Cognitive Reasoning from STEM to STEAM: Creativity

Part II: The Creative Palette 

    Arts classrooms have long been a safe place for students to exhale their creative side amongst a school day that can often be very by the (text) book. The act of creating something is a personal one, not just on an emotional level but also on a brain-based level too. Original, authentic creations are cognitive thumb prints that speak of an individual’s creative process. To truly understand the creative process means unpacking the process of problem solving. One uses creativity in the process of problem solving to design the path that takes them from vision to fruition. For example, to conceptualize a piece of art or solve a math problem one must be creative with their prior knowledge of concepts, tools and methods. When one takes this perspective on creativity it sheds its artistic exclusivity and becomes applicable to a diverse range of environments. It becomes an approachable skill to apply to a wide range of professions, a tool in designing new solutions through the curation of existing problems.

In order for the creative process to thrive in K-12 education it needs to be supported by a learning environment that understands the importance of cognitive discomfort in forming healthy habits of mind. Promoting the creative process with the integration of the arts can nourish characteristics linked to personal and professional success. To pinpoint these traits, a team at the Harvard School of Education examined the regular processes and habits of mind of artists. They developed a framework called "8 Studio Habits of Mind" (also known as the Studio Thinking Project). The list includes the following traits:

• persistence
• the ability to connect ideas of person to community relevance (connected to service learning)
• observation
• reflection (inward and outward)

These habits of mind are the foundation for whole brain competencies such as resilience, evaluation and analysis. Further, when students become observers of art, the critical thinking skills of interpretation and communication are developed. Each of these are traits crucial for student autonomy and achievement.

When one takes the perspective that creativity is crucial to the problem solving process the case for arts integration becomes further justified. The lasting question becomes when do we start demanding a curriculum that acknowledges creativity’s worth in the development of the whole-brain child and push back against the hypocrisy of applauding students who construct, design and build creative solutions to the world’s problems while measuring their intellectual worth with impersonal, stagnant and bias assessments.

Brain Fact:

In the field of neuroscience, finding the specific areas of the brain engaged in creativity remain a challenge to researchers. Two areas believed to be part of creativity are the hippocampus and the hypothalamus (areas linked to emotion and memory). These images show creativity engaging three main networks across the hemispheres: the executive attention network, the imagination network, and the salience network.

Cognitive Reasoning for STEM to STEAM

This series of posts are taken from a paper I wrote born from the need for reasoning over belief. I have always believed arts has a place in STEM yet sought to connect the cognitive proof. These posts are a combination of two papers I wrote on the neuroscience and cognitive functions involved in creativity and arts integration. My intentions with these posts is to share the connections and research I have done with my STEAM colleagues so that you may have fact-based reasoning to strengthen your voice for integrating the arts into STEM. Here is the conversation...

A list of references

Part I: The Canvas

The recognition of the arts as being critical in the development of the whole child has been a challenging one amongst the test-centered timeline of the new millennium. With the passing of No Child Left Behind in 2001, American education turned its priority to improving school performance with an emphasis on math, reading and the language arts (better known as the tested subject areas). In 2006, scrutiny and concern about the state of American education and the future of American representation in science, technology engineering and math was established by a U.S. National Academies report and resulted in the Department of Education increasing its emphasis on K-12 STEM education as if Sputnik had just launched all over again. In 2009, the Common Core Standards were released and spotlighted the priority on tested subject areas and rigorous efforts to improve test scores spread across the country. Despite the grit of American schools to answer to these many calls of the DOE, a 2011 National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) showed a dismal two point increase in the test scores of eighth graders in science. Additionally, and more importantly to this cause, the NAEP study revealed that students were having difficulty with problem solving and critical thinking skills.These pinpointed gaps in cognitive skills is where the arts has a place to move from a sidelined priority on a cart to its reasoning for being imperative in the integration of K-12 American education. In the following posts we will look at the brain-based power of creativity, the neuroscience of the arts and a general view of arts integration to present the reasoning for STEM to STEAM.

Cognitive Reasoning from STEM to STEAM: Creativity

Part II: The Creative Palatte 

    Arts classrooms have long been a safe place for students to exhale their creative side amongst a school day that can often be very by the (text) book. The act of creating something is a personal one, not just on an emotional level but also on a brain-based level too. Original, authentic creations are cognitive thumb prints that speak of an individual’s creative process. To truly understand the creative process means unpacking the process of problem solving. One uses creativity in the process of problem solving to design the path of vision to fruition. For example, to conceptualize a piece of art or solve a math problem one must be creative with their prior knowledge of concepts, tools and methods. When one takes this perspective on creativity it sheds its artistic exclusivity and becomes applicable to a diverse range of environments. It becomes an approachable adjective for thinking, assembling and a process to apply to a wide range of professions where new solutions are curated for existing problems.

In order for the creative process to thrive in K-12 education it needs to be supported by a learning environment that understands the importance of cognitive discomfort in forming healthy habits of mind. Promoting the creative process with the integration of the arts can nourish characteristics linked to personal and professional success . A team at the Harvard School of Education examined the regular processes and habits of mind of artists to develop a framework called "8 Studio Habits of Mind" (also known as the Studio Thinking Project). The team observed the following traits during the creative process:

• persistence
• the ability to connect ideas of person to community relevance (connected to service learning)
• observation
• reflection (inward and outward)

These habits of mind are the foundation for whole brain competencies such as resilience, evaluation and analysis. When students become observers of art, the critical thinking skills of interpretation and communication are developed. Each of these are crucial for student autonomy and achievement.

In the field of neuroscience, finding the specific areas of the brain engaged in creativity remain a challenge to researchers. Two areas believed to be part of creativity are the hippocampus and the hypothalamus (areas linked to emotion and memory). These images show creativity engaging three main networks across the hemispheres: the executive attention network, the imagination network, and the salience network.

When one takes the perspective that creativity is crucial to the problem solving process the case for arts integration becomes justified. The lasting question becomes when do we start demanding a curriculum that acknowledges creativity’s worth in the development of the whole-brain child and push back against the hypocrisy of applauding students who construct, design and build creative solutions to the world’s problems while measuring their intellectual worth with impersonal, stagnant and bias assessments.

Inequities in STEM.edu, Part One

Forward: Lately, I have seen a lot of  conversations in person and through social media about what to put in a the newest trend of education, Maker Spaces. A conversation I am more intrigued by is why this is the hot topic? A conversation I am more intrigued by looks at this subject through a wider lens. I want to have the conversation of how to create a K-12 curriculum that is socially responsible, driven by inquiry and is designed for every school from suburb to urban.  How do we turn this conversation to action and how do we know it has ended successfully? This series of posts will be about the American initiative for STEM education and the role that standardized testing continues to play in perpetuating its inequities in underserved schools. This is me starting the conversation for action. In an effort to go forward, I begin with the facts.

(An insanely boring & necessary list of resources that I used to write all of this. )

Part One:

    There is a large group of students in the United States that are not being democratically served in the initiative for STEM education in American public schools. Students in underserved schools who are culturally and linguistically diverse are being failed in the current, complex Kindergarten to college STEM pipeline. Their right to be educated, to become the best version of themselves, has been compromised by an institution that places more value on systematic standardization than authentic student voice.

     The losses that students in underserved schools face are too costly to ignore. First is an absence of qualified teachers. Eighth-grade students from low-income families were less likely to have science teachers with regular or advanced certifications, a degree in science, and more than three years experience teaching science (Howard-Brown, Martinez, 2012). In 2012, The National Science Foundation reported reported 41% of teachers in high-poverty schools had masters degrees in Math or Science compared to 61% in low-poverty schools.

Next, is the access to basic STEM Materials such as up-to-date laboratories, computers and quality internet access (Williams, 2014). With a closer look, these underserved schools are helplessly dependent on a circular system; in order to provide the basics, they need the funding that is a reward from students performing well on high-stakes tests. Yet, it is the regulated teaching methods and disconnected curriculum followed to pass these tests that fail students the most. For example, in Texas, after years of standardized testing, over 50 percent of all black and Latino ninth-graders did not make it to graduation (McNeil, 2000).

These students are deprived of higher-level concepts and meaningful, relevant instruction time in exchange for lessons on building strategic test skills (Raising the Bar, n.d.). From a broader view, this is a symptom of schools becoming arenas of the dominant test-taking ideology: rote memorization, impersonal teaching methods and a fixed timeline to achieve on high-stakes testing (Raising the Bar, n.d.). Schools have become outlets for grooming masters of recall rather than architects of inquiry (Flinders & Thornton, 2013a). Teachers are timid to protest with oppositional ideologies because their ability to raise student growth percentile is valued more than a connected, genuine student experience (Darder et al., 2003a). The message for “sameness” intended by standardized testing and the push for “STEM for all” in underserved schools is disconnected from the real needs of students and the teaching methods that will best prepare our students to become the best version of themselves.

What language and message are we sending to students when their learning environment shows no attempt to connect to their daily lives and cheers of test scores outweigh their authentic voice? If we know what we are doing is wrong, how do we become empowered to stop?

To be continued...

Inequities in STEM.edu, Part Two

Forward to this conversation


Part Two: 

To pick up on a point where Part One left off, according to the National Science Foundation and The Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education a high-quality program for diverse learners, "combines rich content and challenging activities with instruction that is student-centered, conceptually oriented and focused on problem-solving". It is important that the content of these lessons connect to the life of the learner which predominantly exists outside the discourse of the white, mainstream American culture. The work of education activists such as Nel Noddings, show that personal care and interest of students’ cultural identity from teachers and administrators communicates that a school’s investment extends beyond the hours of the school day which motivates academic success. When schools show an awareness and empathy towards what W.E. Dubois called, a “double consciousness”, honest conversations about the multi-dimensional view of the academic needs of cultural and language diverse learners can begin to be deconstructed for design.

There is an important conversation in the fact that students who have limited English language skills are placed in low-level classes because they take placement tests written in English. (Other studies have shown that Black and Latino students are often assigned lower tracks in schools than white and asian students.) Furthermore, students who are placed correctly do not participate in class and understandably grapple with teacher notation and materials. These language barriers can mask their true abilities and potential. Observations of cultural and language diverse students show that they will switch to their dominant language to engage in higher-level math and science concepts. How can we best serve these students to keep their motivation to succeed alive? The fact is many schools do provide support for these students and some need to give these students a voice and ask, “what can I do to help you be your best?”.

Sonia Nieto, a professor of language, literacy and culture at Amhurst college boldly comments, “schools and colleges of education by and large have failed to adequately prepare future and practicing teachers to teach language-minority students.” She continues, “all classrooms of the future will have students whose first language is not English, even if they currently do not have such students.” In a recent study conducted on how to improve STEM instruction, the point was raised of the importance of leadership and staff members in possessing an understanding of various cultures and backgrounds of the students. The study states, “many of the opportunities needed for diverse learners to become successful in the area of STEM require connections through their cultural beliefs and practices.”

Invested, incredible teachers across the country are providing students from culturally and language diverse homes with the authentic voice they need to make their learning powerful and relevant. These voices of these teachers and students can be heard in schools such as The Science Leadership Academy, The Workshop School and Friends Select. How do we take these school models and make them the standard that does not accept status quo?

Introductions In a Crowded Room

The title of this blog space comes from the mind of Bruce Mau and is named with him in mind for two reasons. When I came across the simple, powerful phrase, "begin with fact based optimism", I felt an immediate sense of connection because it summarizes my current perspective of education. After many discussions of what I "felt" was right for students, I realized the only way I will motivate institutional change is with facts. Finding the facts and data to transform practices in education is what drives my optimism during my doctoral studies. 

Secondly, Mau represents my curiosities of the creative minds outside the often impenetrable world of education. These minds includes the artists, problem solvers and innovators I look to for inspiration and a breath of cerebral fresh air. I find solace in their comfort to be amongst organized chaos and admire their ability to express their observations with evocative visuals.

This blog is a place for me to share the connections I make in my research from various studies, philosophers and creatives. The goal in sharing this information with you is to generate a dialogue that is grounded in points of quantitative and/or qualitative data. 

I realize the room for blogging is currently a crowded one. Much like any room filled with quality people, each person finds the conversation they need. This blog is not started with any intentions to build a brand for myself or win awards. That's not my style.This blog is for two things only, sharing and respectful conversation.Thank you for stopping to think with me for a while.

Hi, it's nice to meet you.