Odyssey of the Mind Creativity Camp Penn State Beaver Campus
We recently had the pleasure of working with a great group of students at the Odyssey Creativity Camp at the Beaver Campus of Penn State University. We did two major hands-on activities with the students. Both activities focused on the idea that perception, observation and attention to detail are important elements of successful and creative problem-solving.
Our first activity was the creation of a Fantasy Clayscape. Linda and I laid out a large area of raw clay in slabs that formed an undulating landscape of clay with hills and valleys,
but was basically a blank canvas.
We then had the students brainstorm as to what might be present in this Clayscape,
talking about place, time frame and elements that might be present in this environment.
There were no limits and future, past and present could intermingle.
After this brainstorming session, we talked about all of the elements they came up with and what they looked like and the details that made those objects unique, etc.
We then demonstrated some clay building techniques and we were off to the races.
Here are some images of what their imaginations created.
click on the images to enlarge.
Our first activity was the creation of a Fantasy Clayscape. Linda and I laid out a large area of raw clay in slabs that formed an undulating landscape of clay with hills and valleys,
but was basically a blank canvas.
We then had the students brainstorm as to what might be present in this Clayscape,
talking about place, time frame and elements that might be present in this environment.
There were no limits and future, past and present could intermingle.
After this brainstorming session, we talked about all of the elements they came up with and what they looked like and the details that made those objects unique, etc.
We then demonstrated some clay building techniques and we were off to the races.
Here are some images of what their imaginations created.
click on the images to enlarge.
As a follow-up to building the Fantasy Clayscape, we had the students sit around their creation and write a storyline describing the characters, buildings, creatures and objects
that populated their land.
that populated their land.
Here is a brief description of the Clayscape's content.
The world they created had complete independence from time and place, but had real and imagined elements. To achieve a positive result we stressed that they think about all of the details of shape, texture and scale of each of the objects they created for the Clayscape.
There were kings and queens, aliens, wizards and farmers. There were farms with tractors and the usual farm animals. There were castles with drawbridges and moats replete with alligators. Not once, but twice the land was visited by an alien spacecraft. Critters of all kinds, imagined and real included dragons, dinosaurs, snakes and monsters. The Clayscape had a crooked house, a church, caves, trees, spacecraft, security fences and military defenses.
In an hour-long brainstorming session after the completion of the building of the Clayscape, the students wove together a storyline incorporating all of these disparate elements.
The tale had the Queen in search of her missing King and the misidentification of one of the aliens as the missing king. The dragon flew over the land to investigate the strange goings-on and reported back to the Queen. There was sorcery and evil on the part of the Wizard that the citizens faced down with their resourcefulness. The Wizard had turned himself into a snake with the intent of eating the plump Queen. That mission failed when the snake attempted to devour the Queen and began to choke and died.
The moral of the story was:
be observant, pay attention to details and don't bite off more than you can chew!
Our second activity at the Odyssey of the Mind Creativity Camp was the creation
of a pastel mural.
of a pastel mural.
Through an exercise working with pastels and images of flowers and insects Linda and I worked on honing their observation skills and sharpening their attention to details. Again we believe these are essential components of creativity. They did a great job with their pastels.
Here are some of the results of their efforts.
click on the images to enlarge.
Linda and I would like to thank the people that helped to make this happen.
Bill Nimick, Dana Alvetro, Marian Vendemia, Mike Baker,
Bob & Susan Bardusch, Susan Rosati & Franny McAleer.
Bill Nimick, Dana Alvetro, Marian Vendemia, Mike Baker,
Bob & Susan Bardusch, Susan Rosati & Franny McAleer.
