COM 222  fall 2014

Class Process

While we still know relatively little about how creativity develops and manifests, research on the topic abounds across disciplines. One theory by Mark Batey, for example, suggests that the creative profile can be explained by four primary creativity traits, which best describes how this course is structured:
 

1) Idea Generation (Fluency, Originality, Incubation and Illumination)
Each week we will have an “experimental project” that explores various media for participation credit. At this stage, your ideas will be more important than technique or production values. Explore and exercise your divergent thinking. Then, you will use those experiments as the basis of a midterm project and final project that you shape for “evaluation” (convergent thinking).  Evaluation is an important part of the creative process (knowing how to choose and critique ideas in terms of how effectively they have solved a given problem or communicated to an audience).

2) Personality (Curiosity and Tolerance for Ambiguity)
Research suggests that highly creative people seek out new experiences, take risks, and are generally curious about the world. They are continually re-shaping their worldviews and are drawn to the complexities of it, rather than seeing the world in black and white. Therefore, they have high tolerance for ambiguity. We will be seeking new experiences in this class, through field trips and other avenues, and exploring our worldviews.

3) Motivation (intrinsic)
One of the highest predictors of creativity is intrinsic motivation—working from passion and interest, rather than for external reward. You will be exploring your passions for various media and topics as you make choices for your projects. We will research ways creativity can be evaluated and will collaboratively develop criteria for evaluation so that we can all be invested in the process.

4) Confidence (Producing, Sharing and Implementing)
Doing creative work is often described as a process of failing repeatedly until you find something that sticks, and creatives -- at least the successful ones -- learn not to take failure so personally. You’ll be sharing your experiments each week with group members and the class as a whole. Research suggests that the best environments for stimulating creativity are collaborative, as they provide ways for exchanging and choosing ideas, testing them on audiences, and developing artistic confidence.