[Olpc-socal] Welcome: Crash Course on Creativity

[Caryl Bigenho]

Hi All...
Here's another great chance to experience, first hand, both cooperative learning and project based learning!  Those of us who took the Venture Lab course "Designing A New Learning Environment" found it both challenging and fun. Our team, Unplugged, designed the LocalFi website and are continuing to work on it even as we speak (a figure of speech).
The instructor will let us know more about team formation in the second week. We may be able to do one together or may need to work with people all over the world, which could also be a great experience. For this course, completing any one project will get you a certificate of completion! (Very unusual for a MOOC must be an experiment to increase the completion rates).
Check it out!Caryl

From: info at venture-lab.org
Subject: Welcome: Crash Course on Creativity
To: caryl at laptop.org
Date: Fri, 19 Apr 2013 17:11:19 +0000



  
    
  
  
    
    Hi All,
    

    Welcome to the Crash Course on Creativity. I am delighted that you will be taking part in this experience, and I am looking forward to seeing all of your creative projects. We now have over 14,000 students signed up for the Crash Course on Creativity, and that number is growing daily. Participants come from all over the world! Feel free to invite your friends, family, and colleagues to join us at Crash Course on Creativity.

Class begins on Monday, April 22 and will run for six weeks, until June 2. Before we start, please look at this five-minute video to get a short tour of the course web site and read the information below.

COURSE DETAILS:

Schedule: New lectures and assignments will be posted on Mondays (right after midnight Pacific time), and assignments are due the following Sunday night (before midnight Pacific time).

Assignments: The first two weeks you will have individual assignments; the following three weeks you will have team projects; and the final week you will have an individual assignment. All of the assignments stand alone, so if you miss one assignment, you can pick up again the following week.

Workload: Expect to spend between 1 - 5 hours a week on the course. (Some people spend much more time on the projects.)

Technical Requirements: You will need a computer that allows you to watch the video lectures, and the ability to upload your assignments, which will be images, videos, slides, and text. You will also be required to collaborate with teammates via email, Skype, and other free online tools.

Text Book: I recommend that you get a hold of a copy of inGenius: A Crash Course on Creativity. There are short excerpts from the book on the course web site, and much more material in the book. It is a quick read that will inform and enhance your class experience.

Prerequisites: This is an introductory course designed for anyone, anywhere in the world. There are no prerequisites. It would be helpful to have basic skills taking digital photos, creating slides, presentations, and short videos for your homework submissions. If you don't already have these skills, you can learn them along the way, and get help from your teammates.

Course Content: The course is designed to introduce you to a set of tools for generating new ideas individually and as part of a team, including opportunity identification, reframing problems, connecting and combining ideas, and challenging assumptions. We will also discuss team dynamics, creative communication, and cultures that support creative problem solving.

Teams: You will create your own team during the second week of class, and the first team project takes place during week three. If you choose, you can work by yourself by forming a team of one person. You can work with others who you already know, or you can build a team with people in the class from all over the world. Details about team formation will be sent the second week of class.

Communication: The best way to reach the teaching team is to post a public message on the class Forum. That way everyone will see the answer. If you know the answer to the question, feel free to answer it. In addition, there is an active Facebook group for the course (Crash Course on Creativity)

Evaluation: Because this course focuses on creativity, evaluation of the projects is necessarily subjective. Our goal is to make sure that you get thoughtful feedback on your submissions and to showcase the most creative solutions for each challenge. To do this, the entire class will be involved in providing feedback on the assignments. You will be getting guidance and feedback on your evaluations in order to make sure they are as accurate and constructive as possible. The projects that are the most highly rated will be showcased on the course home page.

Statement of Accomplishment: All those who complete ANY five of the six weeks of assignments will receive a Statement of Accomplishment.



To get your creative juices flowing, here are some video clips from the Stanford Technology Ventures Program's ECorner Collection.

      Changing the World through Innovation, by Stanford President John Hennessy

      Ideas Come from Everywhere, by Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!

      Orbiting the Giant Hairball, by Tom Kelley, Managing Director of IDEO

In case you haven't seen it, here is a talk I gave on my philosophy on teaching creativity.

Looking forward to our adventures together over the coming weeks!

Creativity Rules,
Tina Seelig

    
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