Creativity with Etec 531

On October 19, 2012, I attended a keynote by Ian Jukes entitled Literacy is Not Enough: The New Learning Process.  This presentation is based upon Ian’s new book: Literacy is NOT Enough: 21st Century Fluencies for the Digital Age (2012).  The five fluencies that Jukes discusses are: 1. Solution fluency 2. Information fluency 3. Creativity fluency  4. Media fluency and 5. Collaboration fluency.

As I attended Ian’s session, I tweeted the following:

‏@mrdeol : by 2017 50% of Cdn. jobs will require creative abstract skills. Ian Jukes #psaday12, #cuebc but creativity is often discounted in schools

A couple of people I’d never met favourited this tweet and a couple of others retweeted it, so it was clear that Ian had struck a chord with his audience by citing this statistic.

I’ve never considered myself to be particularly creative, but Etec 531challenged me to come out of my shell.  I remember being completely intimidated at the start of that course when Professor Franc Feng asked us to discuss historical schools of art.  I felt like a fish out of water and it was clear that others were quite well versed in this subject matter.

Then Professor Feng gave us a seemingly simple task: create a 1 minute media presentation in which we explain “What does technology mean to me?”

Prior to this course, the only videos that I had created were some mediocre instructional screencasts (using Jing) that explained how to use some of the functionality in my online courses.  I was terrified about the prospect of posting a sloppily produced video into the Etec 531 discussion board.  Fortunately, one of my classmates urged me to push ahead without fear.  The video I created appears here: http://animoto.com/play/IgUL0nUcGmpZB0dE7vzt0A

I got some positive response form my Etec 531 peers, and this really helped with my confidence in pushing forward with my larger Media Production project.

The topic I chose for the Media Production was Spirituality in an Age of Technological Advancement which can be viewed at: https://vimeo.com/31831035

I was drawn to this topic thanks to my work in a previous course, Etec 512 in which previous classmates had sparked a fantastic discussion by asking the question “What songs would Jesus have on his iPod?”

In Etec 531, I became completely immersed with the video production.  I decided to be very comprehensive and document the origins of the separation between church and technology.   It turned out that there were extensive writings on the topic of technosecularism.  Some of the highlights of the video production include:

• Many of our current notions of technology  stem from advancements in clock technology in medieval monasteries –  monks needed to pray at timely intervals and newer and better time pieces helped to keep these rituals in synch
• As the Enlightenment, scientific, and industrial revolutions took hold, significant advancements in technology often occurred at the hands of deeply spiritual men.
• In 1919, noted German philosopher Max Weber used the term ‘disenchantment’ to describe the a global shift that was occurring from a religious understanding of the world to a scientific one
• In the United States, the move towards secularization gained traction following the 1925 Scopes Trial
• As Neitzche had philosophized a half century before, Science, technology, and secularization had killed God in western society.
• Petrina and Feng (2010) write about this false division between spirituality and technology: “Indeed, commentators on our times note that we— the masses— are lost, again searching for something. Whether it stems from alienation, disenchantment, secularism or a fear that does not yet have a name, there is restlessness, a thirst for meaning andpurpose and a turn to spirituality and religion. Salvation in shopping, surfing, browsing and blogging is not entirely satisfying.”
• The inability of science to provide answers and meaning may be driving the current revival in church attendance
• In The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace, Margaret Wertheim argues that cyberspace represents the realization of a technological vision for spiritual utopia.
• Technology is providing the answers that traditional faith has not and, for some, is rapidly becoming a religion of its own.
• We will forever ask questions about what is capable through spirituality and what can be done through technology.  The possibilities, whether we embrace them or not, are remarkably the same.

The video is 15 minutes in length, but took dozens and dozens of hours to produce.  It truly became a labour of love.  I discovered that I truly enjoyed all aspects of the video production process: storyboarding, collecting images, collecting audio and background music, organizing and editing video clips, voice-overs etc…

I was so proud of this video production that I shared it with my wife, family, and all of my colleagues at work, and recently on Twitter.   It is one of the defining moments of MET journey.

Connection with Golf Metaphor

Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird once said “I do much of my creative thinking while golfing. If people know you’re working at home they think nothing of walking in for a cup of coffee, but wouldn’t dream of interrupting on the golf course” (Barrett 2011).

Leaton (2012) has written about the need for creativity while playing golf: “You are quite simply never going to be in a position where you have practiced and feel totally confident in every single shot which might be called for whilst out there playing real golf. And that’s just fine. There is in fact a trade-off in golf between technical ability and creativity. What you lack in technical skills you can more than make up for by employing your creative mind.”

I’ve watched my fair share of professional golfers play the game and can tell you that they are just as artistic as any painter, sculptor, or architect.  In golf, there are many times when a shot can be played in a multitude of ways.  For instance, an approach shot to the green can be played as a high lob, low piercing shot, or as a bump and run or a combination of those shots thereof.  Conditions on a golf course change by the second.  Sometimes the wind is into you and the next second it is swirling.  The lie or way the ball is sitting also influences the potential shot as well.

In this wide mixture of variables, human creativity is what distinguishes a successful result in golf from an unfortunate one.   Just as I had to dig deep and think about effective ways that I could deliver my message about technology and spirituality, a golfer must also dig deep and think about what the best shot is that he can take given the conditions presented to her.  In both scenarios, the ability to think creatively is crucial.

Reflection

Creativity is not something that thought that I possessed in any significant way.  My Media production in Etec 531 and the game of golf have helped me to realize that creativity is something that almost all people possess.  Creativity is a much needed occupational skill in my work as an online educator and course developer.   What creativity provides are alternatives to solve the many problems we encounter in modern workforces

In October, I attended a workshop with Dean Shareski (@shareski).  He encouraged each of us to be imaginative with our work with students, but to also to publicly share our learning.  Dean is a videographer.  In years past, I would have been intimidated by his request because video production has long been a mystery to me.  While I am no George Lucas, I have gained a lot of confidence with media as a result of my work in Etec 531.  I know that my students need the same encouragement with media.  Many of them consume it and some produce it on a daily basis.  Just as I benefited from structured feedback with my Etec 531 production, students will expand their work with media if it becomes an integral part of instruction.  I’m grateful for my Etec 531 experience as it will help me to navigate the dramatic shift that is occurring in education from text to digital resources.

References

Barrett, Q. (2011).   Creative Golfing.  Retrieved from http://quinnbarrett.tumblr.com/post/12322362980/i-do-much-of-my-creative-thinking-while-golfing

Geraci, R.M. (2011).  The Integration of Religion, Science, and Technology.  Oxford Scholarship Online. Retrieved from: http://jaar.oxfordjournals.org/content/76/1/138.short

Goertzel, B. (2007).  Human level artificial intelligence and the possibility of a technological Singularity.  Artificial Intelligence.  171: pp. 1161 – 1173

Kurzweil, R., 2005. The singularity is near: when humans transcend biology. London: Duckworth.

Leaton, R. (2012).  Blending Technical Ability and Creativity in Golf.  Retrieved from http://www.positivearticles.com/Article/Blending-Technical-Ability-and-Creativity-In-Golf/53547

Petrina, S. & Feng, F. (Eds.) (2010).   The Techno-theo-logical Condition: Technology, Religion,Spirituality, and the Sacred.  Toronto: Routledge.

Wertheim, M. (1999). The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace.  New York: Virago.