Lifelong learning: Learning is a lifelong quest, creating life-long learners requires creating curiosity, Clay P. Bedford noted that:" you can teach a student a lesson for a day; but if you can teach him to learn by creating curiosity, he will continue the learning process as long as he lives.'' Learning is not confined to childhood or the classroom, but takes place throughout life and in a range of situations.
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''Children are the engines behind their own development. They do not wait passively to be urged to engage... nor do they conservatively avoid new experiences. To the contrary, children create much of their own stimulation by observing and actively experimenting as they play and go through their daily lives" (ETFO, 2010c, p. 34).Children possess a natural curiosity about their surroundings.''
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This is my crazy idea How the thinking process develops?
Professor Charles Fernyhough (Professor of Psychology at Durham University, UK), conducts research in inner speech, child’s thinking process development and children’s developing mind, defines the thinking process as: ‘’inner speech’’ which is conscious and active. It is the kind of cognitive process that can make new connections and create meaning. It is dialogic: it has the quality of an internal conversation between different perspectives. The language that forms inner speech has all of its acoustic properties stripped away, losing the qualities of tone, accent, timbre (link is external) and pitch that distinguish spoken language. ‘’Vygotsky’’ referred to this stage of internal language as ‘'thinking in pure meanings'’. We can clearly see some aspects of this process in action in children's private speech, which can be seen to undergo the same transformational processes as it gradually becomes internalized, and then it reaches the stage of being expressed out in a form of ideas. |
Kindergarten learning environmentGo for your thoughts Idea’s connection find the invention …
The children’s brain that has been stimulated by a particular way of thinking process is showing the most of its ability. Many inventors come up with their ideas through a detailed and long thought process that is structured and iterative. They think, and try, improve and redo, again and again until the right idea takes shape and form in their head. New invention ideas are not created only by those with special gifts, they do not just present themselves to people figuratively, they need a well structured an a deep thinking process. |
creativity cannot be taught What is creative thinking?
Many people believe that creative thinking is just coming up with new ideas. They think that divergent thinking, or most known ‘’outbox thinking’’ is the same as creative thinking. But what I figured out is that the unique ideas from outbox thinking must be streamlined with realistic evaluation using critical thinking , zooming in again, to choose and/or improve the best idea(s) among the generated unique ideas. Creative thinking needs usefulness in addition to uniqueness of outbox thinking. In fact, creative thinking requires inbox, outbox, and new box (ION) thinking skills to achieve innovation. |
''My idea is in my heart ...'' |
What do you do with an idea? project: '' improving children's thinking process...'' |
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With an idea, you can change the world, especially an idea that is different, or daring, or a little wild. What do you do with an idea? is a story of one brilliant idea and the child who helps to bring it into the world. It is a story for anyone, at any age, who’s ever had an idea that seemed too big, too odd, too crazy or too difficult. It’s a story to inspire your child to welcome that idea, to give it space to grow, and to see what happens next.
Based on this story, young students were involved in a project called ‘’What do you do with an idea?’’ this project helps the children to gain a deep understanding about their thinking process and get connected more to the world through their own ideas. |
Where do you think the idea is situated? Was a question looking for an answer in the minds of some children at the age of 4, they are only at KG2 level. It was thrilling listening to their answers, I loved watching them in that incredibly meaningful situation where their eyes were moving every where and their minds were traveling as far as they could trying to find the answer. Some suddenly said: my idea is in my eyes, they were right, I could see it. Some of them said: no the idea is always in the mind, in the head, in the brain. And one said; my idea is here, in my heart. That was extremely important, if your idea doesn’t grow in your heart won’t grow anywhere else, and if it doesn’t come from your heart it won’t reach any one and anywhere in this world. |
When the child's life is full of sights, sounds, tastes, smells, textures, people, and places, he will learn. When he feels safe and loved he will learn. when parents begin to recover from their own ideas about what learning should look like (what they remember from school) they will begin a new life of natural learning, too.(Sandra Dodd) Albert Einstein said: '' curiosity is a delicate little plant which, aside from stimulation stands mainly in need of freedom''. By nature people are learning animals. Birds fly; fish swim; humans think and learn. therefore, we do not need to motivate children into learning by wheeling, bribing, or bullying. We do not need to keep picking away at their minds to make sure they are learning. What we need to do -and all we need to do - is to give children as much help and guidance as they ask for, listen respectfully when they feel like. get out of the way ... we can trust them to do the rest. (john Holt, How Children Learn). Let us give the child a vision of the whole universe ... the universe is an important reality, and an answer to all questions. we shall walk together on this path of life : for all things are a part of the universe, and are connected with each other to form one whole unity. Given a chance , a child will bring the confusion of the world to the woods, wash it in the creek, and turn it over to see what lives on the unseen side of that confusion ... In nature, child finds freedom, fantasy, and privacy; a place distant from the adult world, a separate peace. |
My book of nature is a book made of materials collected from the nature such as dried leaves, sticks, seeds, dried flowers and small stones. It is necessary to move the children's learning environment away from the walls of the classroom to a wider outdoor learning environment, green areas and even to the beach; where they interact with the nature and discover more about its wonders.
This meaningful interaction creates an open world in front of the children for the inquiry that allows them to learn more about that environment and the whole surrounding nature. Using all their senses; the children get a full picture of the different lessons they can learn from the nature. They use their sense of sight to look at the grass, the trees, the birds, the colorful flowers and the insects. They use their sense of hearing to listen to the sound of water, the sound of trees and the sound of the birds, they will feel the cold air on their skin, they will even discover their shadows on the floor learning more about the importance of the sun in creating a shadow of their own body and the shadow of the trees and small plants. |
I once saw a poster that attracted my attention, it says:
''Children are such a nice way to start human beings''. The sentiment resonates for me. But, if I were to rewrite the poster, I would probably lean toward something like: Children are a cutting-edge start to human life. They arrive in the world with a built in capacity to explore, grow and develop. |
21st century inquiry process
After finding a bat in the school play ground, one of the teachers triggered the children's curiosity to find out more about the bats. In the beginning the children were interested in this bat specifically, but when they started to know more about it, more questions occurred. They started wondering, where the bats live?, what do they eat?, where do they find their food?, do they sleep?, how?, and when?, does baby but fly? They googled lots of information with the teacher, they watched documentaries about bats, they found answers for all their questions. in the end ... a knowledge gained. |
Nature's secret ......
Children are born naturalists they explore the world with all of their senses, experiment in the environment, and communicate their discoveries .... Learning through play Is a term used in education and psychology to describe how a children can learn to make sense of the world around them. Through play children can develop social and cognitive skills, mature emotionally, and gain the self-confidence required to engage in new different life experiences and environments. Key ways that young children learn include playing, being with other people, being active, exploring and new experiences, talking to themselves, communication with others, meeting physical and mental challenges, being shown how to do new things, practicing and repeating skills and having fun. |
Kindergarten school trip
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Creativity
Creativity is a phenomenon whereby something new and somehow valuable is formed. The created item may be intangible (such as an idea, a scientific theory, a musical composition, or a joke) or a physical object (such as an invention, a literary work, or a painting).
Creative arts represent an outlet of expression that is usually influenced by culture in society and which in turn helps to change culture. As such, the arts are a physical manifestation of people's internal creative impulse. Major constituents of the arts include literature – including poetry, novels and short stories, and epic poetry; performing arts – among them music, dance, and theatre; culinary arts such as baking, chocolatiering, and winemaking; media arts like photography and cinematography, and visual arts – including drawing, painting, ceramics, and sculpting. Some art forms combine a visual element with performance (e.g. film) or artwork with the written word (e.g. comics). From prehistoric cave paintings to modern day films, art serves as a vessel for storytelling and conveying humankind's relationship with its environment. A debate exists in the fine arts and video game cultures over whether video games can be counted as an art form. |