JOURNALS are a place where people...

• Process what is going on in their lives
• Reveal their inner most secrets and emotions
• Record difficult, amazing, fun, sad etc. things that have happened
• Explore a situation for the lies, the truth, the motives etc.  

This means that one great creative muscle exercise is journal entries for our characters. 

Creativity Muscle Exercise #3

A simple journal entry for a character you KNOW and LOVE from a book, film, or episodic that already is in motion. i.e. Cinderella, Jack Reacher, Sydney Bristow, Luke Skywalker, or the Rat from Ratatouille. 

You pick a favorite...

Write a journal entry from this character's perspective on their birthday. The day could've gone well or badly... or just simple reflection. Whatever you think this character might record on the pages of their journal on their birthday. 

DEBRIEF: 

1. Was choosing a character difficult? Why do you think that is?
2. This exercise taps into...

The UNEXPECTED is always a great tool in writing.

Whether it's...

• An unexpected outcome
• An unexpected setting 
• An unexpected feeling
• An unexpected death
• An unexpected presence
• An unexpected emotional response

It's powerful. WHY?

Because you surprised your audience and that's delightful. It's the TWIST... 

Now I say SURPRISE... not SHOCK! Delight not violate. So the WAY you employ the unexpected must work for your audience. 

Therefore today's creativity muscle exercise is to use the SAME prompt as day 1 and go in the opposite direction. 

• If in the woods, you went to frightening... then go to pleasant.  
• If in the woods, you went with to sadness... then go to joy. 
• If in the woods, you went with to horror... go with childlike. 
• If in the woods, you went with to serious... go with humorous. 
• If in the woods, you went to environmental... go with gluttony. 

Tell the UNEXPECTED ending... and have fun inventing something...

Everyone is CREATIVE...

Look at any 2-4 year old when you hand them a blank sheet of poster paper, a container of paints, and a paintbrush. They create without reservation. They don't stop and say, "I don't know if I'm creative..."

• There is no self-doubt.
• There is no perfection.
• There is no expectation.
• There is only CREATIVE.... 

Being 25, 45, or 65 is no different. We just may have allowed our creativity muscle to atrophy a bit. It may have been discouraged when someone said our dinosaur made out of a toilet paper roll, cotton balls, and purple paint was lame.  But that muscle is NOT gone. 

• We can awaken it. 
• We can strengthen it. 
• We can believe that it is real and powerful. 
• We can enjoy it. 

Therefore, I'm committing to post a Creativity Muscle Workout daily for the next 100 days...  One exercise at a time, we will get your creativity muscle revived and primed to CREATE.  

While most of the exercises...

Thank you to Poppy & Geoff Spencer for sharing their expertise with us about using music and art to reduce anxiety in our kids. 

They shared some great ideas on how to use an "Art Starter" to help get them calm enough to do homework. 

I'm working this into my Become a Better Learner Program, as a way for students to set themselves up for a more successful homework time.  

If you would like to connect with Poppy & Geoff you can do so through their website https://poppyandgeoff.com/

Looking forward to hear how you all use this with your children. Come Share in the FB Group. 

Jill

If asked... "What do you do when you STUDY?" The answer(s) you give are learner tools. 

• Flashcards
• Re-read you notes
• Re-read the book 

To become a better Learner... increase the number of Learner Tools you have to choose from. 

Funny story… I have never been very good at determining how long things really take to do. My TO DO list is evidence of this. I have far too many items listed and too many boxes left unchecked at the end of the day. When I go to “run errands,” I plan to accomplish 5-6 of them in an estimated 1 hour. LOL!!

I laugh about this now, because this work I’m doing around the COS has brought to light my weak sense of time. Even when I’m writing this email, I think… 15 minutes… and then when I look back over the time for revision, editing, uploading, and links… it’s more like 90 minutes.

In contrast, my husband has an EXCELLENT sense of time. He just knows how long things are going to take and he is always pithing 10 minutes of accurate. He doesn’t count minutes or write out a time-specific plan, he just knows. It’s a strength I do possess.  This work uncovered this difference and allowed us to talk and laugh about it....

The 21^st century workplace uses collaboration on a daily basis. So much so, its in the top 5 skills looked for my hiring managers.

You might be asking… then how do we get from ineffective group work to effective collaboration skills?

Good question and one that won’t be answered by the classroom. 

GOOD collaboration requires a vulnerability FROM each participant and a deep respect FOR each participant for that vulnerability.  If either ingredient is missing, the cake doesn’t taste good (Metaphor alert! ).

This recipe is so CRUCIAL, organizations frequently use a skilled facilitator to create safety, elicit vulnerability, mediate discussion, remind respect, and monitor progress toward an end goal.  In time, this group grows in self-awareness and learns to check themselves and each other rendering a 3rd party facilitator unnecessary. This does not happen over night… but is the ultimate goal of collaboration.

This kind of facilitation and...

If I were to write a Christmas song I think I would title it...

What's REALLY Important This Christmas?

3 weeks ago, my family moved from southern California to Texas and the transition has been tough.   I figured amongst all the crazy, a Southern Christmas would be just what the Doctor ordered...

But my attempt at a Cowboy Christmas has not started well and it's only the beginning of December. We attempted to go to a Tree lighting in a neighboring small town and my little munchkin had a melt down. We left after 15 minutes. 

Then we went to put up our Christmas Tree and my box of decorations was nowhere to be found.  Hopefully just lost in our storage shed and not lost by the moving company. 

While these are little things, they were the icing on the cake of moving that just sent me spiraling into tears.  I went to bed. 

The next morning I awoke with an epiphany of perspective....

Many people go without at Christmas... and their "without"...

Situation

Recently I worked with a 6th grade girl on a science task. The assignment was to read about the scientific method and make a flap page (see pic above) to summarize each step. 

Observations

I noticed three problems emerge as she worked on this task.

1. The "artsy" nature of the flap page didn't increase engagement on a learning level. It made it look pretty and she happens to like pretty, but it did not change the learning. 

2. Her "summaries" looked almost identical to the original text in both language and length.

3. There seemed to be no more understanding of the scientific method from this task than before it. And since I assumed this to be the teacher's purpose for this assignment, this was a problem. 

Implications

Both issues 2 & 3 are COMMON struggles when our children read textbooks.  Frequently we assume that READING is a viable way to learn. But reading ALONE is not how we learn... its what we do during reading that results...

"I'm most comfortable when I'm following the curriculum," says one mom I recently worked with.  

Not an uncommon feeling with many homeschool parent-teachers. We trust the curriculum developers to have spent the time and money necessary to design a sequence of learning experiences that will lead children from A to Z in a specific subject area. 

And most are designed this way. BUT they are also designed for the MASSES and based on AVERAGES. 

When you are teaching a large group this is the best option a teacher has to help as many children as possible move from A to Z in understanding. 

But you are teaching 1. OK maybe more than one, but typically only one per grade level.  And this 1 is NOT AVERAGE.  Therefore the best option to lead this child from A to Z understanding is to PERSONALIZE the learning experience.

You don't have to throw out the curriculum, but you do need to consider if it's reaching your...