Play, Kindness & Creativity

Creative Sprint for Educators; Play, Kindness, and Creativity

Last year we started the year with a Creative Sprint using in the book of the same name written by Noah and Mica Scalin, it was really a great way to start the year and spark new creative ideas. Since then we have been able to get to know Mica and share with her our love of the creative sprint and how much we’d like to educators use it to jumpstart both their own and their students’ creativity.

Why Play, Kindness and Creativity?

Playing is a process, as children, we begin to understand so many things about our world. How to interact with others? (grown-ups and peers) How to talk through ideas? (Even the weird ones.) Mr. Rogers said, “Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.”

Are you born with creativity? Or is it something that can be built up with practice?

Maya Angelou believed that creativity is something that must be not only used but also practiced on a regular basis. The more you practice, just like with anything (sports, instruments, speaking a language), the better become. As educators, we see more students given less time to practice to become more proficient at a particular skill. Creativity is a skill that takes practice! Peter H. Reynolds’s motto is “Create Bravely”. Creativity, along with confidence is a powerful combination. It is what helps you to be brave in your own decision-making process, no matter what others may think.

The definition of kindness is the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate. This is what we ideally want for our students. Albert Schweitzer said, “Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.” As artists, it is our responsibility to each other by helping eliminate misunderstanding and get us to be able to talk to one another.

It’s about playing and ideation, challenges and outside the box thinking! It is so much more than sketching and drawing, a perfect way for educators to embrace creativity.

We’ve asked the Creative Sprint team to create a sprint for the month of February specifically for educators with the central theme being, Play, Kindness, and Creativity.

So please join us during the month of February in this opportunity for both you and your students to be able to Play, Be Kind and build creativity.

Sign up using this link to get a prompt for the day from the Creative Sprint Team. https://www.creativesprint.co/atschool

Wishing you a Creative Journey,

Matt & Laura Grundler #TeamGrundler