Tuesday, December 9, 2008

1st Grade Creativity

I brought a blue plastic container (it held coffee) from home for students to do a creative thinking exercise. I was planning on doing a SCAMPER activity with my older students using it, but ended up doing a brainstorming activity (that kinda started as a SCAMPER) with my first graders. The longer we brainstormed, the more creative students became with their ideas. I think it worked well for us to do this activity aloud as a group since students got ideas from each other. They constructed knowledge together.

Students started off suggesting that the object could be used for a trash can or a recycling bin (first grade classes are studying recycling right now) and ended up with ideas like attaching a stick to it to make it a hammer or using it to make a clock.

I may have the first grade students type on the blog (learning log) today. I could have them pick one idea and elaborate on it (I will have to explain elaboration . . . I forget that I work with first grade students . . .since I am so used to 4th and 5th graders . . .)

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