Trends in education - Students as creators

A trend that has really captivated my attention is that of students as creators.

As an Art Teacher and a teacher with a strong practical interest in developing a knowledge building community within the classroom I have to ask what are we talking about when we say 'students as creators'? Are we talking about nurturing creative thinking? Or are we talking about students genuinely innovating and advancing ideas? What's more in a rapidly developing world where innovation is highly valued, what role might the arts play in this?

The Ministry of Education's aspirations for 2025 highly prize innovation "Learning to learn’ is a key component of the New Zealand Curriculum With complex problem solving, communication, team skills, creativity and innovation recognised as necessary skills for success" (Ministry of Education, 2015)

Gilbert (2006) describes a knowledge society. It is a reframing of the 20th century 'industrial' education model. It is no longer fit for purpose for all to recieve a 'one size fits all education' , in fact we need to change the way that we think about teaching and learning. Gilbert identifies the dominant form of production is that of ideas rather than things. Education in this framework is no longer about remembering a body of ideas, rather creating to solve authentic problems. In order to help our learners to navigate the knowledge ecosystem (Poe and Molloy, 2000), we need to shift the pedagogical framework and reimagine the roles of teachers and learners as knowledge creators.

This trend is identified at an international level  as cited in  The NMC/CoSN Horizon Report: 2016 K-12 Edition (2016). There is a shift from consumption of content to creating to explore subjects. This has the potential to transformational for education - in the right environment. It was found in a recent study in 43 schools in Turkey that when teachers were empowered to make autonomous decisions and experiment in the classroom, this provided fertile ground for students to take risks, innovate and take ownership of their own learning. 

We have to look at our own context though. I believe that there is a disconnect between aspiration and practice in New Zealand classrooms and that this is a systemic issue.

We aspire towards innovation but we don't make room for it in education. In the age of national standards and the constant measuring of whether a child meets the standard there is no room for risk taking and failure. Roger Moltzen (Professor of Human Development, Waikato University) identified this as a concern in 2011 (as cited by Andrea Vance on Stuff.co.nz) when national standards were in their infancy "An emphasis on compliance in the classroom is 'counter to creativity' ... I think that one of the things that concerns me about education is there seems to have been a devaluing of the creative aspects in education."

The siloing of subject knowledge at secondary level is also counter-intuitive if we are aspiring towards nurturing creative minds. We overload our students in the pursuit of NCEA credits. It is insanity that students are entered into to 130+ credits when the requirement is 80. Students anxiously prioritise fulfilling the requirements of the standard. This feels a like a production line. Too often I hear "but is it worth credits" or "what do I need to do to get the credits". Yes, clarity in the classroom is important and can be empowering for student learning, but I feel that we are approaching learning from the wrong end with the hyper focus on assessment and accumulation.

We need to shift the focus from assessment to inquiry. Ultimately achievement should be a byproduct of engagement. "Research shows that students engage when they act as their own learning agents working to achieve goals important to them. They must believe they can learn and know how to deal with failures and learn from those experiences." (T Stephens, 2015). If teachers were to shift from credit farming with their students, to offering a smaller range of achievement standards but  designing meaningful learning experiences, we find that there is room to 'fail', learn and innovate. 

"Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better." (Beckett, 1983)

Reference List:

Beckett, S. (1983). Worstward ho. New York: Grove Pr.

Gilbert, J. (2006, August). Catching the knowledge wave? Presented at the Curriculum corporartion 13th National confernce.

Ministry of Education. (2015). NEW ZEALAND EDUCATION IN 2025: LIFELONG LEARNERS IN A CONNECTED WORLD. Retrieved from https://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Ministry/Initiatives/Lifelonglearners.pdf

NMC, & CoSN. (2016). Horizon Report: 2016 K-12 Edition. Retrieved from http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2016-nmc-cosn-horizon-report-k12-EN.pdf

Vance, A. (2011, September 15). National education standards `devalues creativity'. Waikato TImes.

Poe, G., & Molloy, J. (2000). NURTURING SYSTEMIC WISDOM THROUGH KNOWLEDGE ECOLOGY. The Systems Thinker, 11(8), 1–5.

Stephens, T. (2015, August 21). Encouraging Positive Student Engagement and Motivation: Tips for Teachers | Pearson Blog. Retrieved from https://www.pearsoned.com/education-blog/encouraging-positive-student-engagement-and-motivation-tips-for-teachers/