Unleashing creativity in our students

Dr Tony Wagner, education expert and author, made an interesting observation on how we produce innovators more by accident than by design. Entrepreneurs or innovators, he said, rarely talk about how their schooling or place of work develops their talents. In fact, the three most innovative entrepreneurs of the last half century – Edwin Land, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg – had to drop out of Harvard to pursue their ideas. How can we intentionally develop the talents of our young people to nurture their initiative, curiosity and imagination?

In a school, teachers are often told to come up with questions that are rigorous and push students towards higher order thinking skills. We are encouraged to use creativity in our teaching techniques.

Personally, I struggled to do this in my lessons. I found that my students were confused as to what I was doing and wanted to know if there was a right or wrong answer to the “opinion” that I often asked them to write. Students wanted to know if there was a format to follow when they were writing their journal and frequently looked for a standard answer in everything they did. At times, they even went as far as to ask me if they should use a blue or black pen when writing their answers.

It took me a while to make them understand that as long as they’re not writing their answers in fluorescent green ink, I only really care about their thought process when answering a question. It took months to convince them that their opinions could never be wrong as long as they could justify it. And yes, I really didn’t care about a format for their journal as long as I saw them writing in it. It made me sad to know that my 16-year-olds had so much potential and yet were so afraid of the repercussions of being creative.

Then, four weeks ago, my students had to put up a performance in school. They were very hesitant when I suggested that we sing and dance in front of the assembly. In their exact words, “Every time we speak or sing in English, people will laugh at us. They’ll make fun of us for weeks. We cannot do it.” I spoke to my students about how there were only a few students in our school who were proficient in English. The choice was theirs if they wanted to be afraid to showcase their talent or break the walls and show the other students in our school that speaking (and singing) in English is really not that bad.

After much convincing, they trained and practised for nearly two weeks for that performance. As we got closer to the date, I suddenly felt apprehensive about the whole thing. I knew singing and dancing in public was something that was hardly done in my school. I realised then that they weren’t the only ones who were afraid of being creative. In all my ideals of wanting my students to be creative, deep down I shared the same fears as they did.

I was worried that I had put them at the risk of being made fun of by the rest of their peers because they were doing something different. I spoke to a fellow teacher about this and he reminded me that as teachers, we were in the perfect position to push them to be confident and creative and instead of afraid, we should be proud that they decided to take up this challenge.

When my students performed in front of the assembly that day, the entire school was in awe. Teachers and fellow students alike were surprised at how eloquent and brave these students were. For weeks, they were elevated to celebrity status because everyone wanted to compliment them. I even had other students coming up to me to tell me how envious they were of their performance and that they wished they could do the same.

After that one performance, my students were convinced that they had it in them to do anything they wanted to. They asked me for weeks if I was writing a new song for them because they wanted to perform. My fellow teachers and I thought about the idea of making a parody of Taylor Swift’s Blank Space. We knew it would involve lots of work and staying back for hours after school, but at that point, my students were willing to camp in school to get it done.

I was amazed at how cleverly they contributed towards writing the lyrics, directing the video and singing parts of the song. It took them days to get their pronunciation and pitching right for parts of the song but they didn’t mind the extra work. We were amazed at their ideas for the video and how creative these students were.

We finally finished the video four days ago and as I watched it, I could not believe that these students were from a school deemed as one of the most underperforming schools in the state. It was surreal to watch the same kids who once were so afraid to speak in English now sing, act and direct an entire music video. They made me watch it with them over and over again and told me how proud their parents were that they were singing in English.

I knew then that it wasn’t an impossible to ignite creativity in students. Given the right platform and opportunity, the very students you once doubted will be able to take you by surprise. As teachers, we learn the most from our students themselves and this entire experience made me realise that creativity is not a special gift bestowed upon you but a silent trait that already exist and just needs to be unleashed. – March 5, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.