Children's imaginations

[John DiFool]

[Trying to turn this into a question] Do you see a lack of imagination among kids
today? As a teacher I have a front-row seat. At our place of learning (all ages) we
typically have them do 10 sentences or so a day (based off of vocab words)-and I
have a devil of a time getting them to add interesting details or inject some personal
viewpoints into their writing.

If for example I ask them to make a sentence on "cynic" or "cynicism" (which would
be a middle/high school level word-apologies in advance to Diogenes ) I usually get

"My friend Joe is a cynical person"

Instead of something like

"Tobias, the grumpy cynical toad, would sit on his toadstool all day and make
disparaging comments to the passing faeries."

Even if the student is well-read, I don't see the effort and inspiration being put
into it. I had a girl who was an intense nut for fantasy literature of all sorts-even
her sentences would be plain more often than not.

I then remembered a comment in an article in this week's ESPN-TM, which
discussed whether NFL coaches punt too much (we had a thread on that here
recently-couldn't find it in a search tho for some reason). It said the ultimate
reason they don't go for it on 4th down is (get ready this is good) because of
peer pressure. They are afraid of being ostracized from the community of NFL
coaches for going against the prevailing wisdom and basically "showing up" the
other coach. There were other reasons (media criticism), but back to my point...

Perhaps then it is peer pressure: perhaps they are afraid we'll make a big deal
(which we would) if they came up with a series of killer sentences, simultaneously
making themselves stand out uncomfortably from their peers and making said
peers' own sentences look poor in comparison?

Or maybe (original point) they really don't have that kind of imaginative power?
Have you noticed a decrease (Warning: Old Fogeyitis Alert) in the level of
kid's imaginations over the years (in terms of play styles, artwork, and so on)?
If so do we blame it all on Nintendo?

[Rico]

<mod>

Let's imagine this as soliciting opinions.

Then let's make a sentence utilizing the word "move."

Such as "Moved to IMHO."

Oh. Don't mind if I do.

</mod>

Great OP, John. Right on the money observations.

[WhyNot]

I'm gonna be the odd man out, I know, but I've always maintained that kids are NOT imaginative or creative by nature. They're taught how to be imaginative and creative by adults, who ARE imaginative.

Watch adults play with little-bitties. It's NEVER the kid who first initiates a creative action.Rather, the caregiver will, say, pick up a block and "feed" it to the doll, making yummy crunching noises. The child will imitate this, and some other time, will do it when playing on her own, and we say, "Ah! What an imagination she has!" No. She's copying what she was shown, even when the caregiver later on swears up and down he never showed her how to do that. He did, he just honestly doesn't remember it. (One of my professors in college was doing research into this area with video tapes and logs, and found it true in the empirical sense as well as my own experience. But I am totally blanking on her name and don't know whether she ever published.)

My toddler doesn't draw with crayons. She makes scribbles and likes to see how color moves from this stick to that paper. Then she hands me the crayon, and I draw a flower. One of these days, she'll draw a flower - because she saw me do it. Other times, people make Rorschachs out of their kid's scribbles, and praise them for "drawing a cute kitty!", so the kid tries again for praise by drawing something that looks more like a kitty next time.

Kids run around in their underwear wearing pillowcases tied to their shoulders because one day when they were babies, daddy draped a pillowcase around their shoulders and said, "Superbaby!" and "flew" them around the room. They tell stories because we tell stories, and they're terribly bad at it for years. They "create" jokes which are just non sequiturs, because they're imitating us telling jokes.

Piaget posited that logic is the mark of a grown mind. I'd add creative imagination to that. If kids were creative and imaginative, then they'd be making movies and writing books. They're not. (And the rare cases that do get lambasted for being too derivative, a la Eragon.) They're imitative, until their brains develop to the point of being able to be creative as adults.

Same with words. Kids use the simplest words possible to get the job done. "Milk!" and then, after we demonstrate repeatedly and demand it, "Milk, please!" and then, "May I have a glass of milk?". "Pardon me, Mother, but I'd like a glass of milk to drink, when you can spare a moment." is not a kid sentence.

They're not dumb. Your students will write the fewest words possible to get a grade, AND they just don't have the brains to be terribly creative AND they're still internalizing grammar in a crappy school setting that doesn't teach writing very well. Should they be encouraged to stretch and do more complex writing? Absolutely! But I don't think they're any worse at it than most of the kids when I was in school, or in the 20 years I've been helping my mother grade papers since. Before that? I have no experience, but I doubt it.

[WhyNot]

Oh, and if children are less imaginative today, then my hypothesis is that it's due to group child care and less one-on-one interaction with adults and older kids who teach the little ones how to be creatively imaginative. Group a bunch of age-mates together and what they can teach each other is very limited.

[zelie zelerton]

I once had a very interesting wait at a bus stop.

By me were a group of ladies in their mid-fifties or so who were discussing what to buy their grandchildren for Christmas. Flashy toy x and computer game y were mentioned (I forget what, exactly) along with how much little Johnny liked the current craze.

Inevitably they then got on to the fact that as children, they had been given few toys and had relied on imagination to turn objects into toys. This in turn led to criticism of the younger generation who 'lack imagination to play'. There was absolutely no recognition on their part that the adults were the ones creating the situation. By substituting adult attention and playmates for flashy toys I honestly believe we are restricting kids in their development.

[What Exit?]

My kids have pretty good imagination. My daughter reads a lot and it tends toward fantasy and my son all too often is living in his own world anyway. ;)

They both do great at make believe and my daughter does fine with creative writing. It might help that since they were very little I have spun little tales out of suggestions by them on car trips. This usually involves their stuff animals or our cats and my Sister's dogs.

My daughter has a very large stuff unicorn herd and each unicorn has a background and its own abilities. She likes to do little craft projects and enjoys doing large projects with me.

Jim

[Anne Neville]

[Trying to turn this into a question] Do you see a lack of imagination among kids
today? As a teacher I have a front-row seat. At our place of learning (all ages) we
typically have them do 10 sentences or so a day (based off of vocab words)-and I
have a devil of a time getting them to add interesting details or inject some personal
viewpoints into their writing.

If for example I ask them to make a sentence on "cynic" or "cynicism" (which would
be a middle/high school level word-apologies in advance to Diogenes ) I usually get

"My friend Joe is a cynical person"

Instead of something like

"Tobias, the grumpy cynical toad, would sit on his toadstool all day and make
disparaging comments to the passing faeries."

I was an imaginative kid, but I usually didn't put that kind of effort into a "use a word in a sentence" type of assignment. Why should I, when I got the same credit for "My friend Joe is a cynical person"? I also found that sort of assignment extremely boring- I would have put more effort into a more interesting assignment like writing a short story.

[Bobotheoptimist]

Even if the student is well-read, I don't see the effort and inspiration being put into it. I had a girl who was an intense nut for fantasy literature of all sorts-even her sentences would be plain more often than not.Maybe kids are the same as they were 30 years ago and still despise this kind of seat work. They hope that writing "My friend Joe is a cynical person" will get the teacher to move on to something interesting or, failing that, recess. I see plenty of kids with excellent imaginations until/unless someone requires them to demonstrate it.
Or, I agree with Anne Neville.

Or maybe it's that durn moving picture box they stare at all day!

[StGermain]

How about asking them to write a paragraph using all the words? That way they'd have to string it all together somehow. It does seem that the assignment doesn't require creative writing. Most people will take the easiest path.

StG

[gigi]

That's very interesting, WhyNot. It makes a lot of sense too. I know my brother and I made up plays and stuff as little kids but I'm sure the ideas were derived from books.

[Sattua]

I, as a child, resented this kind of assignment--writing stories and poems too. My inner world is none of your business, and I'm not sharing it on demand.

[Marienee]

If your objective is to get your students to add interesting details or inject some personal viewpoints into their writing you might consider, oh, say, something other than ask them to write a sentence using a particular word.

You aren't exactly modelling tremendous creativity yourself with an assignment like that. Mindless assignments usually generate mindless responses.

It seems to me that very few people are truly creative, be they adults or children. Though I disagree somewhat with WhyNot as I think that creative adults generally were creative children.

[Beadalin]

As usual, I find WhyNot's observations about kids spot-on. Storytelling and other patterns of language that make it interesting are learned over time. Great storytelling is a skill that comes from having learned all the rules of language and form first, then injecting the unexpected.

I also agree with Sattua, that when I was a kid, unless I liked and respected you, I wasn't going to give you a window into the inner me. That's my business. Your business is wanting a sentence with a word in it, so I'd write the sentence in a way that took me the least effort. It's busywork: I certainly don't learn anything from it. I'm being asked to perform for you, so I'll go ahead and perform.

My take is that we really mean when we say "creativity" is not "do something wholly new," it's "do something unexpected but within certain bounds." The more minimal the bounds, the more mundane the output. The more stringent and explicit the bounds, the more creativity you're likely to see.

So, I'd ask the OP:
What is it that you're trying to teach through the sentence-writing exercises?

What do you think the students should be getting out of it?

What do you think they ARE getting out of it?

[mrklutz]

Your students are no different from adults of whatever age. I'll use a database development class I took as an example. When we had to enter dummy records to test our applications, most people entered their own name, the name of someone they work with, or something like "John Smith". I was the only one in the class who was amusing myself with sample entries like "Gengis Khan", and even I wasn't putting much effort into it.

When you're learning something, you focus on what it is you're learning. Unless you're learning something for which being creative is important, most people aren't likely to be too creative.

[Gala Matrix Fire]

I agree with Anne Neville and WhyNot.

My mom took great pride in my creativity. I always maintained that I was not creative at all, merely imitating things I'd seen elsewhere. Then she said that the way I combined things I was imitating is what made me creative. You be the judge.

[NJ_Kef]

I tend to agree with WhyNot’s hypothesis, but I would allow for exceptions, and add that creativity is not always obvious and should not be confused with talent. (I have a similar, but unrelated hypothesis about children. I supect that prejudice does not have to be carefully taught (http://www.lyricsondemand.com/soundtracks/s/southpacificlyrics/youvegottobecarefullytaughtlyrics.html). In fact, I think the opposite is true.)

I agree with Anne Neville and WhyNot. My mom took great pride in my creativity. I always maintained that I was not creative at all, merely imitating things I'd seen elsewhere. Then she said that the way I combined things I was imitating is what made me creative. You be the judge.
I totally understand what you’re saying. Who’s to say that creativity and imitation don’t flow from the same source? I experienced a somewhat similiar quandary. I taught myself how to draw at an early age (by imitating what I saw drawn) and kept at it. Everyone told me I was talented. I tried to explain that I had no talent for drawing, that it was my native intelligence (for want of a better word) and creativity that produced those detailed pencil drawings. As I got older, friends complimented my writing and some thought I had talent. I explained to them that I was a terrible writer, but a decent and objective editor of my own crap.

Are children less creative today? I have no idea. At this point, I am not sure how to define creativity. Is a business woman who builds corporate empires more or less creative than a man who fashions sand castles at the beach? Is a student who doodles until her notebooks take on the aspect of illuminated manuscripts more or less creative than a body-builder who sculpts his own physique into a work of art?

[figure9]

Cynical, me?

[araminty]

I agree with the above posters. I never responded to this kind of class work, and somehow I doubt it was due to my lack of imagination. Maybe I would have reacted better to these kind of excercises if the teachers involved had made the effort to involve us better in the lesson. (No disrespect to you, John)

I remember being berated by my grade four teacher for just the same offence -- not making enough effort in constructing sentences using the spelling list words. I particularly remember using the word "boring" to construct: "Making these sentences is boring." At least it was true! And indicative of meaning!

[Anne Neville]

I remember being berated by my grade four teacher for just the same offence -- not making enough effort in constructing sentences using the spelling list words. I particularly remember using the word "boring" to construct: "Making these sentences is boring." At least it was true! And indicative of meaning!

I think I'd have been much more likely to do something like that, or to work some toilet humor into the sentences, than to write a creative sentence like the one John DiFool wrote. I'd probably have wanted to get the assignment over with as quickly as possible, so I could go back to daydreaming.

[Gala Matrix Fire]

Especially since if you write something creative, the teacher then gushes about it front of the class. Que embarrassing!

[fessie]

I've noticed exactly the same thing WhyNot mentions with my own 3-yr-olds. They absolutely mimic us in their play, using our communicative devices as their own rather than innovating. I'm far more drawn into their world than they are into mine, and I'm the one demonstrating creativity here, is not at all what I expected.

For example, ds has been terrified that Swiper (from Dora) is going to come into our house to steal his toys. After all, he takes everything on the show. How do you deal with this anxiety in a 2.5-yr-old? Well, for a while there I had him convinced that Swiper doesn't have an opposable thumb and therefore can't turn doorknobs -- but, upon closer inspection, I was proved wrong on that one.

So instead, and since it was nearly Halloween anyway, we decorated paper pumpkins and taped them to the front door, because I explained to him that Swiper is terrified of pumpkins and won't come near our place. And by an odd coincidence, Swiper's also terrified of the paper Christmas trees that now adorn our door.

[TimeWinder]

I agree with Anne Neville and WhyNot.

My mom took great pride in my creativity. I always maintained that I was not creative at all, merely imitating things I'd seen elsewhere. Then she said that the way I combined things I was imitating is what made me creative. You be the judge.

Yeah, your whole post is just words that could be found in any dictionary!

[John DiFool]

So, I'd ask the OP:
What is it that you're trying to teach through the sentence-writing exercises?

What do you think the students should be getting out of it?

What do you think they ARE getting out of it?

Very good questions. Part of it of course is the more mechanical aspects (grammar,
spelling, etc.), but I can grok why minimal effort is usually what I get, even if it
wouldn't have been my attitude. As an obnoxious gifted youngster I likely would
have striven to craft something to blow the minds of my teachers-the more out
there, the better, just to liven up the proceedings if nothing else. If you are bored
and you express your boredom by doing something in a deliberately boring way,
then you're just perpetuating your ennui as opposed to breaking out of it. You
have freedom to write about whatever you want-what an opportunity! But
most of my students squander it.

I remember crafting some very creative stories about tho dogfights of WWII
fighter pilots in 4th-5th grade, partly because it was much better than any other
possible alternative (yes I hated the parochial school I went to).

I guess the unexamined life (or unexaminable sentence) is not worth living (writing)
IMHO (tho in other ways in my current life I don't live up to my ideal). Why NOT
(sorry WN!) push things to the logical/absurd limit? Life's too short.

[pbbth]

As a kid I hated these kind of assignments. I did all sorts of creative things...I wrote poetry, I was in theater, I made up games and songs and stories for my little brother, etc. I loved creative stuff, but I didn't need to be "on" all the time and being forced to be creative doesn't work very well. I would turn in sub par work, knowing full well that it was crap simply because I didn't want to do it. I think I am very creative to this very day, but you wouldn't see me put much of that into my work. (Though to be fair, it is kind of hard to be creative with insurance.)

[RealityChuck]

I actually think adults are far less imaginative these days; if something isn't complete factual, they sit around sneering at it.

[Guinastasia]

I remember making up creative sentences, that were usually somewhat "naughty", or "insulting", like the time I had to use the word oh, "fireman" in a sentence in third grade-I think I wrote, "The fireman is retarded." I remember getting marked down and reprimanded for that.

[WhyNot]

How about asking them to write a paragraph using all the words? That way they'd have to string it all together somehow. It does seem that the assignment doesn't require creative writing. Most people will take the easiest path.

StG
My son got his sentences handed back to him for not following the directions, because he used multiple vocabulary words in one (complete, grammatically correct, albeit complex) sentence which did indeed demonstrate the meaning of each word. That way, he only had to write four sentences for the 20 words. I don't remember his exact sentences, but they were something like:

Joe, the cynical fireman, theorized that the multitude of alarms rung to the station during English class was a symptom of the students' boredom with writing vocabulary sentences.

I told him he was brilliant, far smarter than his teachers, and once he showed me all his work, I helped him write stupid sentences for his teacher, who then gave him credit.

:D

[Marienee]

As an obnoxious gifted youngster I likely would
have striven to craft something to blow the minds of my teachers-the more out
there, the better, just to liven up the proceedings if nothing else. If you are bored
and you express your boredom by doing something in a deliberately boring way,
then you're just perpetuating your ennui as opposed to breaking out of it. You
have freedom to write about whatever you want-what an opportunity! But
most of my students squander it.


As an obnoxiously giften youngster I did not give the tiniest particle of damn what my teachers thought about me or my work. With a few exceptions of course.

Again, somebody's squandering something but I am rather bemused that you continue to believe that your students suffer from some character flaw because they put about as much effort into their work as was put into designing the assignment.

[Tully Mars]

I told him he was brilliant, far smarter than his teachers, and once he showed me all his work, I helped him write stupid sentences for his teacher, who then gave him credit.

:D
You're such an evil person (just kidding).

I agree with you on this, but be sure to temper such advice from time to time with a reminder that sometimes you just have to play along with those in authority to avoid creating bigger problems. Because, life just works that way.

[Anne Neville]

If you are bored
and you express your boredom by doing something in a deliberately boring way,
then you're just perpetuating your ennui as opposed to breaking out of it. You
have freedom to write about whatever you want-what an opportunity! But
most of my students squander it.

But if you get the assignment over with as quickly as possible, then you have more time to daydream and think about things you enjoy thinking about, rather than spending that time thinking about the assignment. Also, a lot of creative and smart kids resent anything they see as "busy work", and most people will put the minimum possible effort into any task they resent having to do.

[QuickSilver]

But if you get the assignment over with as quickly as possible, then you have more time to daydream and think about things you enjoy thinking about, rather than spending that time thinking about the assignment. Also, a lot of creative and smart kids resent anything they see as "busy work", and most people will put the minimum possible effort into any task they resent having to do.

This could not be more true in the case of my son (7) who as part of his homework is required to write in his daily journal at least 3 sentences about what he learned that day in school. Left to his own devices he'd write the same three sentences daily:

Today I learned about ___________.
It was interesting.
I had fun.
:smack:

I'm having a devil of a time trying to express to him the importance of writing down his thoughts and ideas in a more interesting and creative way but I'm up against a 7 year old's mind that prefers to think about everything that is Star Wars and Gamecube related, almost to the exclusion of everything else. So I try to encourage him to write about that. Still, he'd rather daydream and talk about it than focus on writing in any more descriptive terms than the above three phrases.

My daughter (10), on the other hand, loves to write creatively and has since she was about my son's age. She creates stories almost daily out of a collection of things she's read, watched on TV, talked with friends about or overheard in a conversation while walking through a mall. Everything is fodder for story writing.

So what's my point here? Dunno really. Except that I agree with the idea that writing for an assignment is almost always less interesting than being given free reign to pick an idea and roll with it. On the other hand, teaching kids to channel their imagination within certain bounds, like a specific assigned topic, does require them to try to be more creative within the limited scope they are given to work with. I think it also teaches them to recognize what interests them and what doesn't. Sometimes what doesn't interest them is creative writing.

And the OP makes an interesting point. It does seem to me that it's adults that are the more imaginative.

[QuickSilver]

I'm having a devil of a time trying to express to him....

"....impress upon him....."

:smack:

Perhaps I need to take some writing courses as well.

[WhyNot]

You're such an evil person (just kidding).

I agree with you on this, but be sure to temper such advice from time to time with a reminder that sometimes you just have to play along with those in authority to avoid creating bigger problems. Because, life just works that way.
Actually, that was my temperance!

If I hadn't tempered, I'd have told him, "You're smart the teachers are stupid, I'm going down right now to give Mrs. Smith a piece of my mind, goddammit!" Rather, I said, "You're really smart to have figured that out. I'm sorry your teacher won't accept it, I think that's pretty dumb of her. But you gotta play the game sometimes to get the grade. Tell you what, I'll help you think of some sentences that will keep her happy, but let's show these good ones to Dad tonight, and lets the both of us send a polite note to your teacher telling her why we think she should reconsider her policy, OK?"

[Tully Mars]

Actually, that was my temperance!Good job. I glad your bringing up another non-conformist. We need more.

[Tully Mars]

Now, if I had conformed a little more, maybe I would spell better.