Creative Life Sampler

Creativity and Our "Occupations"   (2 of 2) History is full of the documentation of humanity's creativity. It is not limited to a certain age group, a specific gender, or culture, or any other construct. The desire to design and make something, compose and perform, experiment and invent, speaks to an inherent need to express the quality of creativity... it's a desire we all, more or less, possess. While catching up with a couple of moms recently, I heard about how their sons are doing. In one case, a young college student had taken up pottery and was finding a lot of joy and peace in the creative process of working with clay. He has discovered that this activity brings balance to his day, offsetting the stress he had been experiencing in his rigorous college studies. In the second instance, a mom of two young men in their mid-to-late twenties told of new artistic outlets her sons were pursuing. One son had taken up painting in the after hours of his work as an...

Creativity and Our "Occupations"   (1 of 2) A couple of weeks ago, as we were doing errands in the car we listened to the music of the Russian composer Alexander Borodin. The host of the show mentioned that Borodin had been a chemist, and from the other side of the car my husband said “Of course... the Borodin reaction!” (what a nerd) It got me thinking about this 19 th century scientist/composer. According to Wikipedia, "he regarded medicine and science as his primary occupations", and obviously his work has informed subsequent generations of scientists. But he was also a "prominent" composer and today he may be  more widely  remembered for his music. Borodin clearly loved both pursuits, devoting time and energy to developing a proficiency which allowed him to make significant lasting contributions. If I could interview him today I would ask him how he balanced these interests. I’m curious about how he structured his day and how he accom...

Lesson on Creativity Learned The pattern for this beaded knit shawl  is found  in Knitsimple: 33 Knit Shawls  One of my visions for this blog was that it could be a forum for sharing ideas and encouraging each other to be creative. Since I’m most familiar with applying creativity to artistic pursuits, I’ve come to realize that maybe I had been unconsciously identifying creativity solely with the arts. It was as if I was saying to anybody who wasn’t involved in the arts, “Hey look over here! You need to bring this into your life!” This was brought home to me when my husband, who has a science background, reacted with surprise to one of my comments in my recent interview with Joyce. (See a portion of this interview at this link:   https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2018/09/creativity-in-classroom-2-of-3-how-do.html ) He was taken aback that I said one might not think of creativity in the realms of math and science. It struck me that of co...

Post 100 In grade school some of my children’s teachers celebrated the 100 th day of school with counting, using the opportunity to teach concepts revolving around the number 100. I’m sure this gave them a better understanding of quantity when they counted out one hundred pennies, candies, and other small items. With that concept established they could move on to seeing those quantities multiply… just as I’m looking forward to multiplying the posts for this blog. Of course understanding "quantity" doesn’t necessarily mean you understand "quality"; understanding that is an on-going life lesson. For me writing this blog has been a creative process in itself,- trial and a lot of error- and fun. If you have been reading this blog from the first post, I hope you have seen the unfoldment of themes and a logical progression of thought. My goal is to provide inspiration to: 1) either begin a creative endeavor or push a loved “hobby” to new heights, 2) appre...

Creativity in the Classroom (3 of 3) So, you’re seeing this STEAM approach to teaching has a positive impact on your students? Yes! Another huge area in which creativity has a part is “mindfulness”. Our schools are finally addressing the fact that the single greatest predictor of personal success-- greater than socioeconomics, education or intelligence -- is the ability to regulate one's emotions. Called “equanimity” or “self-control”, this is a skill that is of utmost importance. Giving students the chance to be creative goes hand in hand with developing this self-control. Students who are given the chance to create something new gain the pride of ownership as they become actively engaged in their own learning. I've seen classes of children who come in the door full of distractions become mesmerized by the simple act of sewing a beanbag or creating a figure out of clay. Allowing that creative outlet is so important in an otherwise highly structured day.  Has this p...

Creativity in the Classroom  (2 of 3) How do you begin to present the STEAM goals to your students? Every year I have a theme, which I introduce in September. I've had “perseverance” and “collaboration” as themes. This year my theme is “creativity”. I am using the definition "to use your imagination to create something new." “Creativity” is a word we usually associate with the arts; but with math or science? …maybe not so much. How do you see creativity as relevant to these disciplines? Well, that "something new” could be a different solution to a design problem. For example, students might be tasked with finding a creative solution to cleaning up the ocean. They might then be asked to create a model of their design using recyclable objects, and then test that model in a tub of "polluted water" (water with bits of plastic bags and paper in it.) In another example, students might be tasked to come up with a creative solution for far...

Creativity in the Classroom   (1 of 3) In honor of the start of school, I thought it would be interesting to share my conversation with a teacher about creativity in the classroom. My friend, Dr. Joyce Raines, is a middle school teacher in Massachusetts who has been instrumental in establishing the S.T.E.A.M. curriculum in her school. So, Joyce, please explain the term S.T.E.A.M. The term STEAM is an acronym. It stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math. To begin with, schools created STEM (without the A) to make up for areas in which American students were falling behind, compared to their counterparts in other countries. As a result, many technological jobs were (and still are) being filled by people from countries such as India and China. STEM education has become a hot item in high schools in this country . Wait… did you just say that STEAM is hot? (giggle) And this is a way to get students interested in learning? Yes, and now m...

Project Completed! This quilt is composed of the scraps from my hexagon experiment... "Pink Lemonade". (Check out this link if you weren't with me when I finished that one:   https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2018/07/quilt-project-update-finally-pink.html  ) I've titled it "Pink Lemonade Deconstructed". Now, the deadline for submitting entries to some of the quilt shows is fast approaching and I'm debating about submitting this one for consideration. To be honest, I'm a bit hesitant because of the humbling rejections of my first foray into juried shows. (For a little background on that: https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2018/03/need-muchvalidation-it-was-joy-to-send.html  ) But I think this is kind of interesting... to enter, or not to enter... that is the question.

Linen Closet- Water Tribute Happy Labor Day All! Mother nature might not agree that summer is over, but this holiday weekend marks the end of summer for a lot of people. When we think of vacations, we often think of beach and the water... so I'm sharing this quilt which reminds me of the waves at a beach. The pattern is actually known as "Snail's Trail" and the blocks measure about 11 inches square. It doesn't have a label on it, so it's not dated and the quilting is very simple. It was made before I'd gained an interest in the textures quilting can add to the overall look. Clearly it was a pattern I wanted to try, and then I moved on to the next one.