How does one get to be creative? Is it tied to how intelligent you are? Are you born creative? Can you change how creative or how intelligent you are? These are good questions, and in answering them, we can see the basis for this course. First of all, our creativity is in some part, based on our native intelligence. And, like intelligence, we can change and improve what we have naturally. We can learn through schooling and through experience, and become smarter. And research has proved that we can also develop our creativity through exercise and effort. In previous versions of this class, measured creativity on average, has improved from the 52nd percentile to the 93rd percentile. Creativity is a trait of your personality and can be focused and improved through work and effort. Luckily for all of us, the development of creativity, the actual work, is fun, enjoyable, and can be done anywhere. You won't have to go to the creativity gym to work on your creativity muscles, unless you think of this class as your creativity workout space. Well, like in a gym, one way to think about creativity, is like a muscle. And if we use it, we'll get stronger. And if we don't use it, we'll get flabby and fall back on our old habits. The more you work with your creativity, the more creative you will become. And after a while, like going to the gym, people will notice and begin to comment on your creativity muscles. They may say, he's so creative, let's ask him for help. Or, she always has good ideas, we should see what she thinks would work. Their expectations will also help keep you being creative. So, specifically, how does one improve their creativity, and how will this fit into this class? Best way to have anyone learn something, is to have them actively work in what they need to learn. So this class is about doing stuff, and it isn't going to be about lectures and very creative people. It's about how, all of our creativity that each of us has, can be improved. That is, by the way, the difference between big C Creativity, the experts, and little c creativity. Creativity for the rest of us where it will do the most good. Within class we'll have a number of exercises that help you develop your creativity. You'll be able to do them online to challenge yourself to generate more ideas, and we'll have larger projects called do something different's. That will have you create projects that are inventive, different, odd, unusual, and fun, and you'll talk to people about their own creativity. One thing that most people experience when developing their creativity, is that other people look at them, and think its a little bit odd or weird. This is usually the case with this class. You might get embarrassed and your friends, relatives or others, might ask you what you're doing. Be brave and persevere. You're becoming more creative, even if you are slightly embarrassed. And next time, with the experience behind you, you'll be able to go even further. Creativity is often a public act. And one which others think is odd. Think about new fashions, about unique inventions, or ground breaking work, all broke convention and led to the future. One additional thing to remember, that in this course you have one great tool that you can use when people question you about your creativity exercises. You can just tell them, it's for class. Plain and simple, most people will step back and let you do what you're doing. They might ask you about the class and that's fine too, but this is one of the greatest excuses for acting unusual in public. You may say something like, are you crazy? And you have to get to say, it's for class. Or they could say, are you drunk? And again you can say, it's for class. Or they might say, why do you want an Egg McMuffin in, to eat in the back of a police car? It's for class. It's the true story. We've got the picture. So that you can remember these magic words, I'd ask that you repeat them after me. It's for class. I can't hear you. Try talking clearly into the computer. It's for class. Okay, that's better. Now, a little bit about divergent and convergent thinking. It's a goal, it's a set of topics and ideas that are going to address the whole set of our class. In the field of creativity, we often speak about two different types of thinking, convergent thinking and divergent thinking. Both are needed in normal problem solving, but most of our work and creativity will address divergent thinking. Sir Ken Robinson in his video, said divergent thinking is how to see lots of possible answers to a question, to use lots of ways to interpret a question, and how to think non linearly, and how to see multiple answers, not just one. That's exactly what we've been talking about. Divergent thinking is thinking that seeks multiple and unusual answers and ideas for any given problem. Wikipedia says that divergent thinking is a thought process, or method used to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions. The key here is in generating multiple ideas. Convergent thinking, in contrast, is the process on focusing in and developing one solution, often through a logical process. It does focus on a single answer and makes that answer better through critique, additional creative ideas, or hard work. It often leads to the same answer as before. Enhances less the focus of our creativity work. One of the main goals of this course is to develop your skill in developing multiple ideas, and that the only wrong answer is one answer. We all need to be able to come up with more than one, and preferably many answers to any given problem, and that's the main lead as to why we focus on divergent thinking. Remembering which type of thinking can be derived from the regular use of the words, divergent and convergent. If you are following a path, and the path splits into three dimensions, it is said to diverge. If you come to a meeting place, where all the paths come together, they are said to converge. If you follow the same path, you will get to the same location. Taking a different path in the woods or life, will lead to different and creative answers. One example from real life of divergent and convergent thinking may help. In dating, people go out with a lot of different people. This is like divergent thinking. Trying out multiple ideas. Many times, though, people find someone special, early on, and build a long term relationship with them. This is like convergent thinking. Building and developing one single idea. In this creative problem solving class, we're getting people to date a large number of ideas, as this is the essence for being creative. Developing your divergent thinking is the core to developing your creativity. It is about doing something that, but, different. It is about developing your habits and breaking them. And it's about challenging your assumptions. These are the first steps to being more creative.
