Teacher Yara

DISCUSS

• What is creativity?
• Is creativity a good thing? Why or why not?
• What are some ways that a person can be creative at?
• What creative activities did you do as a child?
 Teacher Yara

WATCHING A VIDEO

You are going to watch a talk by Marily Oppezzo called Want to be more creative?
Go for a walk from the site TED ideas worth spreading.

1) Before you listen, take a look at these vocabularies that you will hear. Match
them to their meaning on the right:

a) refinement ( ) the quality of being new and unusual

( ) an exercise machine on which you walk without moving
b) brainstorming
forward
( ) to make something by cutting into, especially wood or
c) novelty
stone, or to cut into the surface of stone, wood, etc.
( ) a piece of rope, chain, etc. tied to an animal, especially to
d) carve
a dog, at its collar when taking it for a walk
e) treadmill ( ) a small change that improves something
( ) an activity or business method in which a group of people
f) leash
meet to suggest a lot of new ideas for possible development

2) Now, watch the video and answer the following questions according to it:

a) Marily mentions a test they performed. What should the person do in this
test? What example does she give?

b) What is the definition of creativity given in the video?

c) They performed a test on which “you either did this test and came up with
ideas while you were seated or while you were walking on a treadmill”.
What was the conclusion by the end of the test?

d) What is the key for creativity?

3) What is your opinion on the advice she gives to help people getting more
creative? Would it work for you? Do you have any situation to mention where
you were creative? What helped you?

DISCUSS

• How does self-confidence affect a person's creativity?

• Can someone who initially seems to lack any ability for a certain form of art
develop his creativity and finally come to master it?
• Have you heard of any such case?
• Do you know anyone who is personally an example of this?
 Teacher Yara

• Do you believe that natural genetical features in a human being are absolutely
determinant to their future creativity, or is interaction and engagement into self-
expression and interaction with the world more influential than this? In other
words, do you think creativity comes with time and thought or you are born with
creative talent?
• How does early exposure to
diverse stimuli, and his/her
involvement in creative
activities affect a child's
future creativity?
• How does a person's
standard of living, involving
such things as diet, exposure
to chemical or other forms of
pollution, active versus
sedentary living, different
forms of addiction, or any
other aspects you may think of, affect them biologically regarding their creative
capacities?
• Does the education system in your country encourage creativity? How?
• What are some creative ways to entertain children?
• What are some incentives for creative people in the workplace?
• What is a creative business that you would like to start?
• Is taking a risk part of creativity?
• Do you like to take risks? Give an example
• Who are some of history's most creative people?
• In which professional field do you think people are most creative? e.g science
• Do you often ask questions about the way things work?
• Do you like to improve things?
• Do you often answer questions by explaining how things work?
• Can you think of a device that would make people's life easier?
 Teacher Yara

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

00:13
The creative process -- you know this -- from the first idea to the final product, is a
long process. It's super-iterative, lots of refinement, blood, sweat, tears and
years. And we're not saying you're going to go out for a walk and come back with
the Sistine Chapel in your left hand. So what frame of the creative process did we
focus on? Just this first part. Just brainstorming, coming up with a new idea. We
actually ran four studies with a variety of people. You were either walking indoors or
outdoors. And all of these studies found the same conclusion. I'm only going to tell
you about one of them today.

00:51
One of the tests we used for creativity was alternate uses. In this test, you have four
minutes. Your job is to come up with as many other ways to use common everyday
objects as you can think of. So, for example, what else would you do with a
key, other than to use it for opening up a lock? Clearly, you could use it as a third
eyeball for a giraffe, right? Maybe. That's sort of interesting, kind of new. But is it
creative? So people came up with as many ideas as they could, and we had to
decide: Is this creative or not?

01:24
The definition of creativity that a lot of people go with is "appropriate novelty." For
something to be appropriate, it has to be realistic, so unfortunately, you can't use a
key as an eyeball. Boo! But "novel," the second thing, is that nobody had to have
said it. So for us, it had to be appropriate first, and then for novelty, nobody else in
the entire population that we surveyed could have said it. So you might think you
could use a key to scratch somebody's car, but if somebody else said that, you didn't
get credit for it. Neither of you did. However, only one person said this: "If you were
dying and it were a murder mystery, and you had to carve the name of the murderer
into the ground with your dying words." One person said this.

02:11
(Laughter)

02:12
And it's a creative idea, because it's appropriate and it's novel.

02:16
You either did this test and came up with ideas while you were seated or while you
were walking on a treadmill.

02:22
(Laughter)
 Teacher Yara

02:24
They did the test twice, with different objects. Three groups: the first group sat
first and then sat again for the second test. The second group sat first and then did
the second test while walking on a treadmill. The third group -- and this is interesting
-- they walked on the treadmill first, and then they sat. OK, so the two groups that
sat together for the first test, they looked pretty similar to each other, and they
averaged about 20 creative ideas per person. The group that was walking on the
treadmill did almost twice as well. And they were just walking on a treadmill in a
windowless room. Remember, they took the test twice. The people who sat twice for
that second test didn't get any better; practice didn't help. But these same people
who were sitting and then went on the treadmill got a boost from walking. Here's the
interesting thing. The people who were walking on the treadmill still had a residue
effect of the walking, and they were still creative afterwards. So the implication of
this is that you should go for a walk before your next big meeting and just start
brainstorming right away.

03:34
We have five tips for you that will help make this the best effect possible. First, you
want to pick a problem or a topic to brainstorm. So, this is not the shower
effect, when you're in the shower and all of a sudden, a new idea pops out of the
shampoo bottle. This is something you're thinking about ahead of time. They're
intentionally thinking about brainstorming a different perspective on the walk.

03:58
Secondly -- I get asked this a lot: Is this OK while running? Well, the answer for me
is that if I were running, the only new idea I would have would be to stop running, so
...

04:09
(Laughter)

04:10
But if running for you is a comfortable pace, good. It turns out, whatever physical
activity is not taking a lot of attention. So just walking at a comfortable pace is a good
choice.

04:22
Also, you want to come up with as many ideas as you can. One key of creativity is
to not lock on that first idea. Keep going. Keep coming up with new ones, until you
pick one or two to pursue.

04:35
You might worry that you don't want to write them down, because what if you forget
them? So the idea here is to speak them. Everybody was speaking their new
ideas. So you can put your headphones on and record through your phone and then
 Teacher Yara

just pretend you're having a creative conversation, right? Because the act of writing
your idea down is already a filter. You're going to be like, "Is this good enough to
write down?" And then you write it down. So just speak as many as you can, record
them and think about them later.

05:01
And finally: don't do this forever. Right? If you're on the walk and that idea's not
coming to you, come back to it later at another time.

05:10
I think we're coming up on a break right now, so I have an idea: Why don't you grab
a leash and take your thoughts for a walk?

05:19
Thank you.

05:20
(Applause)

Source:
https://www.ted.com/talks/marily_oppezzo_want_to_be_more_creative_go_for_a_
walk?referrer=playlist-simple_ways_to_spark_your_creativity