When Tony and I went to IU for the Armstrong Retreat, we listened to a lecture from Dr. Plucker about the growing intellectual gap in our country which deals not with the bottom academic end, but the higher end. This struck a cord with the teachers in the room. One of the things that Dr. Plucker talked about was the dire need for our country to produce job creators–those innovative, risk-takers that have driven our economy since World War II. Dr. Plucker is referenced in the July 19, 2010 issue in an article called The Creativity Crisis (http://www.newsweek.com/2010/07/10/the-creativity-crisis.html). The article is pretty thought provoking. The study that was done in 1958 by Dr. Torrance with 400 Minneapolis children is worth the read by itself.
One of the things in the article that stood out to me was the need to add creativity (which can be taught) into the classroom to help foster growth; of course, one of things that the article warns about is to not tell kids to be creative (it doesn’t work). I built a PowerPoint entry task as a model for increasing creativity. It deals with watermelons: Square Watermelons I would appreciate any feedback and ideas.
Lambs to Lions 
Jul 17, 2010 @ 20:22:25
In my mind, thare is no actual answer to that question. Without getting into God and stuff like that, have you ever noticed how everything in nature (without human intervention) just… fits? The answer is nothing at all. The question SHOULD be, “How can we make use of this design?”. I think creativity isn’t taking something you find and turning in into something else. Innovation is taking what you have as it is, THEN using what it gives you to solve problems. Big mistake on humanity’s part.