Please Pass the Creativity

At the end of last semester, an overwhelming number of my students wrote in an informal evaluation that they really liked two exercises in particular and found them quite helpful. To begin with, they responded well to the revision exercise, handed down by Craig, in which they wrote a brief freewrite, were asked to tear it up, and then had to rewrite it (to emphasize the totality of revision). Also, I apparently used the "Warnec" exercise from previous GAs with great success.

(Essentially, in the Warnec exercise, I told them about a fictional animal-like toy that had certain extreme benefits and drawbacks; for instance, it could be customized with any particular characteristics of appearance and function the owner wanted, but its waste was toxic to the environment, and the animal would occasionally turn on its owner. One half of the class had to argue that the toy should be taken off the market, while the other argued that it should continue to be sold.)

It was interesting to see the creativity and the imaginative solutions that this "game" incited in the students. Those who were for the sale of Warnecs suggested ways around the drawbacks. The created animal could ingest its own waste, thereby eliminating the problem of polluting the environment. Those on the other side imagined further complications the Warnec could introduce to society, based on its known harms. For instance, one student suggested that Warnecs might also be capable of unlimited reproduction and might eventually take over the world, so they should not be sold.

During the "debate," the students' argumentative skills became obvious. When half of the class argued that Warnecs could be chosen with gentle personalities so they would not attack their owners, a classmate on the other side countered with "statistics," that no matter what, 1 in 20 Warnecs turn on their owners.

And they seemed surprised and amused when the word unscrambled to "New Cars" and the "facts" actually applied to new cars.

I really want more of these creative ideas to use in classes, activities that are interesting/entertaining in some way but also relate fairly closely to what I'm teaching--so I don't waste time.

But I feel that I'm not that creative most of the time. I know it's not bad to get ideas from other people, though, and I guess it doesn't matter too much if I wasn't the first teacher to use a certain activity.