.

The arts require students to make sense of problems and persevere in solving them.  They require students to attend to precision.  These expectations are cornerstones of the CCSS for Mathematics.

Indeed, if you expand your definition of "text" to include non-verbal communication, the arts cover virtually all of the English Language Arts standards.

It is essential to point out that the arts do this without abandoning their intrinsic and unique value.  It's simply a fact that the arts naturally teach the kinds of processes that ELA and mathematics education hope to achieve on a wider scale.  Those are strong words, but I believe them.  The arts do not have to move towards the core - the core has to move towards the arts.

Arts educators - stand firm and stick to the center.  Your best practices meet any initiative that comes down the pike.

References

Charleroy, A. (2012). The arts and the common core: A review of connections between the common core state standards and the national core arts standards conceptual framework. New York, NY: The College Board.  Retrieved from http://nccas.wikispaces.com/file/view/Arts%20and%20Common%20Core%20-%20final%20report1.pdf/404993792/Arts%20and%20Common%20Core%20-%20final%20report1.pdf

TED Talks and Creativity Mythology

With almost 8.5 million views, Elizabeth Gilbert's TED talk (http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius) is among the most popular TED talks of all time.  Gilbert is a best-selling author whose works include Eat, Pray, Love.

Gilbert returns to the ancient Greek idea of The Muses as the source of creativity.  In this model, creativity is divinely inspired by The Muses, and our human form serves as a vessel for this creativity.  If you're not feeling particularly creative today, it simply means that your muse isn't inspiring you.  The rough etymology of "inspire" can be construed as "to breathe into," and that's what the Greeks thought The Muses did - they breathed creativity into our mortal flesh.

This makes for great storytelling, but terrible arts education.

A close listening to Gilbert's talk makes it clear that she is using the concept of The Muses as a psychological shield against writer's block and fear of failure.  It's comforting that you may not be personally responsible for any lack of creative success you are experiencing.  But if this concept is taken to its logical extreme, the human element of creativity diminishes to the point where one wonders if the development of knowledge, skills, and dispositions matters at all.  Gilbert's talk may be useful therapy, but it leads to pedagogical bankruptcy.

I think David Burkus would profoundly disagree with Gilbert.  In his book The Myths of Creativity, he describes creativity concepts such as eureka moments, expert knowledge, incentives, brainstorming, and exposes the myths behind popular perceptions of the creative power of these concepts.

Rather than relying on mythology, Burkus relies on creativity research. According to Teresa Amabile, creativity is influenced by four elements:

1. domain-relevant skills,
2. creativity-relevant processes,
3. task motivation, and
4. the surrounding social environment.

We can influence these factors through education.  Domain skills can be taught and learned  Creativity processes can be taught and learned.  We can develop the dispositions needed to help motivate students to complete tasks.  We can influence our educational environment to promote creativity rather than stifle it.

We know that our society is crying out for enhanced creativity.  We must work hard to advocate for the unique power of fine arts education to fill this need, even if it means questioning one of our favorite authors.

References

Amabile, T. (1996). Creativity in context: Update to the social psychology of creativity. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

Burkus, D. (2014). The myths of creativity: The truth about how innovative companies and people generate great ideas. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.