132 | JADE
KATE BAKER, ELLA TENNANT & FRANK RUTTEN
Ella Tennant (Perspectives of the 2016 Annual
Teaching Symposium)
Keynote - Prof. Paul Kleiman
Creativity: choices, challenges (and a bit of chaos)
Prof. Kleiman began his talk with a series of vignettes, each one
demonstrating that whatever creativity may be, it is often to be
found beyond the confines of the standard structures in Higher
Education. Using quotations from Martha Graham, Boden and
Knight, the audience followed Prof. Kleiman in his search for an
understanding of what creativity actually is and the challenge
we face in attempting to develop a creative curriculum in Higher
Education.
The answer appeared to come in the form of questioning the value
of evidence-based work and designing open curricula to match a
variety of imagined student journeys. Examples of how this might be
achieved were mostly from the contexts of business and creative arts
institutes. In Higher Education, Prof. Kleiman stated the importance
of talking with students and allowing them to be “agents in their
own assessments”. There were no details or examples of provided
as to how this might work in practice, and how these ideas could be
effectively transferred to disciplines which are heavily dependent
on evidence-based content was not addressed. It would be difficult
to argue with the statement that creativity does need to recognised
and rewarded. Innovations in approaches to teaching and learning
do assist in providing ideas and the means for educators to ask
their own questions and explore the how best to creatively develop
curricula for students in their particular discipline. Prof. Kleiman
concluded that a creative curriculum is one which is designed for
learning, and left us with 10 design principles on which this could
be based. The resulting “elegant curriculum” would also contain
empty space, which would then presumably allow flexibility to
move content to suit students on different journeys. The title for
the talk: “Creativity, choices, challenges (and a bit of chaos)”, was
appropriate.