Sometimes our biggest creative failures reveal what we actually believe about creativity. In my second article in my series I'm calling Routine Creativity, I tell the story of a disastrous California Mission project and how one teacher transformed this epic fail into something that was far more authentic and meaningful for me at the time. This revised project forced me to rethink what it means to be a creative thinker.

Years later, I can see how many of my assumptions were actually common cultural myths: that creativity belongs to certain types of people, requires total freedom, comes from completely original ideas, thrives in chaos, and demands fearless confidence.

It started out as a common classroom project, where we had to build a model of a California mission out of sugar cubes. My finished project was an absolute mess (apparently hot glue guns and sugar cubes are a bad combo) because I deviated from the directions.

But after earning a low score, my teacher crafted a new project that pushed me to use creative constraints.

As he put it, “The project was a bit of a mess and I think you could definitely do better. However, your story was really creative so I gave you a C. If you want to redo the model, you can move this grade up to a B or maybe an A.”

Along the way, I learned some critical lessons about how creativity actually works. So, if you're interested in checking that out, please feel free to read the article.
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About the Blog Series

Throughout this blog series, I want to explore some of the counterintuitive ideas about how creativity works. We’ll see why quantity actually leads to quality and constraints can lead to creative breakthroughs. We’ll explore why structure can lead to freedom and how designing for the marginalized will benefit everyone.

Along the way, I want to push back against some of the lies we’ve been told about creativity. We tend to think creativity requires total freedom, a sudden burst of inspiration, or a big, bold project. But often, creativity grows out of things that seem surprisingly mundane. It comes from habits and routines. It comes from deep knowledge and focused attention. It comes from imitation, experimentation, and even failure.

This is why I’m interested in the idea of routine creativity. Creativity doesn’t have to be an event. It can happen in small moments woven into the learning process. Throughout this blog series, I’ll be exploring small tweaks that can make a big difference and introducing specific routines we can integrate into our pre-existing lessons. These aren’t meant to replace the larger PBL units we already love. Instead, the goal is to make creativity something students practice regularly, so that over time, creative thinking becomes a natural part of how students learn.

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Let's Work Together!

I would love to work with your school, district, or conference! You might be interested in keynotes or workshops on intentional tech integration (including AI), deeper learning, PBL, and empowering students and improving student agency (including student ownership of the assessment process).

I still have limited availability this fall but I still have some spots open. I'd also love to do something more in-depth throughout the school year. My workshops include access to my self-paced courses so participants can continue their professional learning after the day's event.

Please reach out to me at john@spencereducation.com or fill out the form on my speaking page, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible. I can send you a PD catalog with all the details.

Dr. John Spencer

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