Creativity key to school life

Simon Marcus Gower, Jakarta

Going to school, it has to be admitted, can unfortunately be a rather hum-drum affair. School life can include uninspiring lecture-like lessons that leave the students bored and practically overwhelmed by the tedium of what they are expected and ultimately required to do.

This kind of tedium can indeed become overwhelming. Recently in a meeting with a student of junior high school age and his parents, it was possible to see just how overwhelming this condition may be. This student was obviously alert, capable and responsive to the world around him but his school life was leaving him depressed and deeply unhappy with both himself and others.

As his mother explained it, his school was nothing more than an endless cycle of him having to take notes and do tests that left him very frustrated. This, almost inevitably, meant that his grades were not good and so, as a consequence of the failings of the school system that he was in, he was being described as a failing student.

The reality may in fact be that with a more reasonable and creative response to his learning needs this student could be highly successful in his schooling. Indeed it is possible and quite likely that many other students too would benefit from greater creativity on the part of the schooling system and their teachers.

One has to wonder at, and question the degree to which endlessly lecturing students and seemingly constantly testing them is going to prove effective and successful in providing an education. It is a likely reality that these kinds of practices are not really effective nor can they prove truly successful because they so blatantly fail to offer opportunities for students to simultaneously develop their critical thinking skills and enhance their creative abilities.

The role of the teacher as a facilitator of learning opportunities is something that should be taken more seriously and supported with far more tangible evidence of it being realized and respected in the classroom. It may be something of a trend and "positive sales pitch" to be able to say that teachers are viewed as "facilitators" but it must be realized the words alone will not make things happen.

Real acknowledgement and support of teachers' efforts to be creative and be facilitators of learning should be condoned but oftentimes it seems they can in fact be condemned. The example of a junior high teacher of biology illustrates how inadequate and prescribed thinking about education can both form an obstacle to, and even essentially halt, creativity.

This biology teacher was teaching his students about human biology and in particular looking at the workings of the heart. Looking for creative ways for the students to look at and learn of human biology, he chose not to just simply follow the mundane text book examples and simple yet quite difficult to understand illustrations.

Instead he took his class from the classroom. He found a short flight of stairs which he would have his students run up and down on. Before they did this they were required to measure each other's pulse and then upon completing the physical activity they measured each other's pulse again. Comparisons and analyses could then follow that allowed the students to get a firsthand and immediate observation based understanding of how their hearts and indeed their bodies are working.

All of this amounted to a very practical and direct way of learning that offered immediacy and a sense of fun that was both effective and memorable for the students. They spoke of it during other subjects and with other teachers and it was clearly a creative way of getting the students involved and active in their own learning.

But, what was the reaction of the other teachers towards this teacher's creativity and originality in bringing learning to the students? Most of his fellow teachers looked upon it with skepticism. No doubt in their minds they were consigning this activity to the realms of foolishness and improper conduct for them within a school. Effectively for them such conduct was not becoming and out of place in their school.

Such attitudes would probably be held in the notion that schools should be highly formal places in which the students should be instructed and so be receivers of knowledge in a passive, formalized and ritualized setting that represents little more than a lecture theater. But this prescription for school and a classroom is a faulty one.

Too often schools and classrooms literally end up imposing knowledge on the students who in turn have little regard or vested interest in the knowledge being put before them.

This directly creates the problem of knowledge being presented but inadequate understanding being achieved. The students have little or no interest and so really do not care for the knowledge that is being, in many ways, forced upon them. Knowing of something without really being able to, or wanting to, understand it equates to no real learning at all.

The biology teacher that managed to create a practical and active way for his students to learn of the human body should have been applauded and supported for his efforts and encouraged to generate more similar ideas. Sadly, though, this was not the case.

Sometimes teachers construe fun as being inappropriate for students in school. This, for them, is not what school or the classroom is for. If students want to have fun they go to the playground or some such but "not in the classroom".

This lack of fun, enjoyment and creativity is unnecessary and should really be unwanted. It is a simple observable truth that if we enjoy what we are doing we are likely to be more successful in doing it. When a sense of fun and creativity is introduced to the classroom, it should not be seen as undermining the learning environment or learning process.

Creativity should be at the heart of learning. The teacher that is able to introduce creativity to his/ her classroom and retain sight of learning objectives for the students is far more likely to be effective than a teacher who endlessly instructs, lectures and seeks passive conformity from the students.

The writer is Executive Principal of the High/Scope Indonesia School. The views expressed above are personal.